Fuel panic!

[wharfhouse]

6 minutes ago, Boxbrownie said:

There is no “jerkiness” in modern automatic transmissions, seriously that’s 40 year old (poor) technology your talking about.

 

I get it, you love your e-cvt, end of.

Agreed I was more referring to manual transmissions with the jerkiness word - but there is still a stepped power curve in traditional autoboxes during acceleration regardless of DSG etc - they are not totally seamless and therefore don't work at maximum efficiency. The e-cvt is an engineering answer that is incredibly simple and elegant - but people being people don't always choose with the head but sometimes the heart. And of course nothing wrong in that - keeps innovation flowing and interest in society.

[Malc]

and the price of petrol here is still at usuary rates from all suppliers in my part of Kent ............  thieves the lot of 'em  .....  especially the SUPERMARKETS

shop at Aldi and Lidl I say coz they have never ripped us off witth petrol prices  

Malc

[Mr Vlad]

What the hells going on with Jerky shifts? If someone is experiencing jerky gear shifts it's down to two things. 1 gearbox gone. 2 the person just can't drive. Its that simple.

The 7.5ton Isuzu I unfortunately drive sometimes is utter utter expletive expletive. That jerks and its an auto box. Superglide I think it's called. Ruddy expletive more like.

The 7.2 ton Iveco is manual and I  shift gears seamless and with no loss of momentum. 

My is250 shifts gear 98% seamless and definitely no loss of momentum. 

Thise of you who have witnessed the vehicle next to you slow down with each gear change have witnessed a expletive who can't drive. 

I know sod all about ecvt so I can't comment. 

is300h is one helluva car and with a full traction Battery gets off the line oh so swiftly and when I had mine no one kept up from a standing start. Oh and it most definitely is a drivers car. Handles sublimely.

Back to petrol prices. Blimey I took a detour back to my base and I passed an Esso station where I noticed unleaded was 182.9 and crikey a queue of about 1/8 mile. Just how many folk are just plain stupid? Why queue for fuel is beyond me. 

 

[First_Lexus]

£1.79.8 for petrol at BP in Calcot, Reading this afternoon. Sign of the times that I was excited by the slight drop in price!

[wharfhouse]

1 minute ago, First_Lexus said:

£1.79.8 for petrol at BP in Calcot, Reading this afternoon. Sign of the times that I was excited by the slight drop in price!

Did you see what Sainsbury’s was as it had crept lower than BP again and was £183.9 last I looked when BP was £185.9 

[dutchie01]

For all young readers out there this granddad had a DAF 44 a forty something years ago. The image of these cars was not too good, senior citizens and so on. Guess what it had a CVT gearbox connected to a 2 cylinder engine. I only drove it full throttle with the engine screaming at max revs until inevitably it blew up. It was a weird sensation then as it is now. The revs climb until a certain rpm stay there with the noise staying thesame but the car accelerates.

forty years on the debate is still on and the majority of drivers do not like it just like the good old days. I really wonder if Toyota/Lexus did not stick to the CVT/ECVT what would have happened. IS300H with a normal 8 speed auto? NX?  would the cars be more popular? I personally do think so....

[First_Lexus]

29 minutes ago, wharfhouse said:

Did you see what Sainsbury’s was as it had crept lower than BP again and was £183.9 last I looked when BP was £185.9 

Afraid I didn’t see - I was headed towards the M4 so couldn’t see the Sainsbury price.

Will be driving past in the morning so will have a look then and report back!

[Mincey]

5 hours ago, Thackeray said:

However, what I don't understand is why the people who want the jolt and drop in revs in a car don't demand the same in a jet plane or a power boat, or an electric powered train, come to that. Can anyone explain why people don't demand the same lack of smoothness in these other forms of transport?

I've always thought the best bit of flying is the take off. Sitting at the end of the runway waiting for the plane to start moving and the whooooooossssshwaheeeeeeyyyywooooooooooooo when the pilot gives it some welly and you all go hurtling along and upwards into the wild blue yonder. I love it. Not quite so keen on landings when they hit the brakes and reverse thrust so hard that you feel like the lap strap is going to cut you in half.

[Mr Vlad]

Oh Bernard you just jolted a great memory. I had a go in a DAF 44 with the CVT. What a scream it was. It belonged to a stone haulier that delivered to me when I was a concrete batcher 30 sommat years ago. I thought it was the nuts but he kept it running for nearly a couple of decades. 

As for the screaming of an engine on a CVT car. I'd imagine one or two cars actually wouldn't like their engines on full throttle for half a minute or so. Some other cars engines would love it. The is300h in particular is such an engine. I drove mine hard and it loved it. It was surprisingly quiet when on full chat. Other cars are loud and clattery by comparison. 

[First_Lexus]

On 7/22/2022 at 6:39 PM, wharfhouse said:

Did you see what Sainsbury’s was as it had crept lower than BP again and was £183.9 last I looked when BP was £185.9 

Only ended up going past today - Sainsbury is £182.9 for unleaded. BP was £179.9, so I filled up there.

What is odd is that BP in Aldermaston, which I drove past yesterday, was still at £1.95 for unleaded!

[wharfhouse]

12 minutes ago, First_Lexus said:

Only ended up going past today - Sainsbury is £182.9 for unleaded. BP was £179.9, so I filled up there.

What is odd is that BP in Aldermaston, which I drove past yesterday, was still at £1.95 for unleaded!

Thanks for the update - very interesting and looks like BP and Sainsbury’s may be finally driving each other down. You're right about the BP in Aldermaston - ridiculous price - same down in Tadley - 10p+ a litre difference for a few miles... 

[Malc]

local Texaco in Sittingbourne Kent today was 181.9p   for unleaded   

Mmalc

[dutchie01]

Euro 2.29/ltr for 95 today down from 2.51. like before around 75% is taxes ( Netherlands)

[flotsam]

There's no second hand market for EV cars. One family recently bought a Ford Focus EV, only to get a warning light and then they discovered Ford no longer supply a replacement Battery. This is why Musk was talking about a million mile Battery, which would last as long as the car.

Even if you could get a Battery small enough and light enough for heavy trucks, there's no way you could get huge amounts of electricity into the Battery without it exploding. That's why they've just announced a hydrogen refuelling station on the M6 will be built.

[Malc]

13 hours ago, dutchie01 said:

Euro 2.29/ltr for 95 today down from 2.51. like before around 75% is taxes ( Netherlands)

nearly a 10% collapse in the price ( and their usuary profit margin no doubt impacted )

[Boxbrownie]

42 minutes ago, flotsam said:

There's no second hand market for EV cars. One family recently bought a Ford Focus EV, only to get a warning light and then they discovered Ford no longer supply a replacement battery. This is why Musk was talking about a million mile battery, which would last as long as the car.

Even if you could get a battery small enough and light enough for heavy trucks, there's no way you could get huge amounts of electricity into the battery without it exploding. That's why they've just announced a hydrogen refuelling station on the M6 will be built.

Is that why the secondhand market for EVs is climbing in price every day?

 

Your using a single anecdote from experience from where I have no,idea, it certainly wasn’t the U.K. as of the 20 or so none were sold to the public in the U.K., just supplied to dealers for demos, only 61 I think were registered in mainland Europe and it primary market in the US just a few thousand were supplied before being halted.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/may/10/uk-sales-of-secondhand-electric-cars-more-than-double-in-a-year

[Mr Vlad]

Re the Ford Focus EV. I use to see one regularly some years back. Reviews weren't good for it. I also saw them in Ford showrooms. So whoever said they weren't available for Joe public were totally wrong. 

Very interesting news on a hydrogen filling station on the M6.

As for an electric large truck. Some laws would need to be changed allowing much much heavier trucks on the road. 

[Bluemarlin]

The Ford Focus story was from the US. Such incidents aside, I woud imagine the used EV market will be very busy. A lot will depend on both third party repairers, and the manufacturers, but currently people seem to have little fears over buying 10yr+ Toyota/Lexus hybrids, despite the potential for expensive Battery or inverter failures.

As for electric trucks, amazon are running 37 ton DAF electric HGV's in the UK.

https://www.aboutamazon.co.uk/news/sustainability/amazon-unveils-first-ever-fully-electric-heavy-goods-vehicles-in-its-uk-fleet

[Boxbrownie]

5 hours ago, Mr Vlad said:

Re the Ford Focus EV. I use to see one regularly some years back. Reviews weren't good for it. I also saw them in Ford showrooms. So whoever said they weren't available for Joe public were totally wrong. 

Very interesting news on a hydrogen filling station on the M6.

As for an electric large truck. Some laws would need to be changed allowing much much heavier trucks on the road. 

You might have seen one of the dealer demos, they were never sold to the public in the UK , there are two registered presently and the other seventeen are stored by FMC on SORN.

 

I know of none which were ever sold publicly.

 

My mate where I worked was the chief development engineer on the programme, the development was taken away from Ford  U.K. (and him) and transferred to Ford US way back in the early noughties.

[Boxbrownie]

3 hours ago, Bluemarlin said:

The Ford Focus story was from the US. Such incidents aside, I woud imagine the used EV market will be very busy. A lot will depend on both third party repairers, and the manufacturers, but currently people seem to have little fears over buying 10yr+ Toyota/Lexus hybrids, despite the potential for expensive battery or inverter failures.

As for electric trucks, Amazon are running 37 ton DAF electric HGV's in the UK.

https://www.aboutamazon.co.uk/news/sustainability/amazon-unveils-first-ever-fully-electric-heavy-goods-vehicles-in-its-uk-fleet

Don’t spoil a good yarn with facts! 🤣

[First_Lexus]

8 hours ago, flotsam said:

There's no second hand market for EV cars. One family recently bought a Ford Focus EV, only to get a warning light and then they discovered Ford no longer supply a replacement battery. This is why Musk was talking about a million mile battery, which would last as long as the car.

Even if you could get a battery small enough and light enough for heavy trucks, there's no way you could get huge amounts of electricity into the battery without it exploding. That's why they've just announced a hydrogen refuelling station on the M6 will be built.

The market for used EVs seems to be pretty strong from where I’m sitting.

Autotrader bought a cheap Nissan Leaf and did a series of videos about it. All that had happened was the range had reduced on maximum charge.

As time goes on, either specialists will appear who can recondition/replace batteries at a reasonable cost and/or manufacturers will develop longer lasting and more reliable Battery technology.

Maybe hydrogen will also have a part to play in the future, maybe not. Time will tell. For areas of the planet that are more remote or that require longer distances - parts of South America, Africa, even Australia and the US - I would think there will need to be something other than the EV solution we see now. 
 

 

[ganzoom]

18 hours ago, flotsam said:

There's no second hand market for EV cars. One family recently bought a Ford Focus EV, only to get a warning light and then they discovered Ford no longer supply a replacement battery. This is why Musk was talking about a million mile battery, which would last as long as the car.

Tesla will sell and supply+fit a refurbished old Battery in any of their older out of warranty (8 years+ old) cars for £10k, a brand new 90kWh Battery is also available for £20k which gives a 2012 Model S almost the same range as a brand new 2022 Model S - which costs £70k+ at present.

For EVs to make sense longterm batteries have to be replaceable. 

Our EV is currently 5 years old and show roughly 6% Battery degradation. I plan on keeping as long as the chassis is road worth with a view of getting a new Battery fitted sometime around 2030. 

At £20k every 150k miles for a new Battery, that's 13p per mile in Battery replacements costs. Given I pay £0/mile in fuel for using Tesla DC rapid chargers Battery replacement costs are OK with me.

Clearly if Battery costs some down or the need/timing of replacement packs are longer than anticipated the cost per mile drops. A £10k refurbished pack would only work out at 6.6p/mile. 

[Mr Vlad]

I'm not going to carry on re the focus EV. All I know is what I saw on numerous occasions with different number of occupants. 

Price of petrol. Well blow me here's me thinking supermarket petrol is cheaper. On the way to work this morning I noticed tesco 187.9ppl. 1.5 miles down the road there's a BP station. Now I've always found BP to be the dearest but ugger me there's was 182.8 a whole 5p difference. Are supermarkets starting to take the wee wee out of us one wonders.

[Malc]

2 hours ago, Mr Vlad said:

Are supermarkets starting to take the wee wee out of us one wonders.

starting, starting you say ..  they've been doing it for a very long time with petrol .......  I'm only using Aldi and Lidl for my groceries now .....  the only one's who don't sell petrol and therefore more honest than the rest ......  imho 

Malc

[Mr Vlad]

You may well be right there Malc 👍