EvilRacer329

Hey Barry14, you're not wrong - there are a few options, but none of them good. The Harley-Davidson LiveWire, Zero SR/S, and Energica Eva/Ego are the only ones that match ICE motorcycles for straight-line performance, and even then they are heavy and don't yet have realistic real-world ranges. I tested the Zero recently and in normal riding would've been empty by 60 miles, and the gentlemen making the rounds on Apple TV were lucky to get 100 miles to a charge on their Harleys while trundling along at 30-45mph. Lower-powered scooters etc. are available, but mostly with 30-40mph ranges and even worse ranges, so they're still very much toys for the rich or local runarounds. The view in some circles is that motorcycles will die off entirely with this transition, replaced by electrically-assisted bicycles that can be ridden away from our increasingly dangerous and congested roads. I hope this doesn't happen, as I very much enjoy motorcycling and cannot wait for a 200-mile touring bike to replace my petrol versions. Fortunately, motorcycles don't yet seem to be part of the 2035 ban, but it can't be long now... Taxation is a very interesting question, and one that I and many others often forget. As some have said, this could be a catalyst for a complete rethink and simplification of our taxation system in the UK. I'm sure there are plenty of economists who have been running different models to assess the outcomes, as there are always knock-on effects. No matter what is done, some will benefit and others will lose out. I have to say, I appreciate how the members of this forum can have a genuinely sophisticated and nuanced discussion about a complex issue like this. On too many corners of the internet this would have already degenerated into a vitriol-filled quagmire. How incredibly refreshing. 🙂 Nick

I suppose it could be argued that it is our energy consumption overall that's unsustainable, whether it be from petrol, coal, nuclear, or almost anything else. The fact is that we can speculate as much as we like - the clock is ticking. Governments across Europe, including our own, have set a deadline after which ICE vehicles will no longer be allowed to be sold. Maybe future government's will change their mind, but with popular opinion and voters demanding the push, I consider it unlikely. Maybe electric vehicles will be able to directly replace petrol cars by then, maybe they won't. Maybe the world will change more than any of us can imagine, just like how the introduction of cars did in the last hundred years. Maybe personal vehicle ownership is simply incompatible with electric vehicles, and we'll all move to cars-as-a-service, getting picked up by little robo-taxis for short journeys and renting long-range fast-charging limos for longer trips. Maybe we won't travel as much, with video conferencing taking over. I'm very aware that I'm probably a good few years younger than the average Lexus owner, and it's the nature of human beings to scoff and dismiss that things will ever change, despite living in a world that would have been utterly unimaginable just a decade or two ago. I'm grateful to live in an era of fantastic healthcare and the internet, but also wish I'd been able to live in an era of cheap petrol and powerful V8s. I have to accept that this is the world I live in, and I'll either adapt or fall by the wayside as the world moves on. I don't have the imagination to know what the world will look like in 10 or 20 years' time. I don't think any of us can predict the future. But simply saying that electric cars will never catch on rings a little hollow. Just think how many people have said that about pretty much every piece of technology we have ever developed. On December 2035 the very last petrol-powered car ever will be sold in Britain. Will we all be making do with whatever electric cars have become by that point, with all the legitimate caveats raised in earlier posts becoming unfortunate realities that force us to adapt to a different relationship with personal transportation? Will the government give in, and let everyone continue burning oil and coal until rising sea levels and extreme weather destroy our homes? Or will some soon-to-be-billionaire invent a magical new type of engine that costs the same as a modern petrol engine but requires no fuel and generates no pollutants? Maybe governments decided that a hard stop was necessary to focus the minds of the engineers. After all, look at the motorcycle world - barely token efforts are being made to develop viable alternatives because no-one is demanding or requiring them. As a result, no turbos, no hybrids, no concern for aerodynamics and an uneducated user-base who think that 45mpg is good for something that has a fraction of the mass of any car. That same user-base loudly proclaims that they will never buy an electric motorcycle, no matter how good they become. My response is that those people probably won't have a choice if they want to keep riding in a couple of decades. We could probably be worlds ahead of where we are in electric vehicle development if we'd started earlier, but no-one was funding the research because it was way easier to make big money selling petrol cars instead. No - I think we can get there. With the clock ticking and no chance of a reprieve car manufacturers will either find a way to solve these problems or die trying. Either we'll all have cheap long-range wirelessly-charged electric cars, or we'll be living in a world that doesn't travel anywhere near as much as we currently enjoy. Nick

I would love an electric car. Cheap to run, zero road tax, no engine to service, starts every day with a full tank, hilariously quick off the line. Sure, long trips may involve a lunch-tea break somewhere with a fast charger, but if you don't need to travel 200+ miles on a regular basis it's a no-brainer. And if you're a company-car driver, you'd be a bit of a fool to choose anything else given the 0% BIK at the moment. But for a private buyer, the problems are price and choice. I wanted a reliable, quality luxury car, which rather narrowed things down to Lexus, who until recently didn't have an electric offering. If I'd been significantly more wealthy then Tesla and the German manufacturers have choices, but I've seen those brands' reliability scores. I could have gotten a new Nissan Leaf, Kia/Hyundai electric or even waited for a VW ID3, but those aren't premium products, despite being priced the same as my hybrid UX. In 15 years' time I daresay the infrastructure problem will have been solved and costs will have come down to a parity with petrol/hybrid options. Otherwise the government may have to pull a sharp u-turn and allow PHEV's to live on as options beyond their 2035 deadline. Let's face it, there are plenty of people driving around in older cars getting 30mpg and spewing out dirty exhaust. If we were to shift those folks into 50mpg+ hybrids or range-extended/PHEV vehicles over the next 10-15 years, we'd be halving our emissions - all without putting a significant strain on the grid. Do I still want an electric car, complete with all the benefits, but I cannot afford or do not want to pay the premium at this time. When my UX is ten years old, perhaps things will be different. Nick

I tend to have the directions in the dashboard turned off and I don't have the HUD, but I really miss the ability to have the hybrid information screen alongside the navigation. Frustratingly, it shouldn't be impossible to make happen - it's all just a software pass-through allowing the phone to use a portion (or all) of the in-car screen as a secondary display. But I also suspect that Lexus won't bother with that extra integration. For the time being I'm using the pop-up display in the dashboard to show that info, but it's not ideal. C'est la vie, I suppose! Nick

Yeah, what would you like to know? I drove a CT for a week as a loaner, so I could answer some of your questions... Nick

Done and dusted - four hours from when I dropped it off to when I got the keys back, but they did thoroughly clean the car inside and out as part of that, so three hours for the upgrade seems about right. Only had a quick play with my iPhone, but works as advertised and looks fantastic in the 10" screen. Doesn't look like it integrates at all into the dashboard, and as expected there's no split-screen function. If you want to monitor your hybrid system while you drive, you'll have to bring it up in the dashboard. I'll play with it a bit more this weekend and report back. If anyone has any particular questions, let me know! Nick

That's impressive economy! My last fuel-up of commuting and a bit of enthusiastic leisure driving was 49MPG, which by my calculations means 460 miles from a tank. The couple of more relaxed long-distance runs I've done have averaged 55MPG, with Road Trip estimating 520 miles from a tank at that rate. Would a larger tank be nice? Absolutely - but it's still better than my motorcycles! 😄 Nick

Sat in MK Lexus now while mine is upgraded. I'll see if I can shoot some video of the system in action this weekend. I know there are some aspects of the on-board system I'm going to miss, but the improved integration with Plex Amp and Google Maps will be fantastic. I don't have a HUD in my car, but I'll report back on any other elements people are curious about! Nick

I wouldn't count on it. Apple CarPlay/Android Auto are just smartphone mirroring options that allow you to run any apps that the phone deems suitable. Lexus and Google aren't working directly together to pull just Google Maps into the HUD, though the extra-screen mirroring feature offers some hope that Google could add that functionality. Legally, I don't think Lexus have any obligation though. 😕 Nick

You can program the built-in sat-nav to assume you are heading to work or home from work at certain times of day. So if I get in the car at certain times in the morning, it'll automatically plot a route to the office. Similarly, when I hop back in at the end of the day, it offers to plot me a route home. Very handy, but arguably only necessary because it's so awkward to plot routes in the GPS manually! Nick

Thanks, Habu. Damn. I guess I'll have to decide what's more important. I guess that means you also lose features like the scheduled auto-navigate? Sumospin - I believe it's a phased rollout across the UK, it's apparently super easy for mechanics to get it wrong and brick the entire infotainment system, so maybe Lexus is waiting to see what happens with the first few workshops? Nick

That's right - I'm booked in with Milton Keynes Lexus for next friday. It sounds like I'll be one of the first one they do, but I've been hounding them since I picked up the car in July and they're trying to resolve an issue with the telematics system as well, so I'm at the top of their list. Nick

Here's a question - I've got the 10" screen in my UX and am getting the CarPlay upgrade next week. Will I be able to still run the main screen in split-screen mode, with the hybrid/battery info in the small panel and the map on the large panel? Or does CarPlay take over the entire screen no matter what? That would be a drag... Nick

Spoke to my dealer (Milton Keynes) this morning and they've booked me in for next Friday (30th). They said they've been told to quote up to three hours, but that's assuming people coming in with early 2019 cars who've never had their entertainment systems updated and need a whole host of sequential patches to be installed. My system was fully updated a couple of weeks ago, and he reckoned that my CarPlay/Android Auto update might be quicker as a result. I'll keep everyone posted! Nick

How did you capture this data, it's fantastic! I've got an OBD2 adapter, but which software are you using? Nick

I'm not finding these apps on the Apple App Store - are they Android-only programs? Nick

The only way the paddles on the UX make sense to me is in conjunction with both the shifter and engine mode set to "Sport". Then, the transmission behaves like an automated-manual, allowing you to shift at will and keep the revs high for fast driving. It does make the car more responsive, because there's instant power when you ask for it, as there's no delay while the engine spools up, but it's obviously very thirsty. Something I tend to do only on very twisty roads, for fun. In day-to-day the car is left in "Normal" mode. Fascinating stuff about "B" mode, I'm happy to be wrong on that one and am now no longer annoyed that my car lacks it! 🙂 Nick

I spoke to my dealer (Milton Keynes) yesterday, and they said they've received the training but not the kits themselves (USB sticks etc.) Apparently the training emphasises that if dealers screw the process up they're responsible for the £1,000 repair that would result, presumably from bricking the entire entertainment system. Apparently there are a lot of things that can go wrong, a lot of ways that they could get it wrong - up to and including attempting the upgrade on a not-entirely-compatible unit. I'm definitely waiting to let my dealer handle this one... Nick

Ah, that makes a lot of sense - thanks, Thackeray/Herbie! It figures that the limit is the battery's charge rate rather than the amount of load/electricity that the generator can, well, generate. I gather that one of the reasons Lexus/Toyota are still using Nickel-Metal Hydride batteries is because their fast charge/discharge rates are slightly better than lithium ion, even though they're less energy dense and heavier as a result. I didn't realise that Teslas had no coast mode - can you adjust the level of automatic regenerative braking in case you want to coast etc.? Nick

Yeah, I found a couple examples online of white cars where someone had also painted the plastic arches, and it looked amazing. Cue Lexus launching a special edition next year with blue paint and blue wheel arches that looks amazing. Still, I'm happy with my grey/black combo. 🙂 Nick

*low whistle* Honestly? I'd love it if Lexus could find a way to wildly increase the amount of regeneration braking the motor could provide to the point where you'd only need pads to hold the car at a stand-still. Time to go read up on how alternator/generators work... Nick

The paddle-shifters in the UX250h simply force the transmission to run the engine in a higher rev-range, creating engine braking. It doesn't affect how much energy the electric motors can capture, and in fact wastes a bunch of energy as heat and noise. A far better idea is to squeeze the brake pedal until you max out the "regeneration" indicator on the dash - that's the maximum energy the electric motor can capture - squeeze it further and brake disks come into play, at which point you're once again turning momentum into heat instead. If you can start braking early enough using maximum regeneration you can actually come to a complete stop without using the brake pads at all. I understand that the "B" mode simply increases the amount of automatic regeneration that the motors apply when you release the accelerator peddle, even before you touch the brake. It means you can't coast as well, so not as efficient in many cases, and probably why Lexus stopped putting a "B" mode on their newer models. Hope that helps! Nick

Oof, sorry to hear that Brent, and if you've already got a hybrid electric bike then you've already thought of my next suggestion! I also agree on the unlit streets thing - it's not always a great idea... I think you've already considered all the other options, so it may just be a case of living with lower fuel economy. An all-electric or plug-in hybrid would, of course, solve the problem completely, and there is now an electric UX. Something to consider, perhaps! Nick

If your commute is that short the engine will spend most of its time warming up, when injection computers richen the mixture like crazy to compensate for clumping fuel droplets that don't properly vaporise in the low temperatures of a cold engine. The UX warms up pretty quick, but even so, the first couple of miles will get terrible fuel economy. All joking aside, have you considered a bicycle...? Nick

Back when I thought I might end up with an IS300h I did some research and found a couple of aftermarket solutions. Don't give up! 🙂 Nick