Have any of you got all electric cars? Pros and cons please.

Mamie
The reason EVs are going to reach these sales is down to the Chinese. 58% drive one.
My son in law manages the largest dealership in the uk of a certain German car brand. His EV sales are approximately 7in 100.

I don't live in the UK, but out of interest where are the problem areas for charging now?
I'm down in Cornwall on holiday at the moment and had thought it might be a problem here. I've been keeping my eyes open for future reference, and have seen charging points in random places like craft shops/cafés. Maybe things are looking up!

Prices are coming down all the time and certainly here in France there is a lot of financial and practical support for people making the change. Is that because in France you have all the necessary infrastructure in place due to your investment in nuclear Mamie?

*it not vit

I think if Boris' ban on new petrol or diesel cars were still in place for 2030vit would be a no-brainer for me. I would buy electric to be ahead of the game. As that has been pushed back by Sunak it kind of gives me longer to dither as I could buy a new petrol now and then an electric in 5 or 6 years time to see me out.

This if from the link on the previous page Grantanow.
"Electric and plug-in hybrid car sales will jump to a new global record in 2024 despite slowing growth in some markets, according to forecasts from the influential International Energy Agency (IEA).
The Paris-based forecaster said that 17m battery electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles will be sold in 2024, up more than 20% compared with 2023.
The IEA also said most electric cars will cost the same as petrol equivalents by 2030 as prices drop. "
I don't live in the UK, but out of interest where are the problem areas for charging now? I had the impression from UK EV forums that things had improved a lot over the last year, especially on major roads. Is the problem with destination chargers?

If the government really wanted us to buy EVs they would ensure an adequate charging network throughout the UK ( as in Norway) and find ways of bringing the EV prices down to be similar to petrol cars.

Aveline

I'm not insulting EV owners just giving another side to the discussion.

...That people who have them and like them are suffering from cognitive dissonance?
Hmm...
This is interesting though.
www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/apr/23/electric-and-hybrid-car-sales-to-rise-to-new-global-record-in-2024#:~:text=The%20Paris%2Dbased%20forecaster%20said,by%202030%20as%20prices%20drop

I'm not insulting EV owners just giving another side to the discussion.

I guess that is why people with current experience of EVs are reluctant to post Aveline. No we are not suffering from cognitive dissonance. We have a lease car, which is extremely economic to run and a joy to drive. Our daughter has hers for business and personal use and is also very happy with it.
Even if there were disadvantages (which we have yet to experience) we would still consider it worthwhile for the end result of improving the air our grandchildren breathe.
I fully understand that people are unable to afford new cars and hope that the UK government gets round to providing the support we have here.
But please don't insult people who have made reasoned choices and are prepared to share their experiences.

Interesting Aveline.

That's lovely that you're happy with your electric cars. Of course propaganda goes both ways. Cognitive dissonance has a great effect too. If you've invested a lot of money in an electric car you're bound to have to find that it's terrific. I have met several previous owners who have given up on theirs. They were a bit sheepish.

karmalady

If you ran out of charge on a quiet lane, you could not ask a passing motorist to bring a gallon of petrol to get you to the nearest garage

I never ran out of petrol/diesel when I drove one, and will not run out or charge in our ev because we plan our journeys. Have had a lovely little BMW I3S for just over a year, and would never go back to an ice (internal combustion engine) car.
On longer journeys we use the Sat nav, which will always come up with a warning message well in advance if there is not enough range to complete your journey. It will give a list of all the places with fast charging that you could use. In the year that we have owned it, there has been a huge increase in the number of chargers put in around the country and we do a fair bit of travelling. Apart from very remote areas eg Highlands of Scotland, where I assume there aren't too many petrol stations either, there are chargers in supermarket carparks and many other public areas.
We are happy that we are not polluting the environment and hopefully the air will be cleaner in the coming years for our grandchildren and future generations.
By the way, we bought a used car, low mileage and couldn't be happier with it.

Urmstongran

^Trying to keep this near the top in the hope of some responses.^
I’m amazed there are no EV owners on this group.

I’m not. They are prohibitively expensive and a replacement battery costs upwards of £4k I believe. We certainly couldn’t afford one and not one of our family, friends or neighbours has one.

Perhaps we are all just in a different financial bracket to many on here!

But we have responded. At length and with personal experience and up-to-date information.
It doesn't seem to matter how much we post, people still quote outdated "evidence" from dubious sources, propaganda from the fossil fuel industries and stories from a friend of a friend.
Some of the stuff posted was true a few years ago, but is not now. Battery technology is constantly evolving.
Prices are coming down all the time and certainly here in France there is a lot of financial and practical support for people making the change.

I personally don’t like them as can’t hear them.. and they always seem to have bright headlights on 🤫

Car batteries are recycled and mostly re-purposed Urm. Solar is one use.
MOnika we lease our car for the equivalent of about £250 a month. No service bills, tyres replaced and repairs covered. It costs us about 20€ a month in electricity.
What I find amazing is that there is a long thread without talking about the quality of air our grandchildren breathe. That was the main reason we chose electric.

Something else to consider.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impacts_of_lithium-ion_batteries#:~:text=the%20lithium%20production.-,Disposal,disposal%20of%20lithium%2Dion%20batteries

We have a hybrid and find the petrol usage very low especially on long journeys. It is a joy to drive and we are not worried about running out of charge.

Our 18y old little Peugeot has never needed a new engine. 😊

Batteries are expensive but all are guaranteed for 100, 000 miles and plenty are lasting much longer, find a petrol car that guarantees its engine for that long. Replacing an engine is far more expensive an ordinary petrol engine costs £10,000 to replace, many diesels double that

Urmstongran

^Trying to keep this near the top in the hope of some responses.^
I’m amazed there are no EV owners on this group.

I’m not. They are prohibitively expensive and a replacement battery costs upwards of £4k I believe. We certainly couldn’t afford one and not one of our family, friends or neighbours has one.

Perhaps we are all just in a different financial bracket to many on here!

There are lots with EVs posting including myself, currently Teslas are very competitively priced as are some Chinese brands -BYD and MG, EVs probably are heavier on average but don’t believe scare stories, passenger cars don’t damage roads it’s the heavy trucks that do that, roads have to be built for the trucks not cars.

Trying to keep this near the top in the hope of some responses.
I’m amazed there are no EV owners on this group.

I’m not. They are prohibitively expensive and a replacement battery costs upwards of £4k I believe. We certainly couldn’t afford one and not one of our family, friends or neighbours has one.

Perhaps we are all just in a different financial bracket to many on here!

The problem is, Mamie, in this house hold we rarely buy cars less than 10 years old. We seem thm as disposables, run into the ground then scrapped.

We could afford more expensive cars if we wanted to, but cannot be bothered, we have other spending priorities. However many people cannot afford to spend huge amounts on cars and they are the ones that can least afford to replace a battery, if needed.

I am not opposed to electric cars, but they are not the answer to our transport prayers.it is a lot more complicated.

I have a small EV and a home charger. We just use it for short journeys and city driving my son had a Kia EV which has a range of some 300 miles. He’s done several journeys to the south of France in it.

I watched a documentary of EV's vs petrol/diesel powered cars. It was fantastic for short journeys but horrific for long journeys as the people testing the theory could not find enough charging points at service stations etc as people were queueing to use them or they were out of service. It said that the journey took him much longer to get back to where he had started from. They said it was not that it took longer to get back home that was the problem it was the queing, and the stress of hoping they had enough charge left to get to the next service station. I think you have the right idea, an EV for short journeys and a petrol/diesel vehicle for long journeys until they get it right.