And because it has the most hideous grille of any car?
I'm tempted to save a lot of money on fuel by buying a Jaguar I-Pace electric car. The only downside is that $120k worth of fuel would keep the S3 going just about forever. Plus if I keep buying toys, I'll never be able to retire.....
On the other hand, he who dies with the most toys wins.
We drive a Tesla, but 'fuel savings' is realistically a delusion at best. When one spends 200k+ on an EV, you're doing it not to save 3-5k on fuel every year. After all, we could just get a comparable ICE vehicle for several grand cheaper and obviate the fuel costs. While the dynamic is constantly shifting (slowly but surely) in favour of EVs, current costs of EVs are still quite prohibitive due to the price of their battery packs, wiping out any fuel savings vs choosing an ICE instead. (So yes, I do appreciate and understand the limitations of EVs as they are - so hope this post overall doesn't come off as waxing lyrical about them).
Probably preaching against the choir (unless you're in the market for an EV), but for us (EV drivers) it's more about
- Never having to visit a servo again (for general re-fuelling) - probably the biggest hidden benefit and time saver that people don't think about when considering EVs over ICEs. Yes, you wait
- No engine maintenance of any sort ever again (oil changes, what are those?)
- Smoke the performance of almost all road legal cars and doing it silently in a 2.2ton 5-seater family sedan (my personal guilty pleasure, and yes as @Quickstatus pointed out, Sydney traffic doesn't allow for the opportunity very often - it's more just knowing it's possible should I ever want to, and as a technical demonstration that EVs aren't sloths)
- Massive amount of storage - almost 900L including the front trunk. There are people who literally drive their Teslas around the US and sleep in the back as it fits a Q-sized bed with the back seats folded down.
Naturally, for any long road trip where there's no charging infrastructure, ICEs have it down pat. Different use case however.
Wow. 14c off peak electricity. Where do you get that?
Electric cars at that price level make zero economic sense, and only a little driving sense. I guess it's a case of economy at any price. Plus there is little to zero charging infrastructure in Oz, and they become very difficult to use.
Nevertheless, the Jag I-Pace is a very interesting vehicle. Now, if they'd just put a 215 kw turbo 4 into it....
As an actual Tesla driver on these forums, I would not go so far as to say 'zero economic sense' - such a superlative literally does not hold for the 200k+ Teslas (and that's just Tesla EVs!) driving around the streets of the world. Of course, I could be misinterpreting what you mean, so happy for that to be expanded on
There isn't much charging infrastructure in Oz, that is true - relative to the states. However, I'm already able to do a full road trip from ADL to BNE should I wish to. Superchargers are set up specifically to allow these kinds of runs. Gosford, Orange, Bathurst, CBR, etc. all have similar provisions. Destination charging (chargers installed at key venues) also go to great lengths to lessen 'range anxiety'. As for 'difficult to use', I really don't know where you're coming from there - it's literally a case of touching our car's charge port, it flipping open automatically, and plugging in the fat supercharging cable.
Also...why would you want to put a turbo into an EV? Does that not defeat the point?
