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Comment by xeromal | Hacker News Reader

If you've actually driven an EV, you realize mileage is a crock of shit so getting 700 miles actually means you can not worry.

* You can't use the bottom 10% without going against recommendations

* You shouldn't charge above 85-90% to avoid going against recommendations

* If you drive over 65 mph, the drain is above average.

* If you tow a trailer, your range is halved.

* If you install a little storage roof rack, you lose 20-30% of range

* You experience 10% battery degradation in the first couple years of ownership.

* 20% loss to cold weather (Thanks to a comment for this one)

I really don't want a reply to this comment to be "Well...gas engines..."

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I'm just going by the statistics, where I live (France), half of the workers are living less than 12km from their workplace.

Right now, electric cars have improved and the ones being sold are in the 300km battery range.

That's already overkill for most of the normal usage. People have a warped idea on how they are using their car and think they are doing way longer trips than the statistics tells you.

I'm using an EV myself and I changed nothing to my behavior, everything is alright.

The problem is that here in the US, the chance of making a 200 mile trip 10-20x in 3-5 years is high and no one here wants to deal with getting a rental or special car just to do that.

We like our road trips and while they're rare, they're important and we don't want to rent or have a second car in order to do that.

EVs need to be comparable with gas cars in realistic scenarios and that means a real 3-400 miles. Not 400 miles but with a giant list of can't do's

My gasoline car doesn’t get 400mi of range. Most modern EVs easily get 200 miles. Only a fraction of people will tow a boat or camper.

Once you drive an EV you realize that the range is less of a concern than you though it would be.

I had one from 2019 till a few months ago and I never really shook the anxiety and I live in SoCal where there were chargers coming out of my ears. I think the anxiety is mostly there unless you own a home or garage where you can charge nightly.

It’s either get off fossil fuels or die.

Then we’ll die if we can’t innovate fast enough.

The last couple of decades have shown what happens if you warn people about some imperceptible (to them) danger and tell them sacrifice personally, even in minor ways, to stave it off.

Frighteningly little happens. The change that does happen has been frequently coming in on a wave of technical innovation making greener options superior to old ones.

I'm well aware. The masses have to believe that though

Everything here is accurate. I still chose an EV because I can deal with the caveats, but this helps clarify to me why others wouldn't want to bother. This doesn't even mention access to charging; much easier for homeowners to justify an EV.

One thing though:

> You shouldn't charge above 85-90% to avoid going against recommendations

Daily driving this doesn't matter much. Longer drives you can charge to 100% as long as you depart within a reasonable time frame of say within 6 hours, probably longer. More annoying is the charging curve after 80% at fast charging stations. In my experience you usually won't want to spend the time to get that last 20% unless absolutely necessary.

Yeah, I'm not hating at all on EVs. Just saying that a 700 mile battery would assuage a lot of fears. I owned a Tesla from 2019 till a few months ago. I got bored and sold it for a profit and got myself an old LX470.

Most of those problems are exactly the same with ICE engines. You may not want that comment, but it's true.

Except the roof rack one is bogus. I installed the cross bars of a roof rack on my Bolt EUV (it came with the rails), and afaict it affected my mileage not at all. I still get 320 to 330 estimated miles (against the EPA's 247 estimated miles).

And the don't charge above 85--90% one is bogus too; there's talk about that on forums, but the manufacturer says nothing about it.

And I wouldn't want to go below 10% on a gas powered car either...

I'm open to you explaining how those ice issues are the same instead of just saying they are.

Running your car to zero fuel may potentially damage your fuel pump while running your Tesla or electric car to 0% constantly will completely destroy the battery. Much more expensive issue. Someone can easily bring you a small Jerry can of gas if you run out while it's day near impossible to do the same thing for an electric car. It'll need to be towed.

you forgot about the up to 20%? degradation in the cold

Great point. That's another one.

I think the heat also causes problems too? https://blog.carvana.com/2023/04/preventing-ev-battery-degra...

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