12 ms·

I feel like rental cars are one of the worst places for the current generation of EVs. This was my recent experience. I was offered an EV car as a rental upgr

by kirse 3y ago

I feel like rental cars are one of the worst places for the current generation of EVs. This was my recent experience. I was offered an EV car as a rental upgrade in a major city because the local rental place didn't have an EV charger. I figured what the hell because it was a relaxed holiday vacation. Turns out that was a hilariously bad idea. Ended up spending at least 5-6 hours of my week vacation trying to avoid the EV going to 0% battery. Half of that time was spent on Google Maps - trying to find chargers with the right plug, ones that aren't broken, ones that were available, downloading various apps, etc. Then when I did find a charger I sat in the parking lot waiting for it to juice up. All of that effort and I still could only give myself the miles back that I spent finding chargers, it was even funnier when the cold weather took miles away. Finally ended up luckily finding one at a local movie theater and asked family to shuttle me back and forth because of how long it took to charge. Not a knock on EV's really, mostly the charging infrastructure and the rental experience.

kbos87 3y ago
I'm sorry that happened to you. I can say that having an EV in a place you know and as part of a familiar routine is a very different experience.
- computershit 3y ago
  As long as you live where you can place your own charger. I've ridden with countless Uber drivers who rent EVs from Uber whose experience would disagree with such a blanket statement.
  - bigshot 3y ago
    Uber drivers are not representational of all drivers
paganel 3y ago
It is a knock on EVs as longs as the missing/lacking/very deficient charging infrastructure is what literally makes the EVs work or fail. No suitable (and fast) charging means EVs are meant to fail, and deservedly so.
- xwolfi 3y ago
  Yeah but petrol cars weren't serviced as well as now when they started (arguably with a much longer range per much faster "charge", maybe). EVs are probably going to be a good idea, it'll just take time. Imagine in 1995 saying emails will never replace sending around documents at the office, just because there wasn't any infra yet. Wait a bit, or even help !
  - fsckboy 3y ago
    today, i consider email to be a failure, Imagine saying that in 1995. I rarely get them or have a need to send them which amplifies the spam ratio. It annoys me to get and send pdfs in text messages, but that seems to be how the world works now.
    - pbourke 3y ago
      > It annoys me to get and send pdfs in text messages, but that seems to be how the world works now. Do you mean PDFs for correspondence such as bills or invoices? That is not common for me.
      - fsckboy 3y ago
        mostly referring to pdfs to fill out and "e signature", my assistant sends them to me all the time.
    - bluGill 3y ago
      In 1995 email was very common, but it was always a propriatory system that only could be used in your office. Very little was connected to an outside network.
      - ghaff 3y ago
        We had an email system starting before I joined in the mid-80s (a product we made called CEO) but it was purely internal until well into the 90s. I'm not sure exactly when most people had some form of interoperable email but it was well into the dot-com era. I still use email pretty frequently even if communications are at least somewhat fragmented across SMS, Facebook, Slack, etc.
tuatoru 3y ago
> ... trying to find chargers with the right plug, ones that aren't broken, ones that were available, downloading various apps, etc. Then when I did find a charger I sat in the parking lot waiting for it to juice up. These considerations are why I think we'll eventually move to battery swapping, when the market is mature enough to have standards for batteries. When there are as many battery swapping stations as there are gas stations now, the problem will be greatly diminished.
- theptip 3y ago
  With enough market penetration you just plug in to the nearest street light. https://www.evstreetcharge.co.uk/ https://www.evstreetcharge.co.uk/
  - robaato 3y ago
    We have them locally - but parking is generally not easy - so getting to chargers isn't either...
- chrisbolt 3y ago
  The market is mature enough to have standards for charging, but is nowhere near being mature for battery swaps. The charging problem will be solved long before battery swaps get close to being a thing, especially with the recent convergence on NACS.
  - b112 3y ago
    Which is why h2 is the answer. h2 that is shown to work, regardless of all the hyperbole and reckless claims battery fans make.
    - klodolph 3y ago
      Just need to solve that pesky little storage problem and it will all be coming up roses…
huytersd 3y ago
Hopefully everyone converges on NACS and the weird charger issues go away. It would be a pain to have to go to specific gas stations for different car models if they had different nozzle sizes for different models for instance.
rdtsc 3y ago
> Not a knock on EV's really, mostly the charging infrastructure and the rental experience. But why not knock on them? They had a lot of promise and a lot of hype when they were being touted as simpler and cheaper and just overall better. Somehow they ended up being more expensive, unless we're talking about Chinese brands, more costly to insure, a longer time to charge than a corresponding IC car and incompatible charging networks. I think they can handle a bit of criticism, it's a big industry, and it can deal with some minor criticism from an orange hacker forum.
- hiddencost 3y ago
  I think you're confused. The future predictions that you all listed are right. No one promised them to you this year. The subsidies exist to support the market until the market can support itself. Taking on those kinds of costs is one one of the intrinsic functions (and reasons to exist) of a government. There were certainly mistakes (e.g., not supervising VW properly when they went full DGAF on the electricify america rollout). The parent is saying they still believe in the analysis that electric will work, they just spent their whole comment criticizing their EV experience.
- starbugs 3y ago
  > Somehow they ended up being more expensive, unless we're talking about Chinese brands The Chinese brands' pricing seems to be at least in part due to subsidies: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsid... At least that's what the EU says. > But why not knock on them? I would agree that the discussion on EVs is a bit misguided in general. It always is EVs or ICE cars and EVs must be the winner otherwise you are "confused" or "out of your mind". In reality, both can coexist and have a place for what they are really good at.
  - Sebb767 3y ago
    From your link: > The anti-subsidy investigation covers battery-powered cars from China, so also includes non-Chinese brands made there, such as Tesla (TSLA.O), Renault (RENA.PA) and BMW (BMWG.DE). It is also unusual in that it is brought by the European Commission itself, rather than in response to an industry complaint. This does seem like more of a political play rather than China actually trying to flood western markets, especially considering that western EV producers are also being subsidized and that the Chinese domestic market is sufficiently large by itself.
alibarber 3y ago
Yeah - I was getting excited about having booked an EV for my Christmas holiday visiting family in the UK (with Hertz). Fortunately researching charging knocked some sense into me and I switched back to a ICE vehicle. - Even though I was staying in their house there was no way I could charge it without buying an expensive cable, or risking some cheap crap from Amazon (blow up the house or the rental car perhaps?) - Every damn thing needs an app (and an account and registration - fun if you don't actually live in the country in question). Seriously just put up a charger and a contactless payment reader. Imagine if every petrol pump needed an app to start? May as well go back to having to put pound coins in a meter... - Oh and it was expensive anyway at 85p/KWh at public recharging points. So 78kWh * 0.85 = 66GBP ($84) per charge, say 230 miles to be generous. I gave the petrol rental back with 600 miles extra on the clock and put a bit over 50 quid in petrol in it.
- bb123 3y ago
  > Every damn thing needs an app (and an account and registration - fun if you don't actually live in the country in question). Seriously just put up a charger and a contactless payment reader. Imagine if every petrol pump needed an app to start? May as well go back to having to put pound coins in a meter... This actually isn't true. It is law in the UK that every public charger must have a contactless reader on it. Many of them have apps but you don't need to use them. Your point about the price is very valid though. With the exception of Tesla Superchargers they are extremely expensive. For some reason Supercharger prices range from 12-35p. The Supercharger network in the UK is pretty good, but driving anything other than a Tesla is a nightmare.
  - jasoncartwright 3y ago
    I think your knowledge may be a little out of date. I charge my (non-Tesla) EV at Tesla Superchargers and pay 30p/kWh at the excellent Ionity (350kW!) chargers.
    - toyg 3y ago
      There is exactly one Ionity charger for the whole of Greater Manchester, with the other nearest ones being more than an hour drive in two directions. Not a realistic suggestion for anyone not living in London.

by kirse 3y ago

kbos87 3y ago

I'm sorry that happened to you. I can say that having an EV in a place you know and as part of a familiar routine is a very different experience.

computershit 3y ago
As long as you live where you can place your own charger. I've ridden with countless Uber drivers who rent EVs from Uber whose experience would disagree with such a blanket statement.
- bigshot 3y ago
  Uber drivers are not representational of all drivers

paganel 3y ago

It is a knock on EVs as longs as the missing/lacking/very deficient charging infrastructure is what literally makes the EVs work or fail. No suitable (and fast) charging means EVs are meant to fail, and deservedly so.

xwolfi 3y ago
Yeah but petrol cars weren't serviced as well as now when they started (arguably with a much longer range per much faster "charge", maybe). EVs are probably going to be a good idea, it'll just take time. Imagine in 1995 saying emails will never replace sending around documents at the office, just because there wasn't any infra yet. Wait a bit, or even help !
- fsckboy 3y ago
  today, i consider email to be a failure, Imagine saying that in 1995. I rarely get them or have a need to send them which amplifies the spam ratio. It annoys me to get and send pdfs in text messages, but that seems to be how the world works now.
  - pbourke 3y ago
    > It annoys me to get and send pdfs in text messages, but that seems to be how the world works now. Do you mean PDFs for correspondence such as bills or invoices? That is not common for me.
    - fsckboy 3y ago
      mostly referring to pdfs to fill out and "e signature", my assistant sends them to me all the time.
  - bluGill 3y ago
    In 1995 email was very common, but it was always a propriatory system that only could be used in your office. Very little was connected to an outside network.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      We had an email system starting before I joined in the mid-80s (a product we made called CEO) but it was purely internal until well into the 90s. I'm not sure exactly when most people had some form of interoperable email but it was well into the dot-com era. I still use email pretty frequently even if communications are at least somewhat fragmented across SMS, Facebook, Slack, etc.

tuatoru 3y ago

> ... trying to find chargers with the right plug, ones that aren't broken, ones that were available, downloading various apps, etc. Then when I did find a charger I sat in the parking lot waiting for it to juice up. These considerations are why I think we'll eventually move to battery swapping, when the market is mature enough to have standards for batteries. When there are as many battery swapping stations as there are gas stations now, the problem will be greatly diminished.

theptip 3y ago
With enough market penetration you just plug in to the nearest street light. https://www.evstreetcharge.co.uk/ https://www.evstreetcharge.co.uk/
- robaato 3y ago
  We have them locally - but parking is generally not easy - so getting to chargers isn't either...
chrisbolt 3y ago
The market is mature enough to have standards for charging, but is nowhere near being mature for battery swaps. The charging problem will be solved long before battery swaps get close to being a thing, especially with the recent convergence on NACS.
- b112 3y ago
  Which is why h2 is the answer. h2 that is shown to work, regardless of all the hyperbole and reckless claims battery fans make.
  - klodolph 3y ago
    Just need to solve that pesky little storage problem and it will all be coming up roses…

huytersd 3y ago

Hopefully everyone converges on NACS and the weird charger issues go away. It would be a pain to have to go to specific gas stations for different car models if they had different nozzle sizes for different models for instance.

rdtsc 3y ago

> Not a knock on EV's really, mostly the charging infrastructure and the rental experience. But why not knock on them? They had a lot of promise and a lot of hype when they were being touted as simpler and cheaper and just overall better. Somehow they ended up being more expensive, unless we're talking about Chinese brands, more costly to insure, a longer time to charge than a corresponding IC car and incompatible charging networks. I think they can handle a bit of criticism, it's a big industry, and it can deal with some minor criticism from an orange hacker forum.

hiddencost 3y ago
I think you're confused. The future predictions that you all listed are right. No one promised them to you this year. The subsidies exist to support the market until the market can support itself. Taking on those kinds of costs is one one of the intrinsic functions (and reasons to exist) of a government. There were certainly mistakes (e.g., not supervising VW properly when they went full DGAF on the electricify america rollout). The parent is saying they still believe in the analysis that electric will work, they just spent their whole comment criticizing their EV experience.
starbugs 3y ago
> Somehow they ended up being more expensive, unless we're talking about Chinese brands The Chinese brands' pricing seems to be at least in part due to subsidies: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsid... At least that's what the EU says. > But why not knock on them? I would agree that the discussion on EVs is a bit misguided in general. It always is EVs or ICE cars and EVs must be the winner otherwise you are "confused" or "out of your mind". In reality, both can coexist and have a place for what they are really good at.
- Sebb767 3y ago
  From your link: > The anti-subsidy investigation covers battery-powered cars from China, so also includes non-Chinese brands made there, such as Tesla (TSLA.O), Renault (RENA.PA) and BMW (BMWG.DE). It is also unusual in that it is brought by the European Commission itself, rather than in response to an industry complaint. This does seem like more of a political play rather than China actually trying to flood western markets, especially considering that western EV producers are also being subsidized and that the Chinese domestic market is sufficiently large by itself.

alibarber 3y ago

Yeah - I was getting excited about having booked an EV for my Christmas holiday visiting family in the UK (with Hertz). Fortunately researching charging knocked some sense into me and I switched back to a ICE vehicle. - Even though I was staying in their house there was no way I could charge it without buying an expensive cable, or risking some cheap crap from Amazon (blow up the house or the rental car perhaps?) - Every damn thing needs an app (and an account and registration - fun if you don't actually live in the country in question). Seriously just put up a charger and a contactless payment reader. Imagine if every petrol pump needed an app to start? May as well go back to having to put pound coins in a meter... - Oh and it was expensive anyway at 85p/KWh at public recharging points. So 78kWh * 0.85 = 66GBP ($84) per charge, say 230 miles to be generous. I gave the petrol rental back with 600 miles extra on the clock and put a bit over 50 quid in petrol in it.

bb123 3y ago
> Every damn thing needs an app (and an account and registration - fun if you don't actually live in the country in question). Seriously just put up a charger and a contactless payment reader. Imagine if every petrol pump needed an app to start? May as well go back to having to put pound coins in a meter... This actually isn't true. It is law in the UK that every public charger must have a contactless reader on it. Many of them have apps but you don't need to use them. Your point about the price is very valid though. With the exception of Tesla Superchargers they are extremely expensive. For some reason Supercharger prices range from 12-35p. The Supercharger network in the UK is pretty good, but driving anything other than a Tesla is a nightmare.
- jasoncartwright 3y ago
  I think your knowledge may be a little out of date. I charge my (non-Tesla) EV at Tesla Superchargers and pay 30p/kWh at the excellent Ionity (350kW!) chargers.
  - toyg 3y ago
    There is exactly one Ionity charger for the whole of Greater Manchester, with the other nearest ones being more than an hour drive in two directions. Not a realistic suggestion for anyone not living in London.