Would you have an electric car if you had the money for a new car and were in the market for one?

[Taipan]

VW showroom appeal

When we collected wifey's new Up a couple of years ago it was parked outside in the sunshine, the paintwork was nothing but swirls, she refused to take it. I went for a walk round the showroom with the salesman and the dealership manager, every car in there had fucked paint. Whoever was prepping the cars when they were delivered was cleaning them with a gritty rag in big circular motions. The Up went off to have the paint properly detailed at their expense and with strict instructions they were not to touch it when it came back.

My mate's Son is a fantastic car painter. Produces stunning work on cars, real smooth, mirror finish stuff. But, he said it's really hard to match manufacturer's shit paint jobs, citing BMW and VW as the main culprits!

[Taipan]

Just seen a VW ID.3 in the car park with one of our maintenance was guys talking to the driver. The car is a very basic design, almost like a 80s Escort Popular and not much to be excited about! I asked the young driver what he thought of it and how he was getting along with it. He replied, "I love it. It's electric, really smooth, and is perfect for round London".

Suddenly, I get it. It's like the rise in popularity of scooters, which in London seem to be owned by people with no interest in motorcycling, just a mode of transport. Leccy cars are the same. An environmentally acceptable personal mode of transport for upcoming generations.

But I also came away thinking I could have one of those. I don't need a Tesla, or anything exciting as a daily. That would be perfect. Charge it. Drive it. Service it when needed. Never give a crap about it.

They should have them like Boris bikes or leccy scooters. Who needs to own one. Get in and open the app to pay, and off you go. Extend the scheme countrywide and when the battery gets low, pull into the services and swap it for a charged one. We could all dress like the people from Logans Run too!

[weeksy]

Just seen a VW ID.3 in the car park with one of our maintenance was guys talking to the driver. The car is a very basic design, almost like a 80s Escort Popular and not much to be excited about! I asked the young driver what he thought of it and how he was getting along with it. He replied, "I love it. It's electric, really smooth, and is perfect for round London".

Suddenly, I get it. It's like the rise in popularity of scooters, which in London seem to be owned by people with no interest in motorcycling, just a mode of transport. Leccy cars are the same. An environmentally acceptable personal mode of transport for upcoming generations.

But I also came away thinking I could have one of those. I don't need a Tesla, or anything exciting as a daily. That would be perfect. Charge it. Drive it. Service it when needed. Never give a crap about it.

They should have them like Boris bikes or leccy scooters. Who needs to own one. Get in and open the app to pay, and off you go. Extend the scheme countrywide and when the battery gets low, pull into the services and swap it for a charged one. We could all dress like the people from Logans Run too!

I drove a 21 plate automatic Micra the other day... it cemented my decision that my next car will be an auto.... TBH, this one should have been !

[Taipan]

Just seen a VW ID.3 in the car park with one of our maintenance was guys talking to the driver. The car is a very basic design, almost like a 80s Escort Popular and not much to be excited about! I asked the young driver what he thought of it and how he was getting along with it. He replied, "I love it. It's electric, really smooth, and is perfect for round London".

Suddenly, I get it. It's like the rise in popularity of scooters, which in London seem to be owned by people with no interest in motorcycling, just a mode of transport. Leccy cars are the same. An environmentally acceptable personal mode of transport for upcoming generations.

But I also came away thinking I could have one of those. I don't need a Tesla, or anything exciting as a daily. That would be perfect. Charge it. Drive it. Service it when needed. Never give a crap about it.

They should have them like Boris bikes or leccy scooters. Who needs to own one. Get in and open the app to pay, and off you go. Extend the scheme countrywide and when the battery gets low, pull into the services and swap it for a charged one. We could all dress like the people from Logans Run too!

I drove a 21 plate automatic Micra the other day... it cemented my decision that my next car will be an auto.... TBH, this one should have been !

I hate manual cars. Never liked them tbh. As a young bloke, I was always swanning around in prestige cars as I worked in the trade and nearly all prestige vehicles are autos, so I just got used to them. Dread having to drive a manual car and never really understood the attraction of them. Mind you I'm the same with bikes now!

[Count Steer]

I hated automatic cars...until I bought one, then another one........

Still like driving the Mrs's manual though. Neeeeeoowwwww!

[Taipan]

I always thought flappy paddles would be a total waste of time, but they are brilliant. You don't always need the full monty kickdown, just a quick flick for when you want a bit more oomph, but not full on turbo boost. Surprised at how often I use them, especially on the wifes Cooper S, yet I'd hate to be having to manually shift gear lever to get the same efect.

[Mr. Dazzle]

The one thing I hate about auto's is that it's hard to stop dead smoothly...I don't know why it irritates me so much I always lift off the brakes just as I'm coming to a halt so you don't get that "bounce back" jerk. If you do it in an auto you never stop! Mercedes did actually have a 'soft stop' feature built into their brakes at one point, but AFAIK they've binned that off.

[Mussels]

The one thing I hate about auto's is that it's hard to stop dead smoothly...I don't know why it irritates me so much I always lift off the brakes just as I'm coming to a halt so you don't get that "bounce back" jerk. If you do it in an auto you never stop! Mercedes did actually have a 'soft stop' feature built into their brakes at one point, but AFAIK they've binned that off.

I have been wondering that about the Jag, I thought it was just something to do with the brakes but maybe drive is disconnected just before it stops so where the brakes were working against the engine suddenly they aren't and it jerks to a stop.
I don't remember having that problem in the Jeep that had a similar ZF gearbox, has there been a change to improve emissions at the expense of a smooth ride?

The big reason I dislike the Jag being auto is it doesn't pull away very well, there's a delay between throttle and wheels moving. But again I don't remember the Jeep doing that so maybe it isn't autos I don't like, it's emissions programming.

[slowsider]

The one thing I hate about auto's is that it's hard to stop dead smoothly...I don't know why it irritates me so much I always lift off the brakes just as I'm coming to a halt so you don't get that "bounce back" jerk. If you do it in an auto you never stop! Mercedes did actually have a 'soft stop' feature built into their brakes at one point, but AFAIK they've binned that off.

I have been wondering that about the Jag, I thought it was just something to do with the brakes but maybe drive is disconnected just before it stops so where the brakes were working against the engine suddenly they aren't and it jerks to a stop.
I don't remember having that problem in the Jeep that had a similar ZF gearbox, has there been a change to improve emissions at the expense of a smooth ride?

The big reason I dislike the Jag being auto is it doesn't pull away very well, there's a delay between throttle and wheels moving. But again I don't remember the Jeep doing that so maybe it isn't autos I don't like, it's emissions programming.

Never had that in the XF or Mrs ss's XE.

[Rockburner]

I hated automatic cars...until I bought one, then another one........

Still like driving the Mrs's manual though. Neeeeeoowwwww!

I had a couple of autos when I was recovering from my leg accident (couldn't move my right leg easily so an auto meant I could left foot brake).
An Opal Monza and a VW Scirocco IIRC.

Couldn't wait to get back in a manual once my right leg was strong enough again to swap pedals easily.

[Rockburner]

The one thing I hate about auto's is that it's hard to stop dead smoothly...I don't know why it irritates me so much I always lift off the brakes just as I'm coming to a halt so you don't get that "bounce back" jerk. If you do it in an auto you never stop! Mercedes did actually have a 'soft stop' feature built into their brakes at one point, but AFAIK they've binned that off.

I've never experienced that.

I do hate autos when you floor them and you get that delay whilst it decides what it's doing and then slams down a couple of gears and goes.
Even the Porsche does it in race settings if it's in auto, which I can side-step because I can shift manually using the paddles then floor it so you don't get that clonk, but my truck doesn't have a manual feature so I'm stuck with the clonk.

In the Mustang I hired, you had time to send a telegram message before the thing would 'launch' when you put your foot down.

[Taipan]

The one thing I hate about auto's is that it's hard to stop dead smoothly...I don't know why it irritates me so much I always lift off the brakes just as I'm coming to a halt so you don't get that "bounce back" jerk. If you do it in an auto you never stop! Mercedes did actually have a 'soft stop' feature built into their brakes at one point, but AFAIK they've binned that off.

I've never experienced that.

I do hate autos when you floor them and you get that delay whilst it decides what it's doing and then slams down a couple of gears and goes.
Even the Porsche does it in race settings if it's in auto, which I can side-step because I can shift manually using the paddles then floor it so you don't get that clonk, but my truck doesn't have a manual feature so I'm stuck with the clonk.

Think about that and then how you have to throttle back, push the clutch pedal down, change gear, then release the clutch and apply throttle again. It probably doesn't seem so bad now!

[Mr. Dazzle]

The one thing I hate about auto's is that it's hard to stop dead smoothly...I don't know why it irritates me so much I always lift off the brakes just as I'm coming to a halt so you don't get that "bounce back" jerk. If you do it in an auto you never stop! Mercedes did actually have a 'soft stop' feature built into their brakes at one point, but AFAIK they've binned that off.

I've never experienced that.

I do hate autos when you floor them and you get that delay whilst it decides what it's doing and then slams down a couple of gears and goes.
Even the Porsche does it in race settings if it's in auto, which I can side-step because I can shift manually using the paddles then floor it so you don't get that clonk, but my truck doesn't have a manual feature so I'm stuck with the clonk.

Think about that and then how you have to throttle back, push the clutch pedal down, change gear, then release the clutch and apply throttle again. It probably doesn't seem so bad now!

Sometimes I push the brake pedal at the same time too, get all three

The stopping thing has always been an irrational pet hate of mine I'd say >95% of drivers I've been with do it - or rather don't do it. By "it" I mean let off the brakes gently as you come to a stop so that you don't get a little jerk just as you haul up. If you just hold your foot on the pedal all the way to a stop the car 'bounces' when you actually stop doesn't it?

[Mr. Dazzle]

All the modern Beemers, Jags etc I've driven will let you just tap the flappy paddle/slap the gear stick three times and bang it through three gears no problem. In sports mode the BMWs will bounce off the rev limiter rather than changing up too.

You can't "block shift" of course though. Quite often in my car I'll do 3rd to 6th coming out of roundabouts my wife's old Civic Type R hated going "up/down" on the gearshift when it was cold so you'd often drive it in 2nd, 4th and 6th only in winter.

[Yorick]

Think about that and then how you have to throttle back, push the clutch pedal down, change gear, then release the clutch and apply throttle again. It probably doesn't seem so bad now!

I like smooth and manual means I can change smoothly if I want to knock it down three gears, a fully auto means I just have to floor the pedal and wait.
The PDK is ok because it has three ways to change gear, with the paddles, with the stick or fully auto and you don't need to mess about, so I can be in fully auto and still use the paddles if I want to drop it down a few. I also like the sequential race car style gearstick in the 911 push forward or backwards to change.

In my TT it had a Sport mode. Was always in the right gear with revs high. Loved it.

[Horse]

Mr Dazzle has been saying for ages that big developments in battery tech were imminent. Perhaps this is one?

https://www-thebrighterside-news.cdn.am ... 15-minutes

QuantumScape has announced impressive performance figures for what may be the first commercially viable lithium metal solid state battery. They claim that they can increase the autonomy of an electric car by up to 80%, and it that it can charge from 0 to 80% in just 15 minutes.

By using a solid electrolyte instead of the typical liquid solution, solid-state batteries can store considerably more energy by weight and volume than lithium-ion batteries; but yet, making a battery that is reliable and has a useful life appropriate to any driver's needs - high charge and discharge rates, long service life, and without any temperature or safety concerns - has proven difficult up to now.

[Mr. Dazzle]

Solid State is probably gonna be on the market within 5 years. Lots of the OEMs have prototypes in active development. Mercedes just bought a solid state battery manufacturer and you don't do that unless you plan to use em.

Charged by nuclear fusion generated electricity, naturally.

[Horse]

[Mussels]

That Tesla doesn't meet safety requirements for the power it puts out, it gets kicked out for that rather than being too fast.
The track marshal seems a bit fed up with people turning up to show how quickly their one trick pony covers a short distance so they can put it on YouTube. I can understand that, it's like an F1 team discovering a new type of engine that's in the rules but produces twice the power, it gets boring quickly.

[Mr. Dazzle]

Solid State is probably gonna be on the market within 5 years.

Which means the current crop of cars (until then) will be obsolete and a big negative equity package waiting to drop?

You're a cheery sort, aren't you?

It's not like the supply is suddenly gonna switch over to all Solid State one morning. But yes I expect it'll have an impact. Times are a changin' and there're gonna be shifts.