Not an ‘X’ but is an Xdrive

[X5Sport]

Pvr - the salesman we were talking ordered an i4 for his Dad in Jan ‘22 and still has no build slot.

The charge point will need putting in as well as going to smart meters. Main circuit is 100A fortunately and I have three ‘spaces’ in the breaker box to add another 32A circuit. If your main house feed is a 60A fused then you may need it upgrading to 100A single-phase. That allows a 7.4kW/h charger. If you want more (say 22kW) then it’s a 3-phase feed and a friend of mine has been quoted £30k just for that.

Been warned off BMWs own ‘pod’ as the contract is through BP and their customer support is abysmal plus the phone number on their website is (or was) wrong anyway and they don’t respond to emails allegedly. Pod prices are around £900 installed. There was a grant of £450 available but that has now gone unless you are in rented or multi-occupancy building. Single-occupancy or owned houses were removed as if 1st April. Seems daft to me.

Apparently our cancelled M340d is now in the country but minus a lot of the packages I wanted due to ‘supply issues’.

Looking forward to getting this thing. 537bhp / 0-62 in 3.9 sec is scary fast……and probably kills the battery in 5 miles. We did try just flooring it without the Sport+ mode on and it felt like a 2g ‘shove’ accelerating. With Sport+ mode on you get all 537bhp instantly through both motors!!

[Leslie]

Well what a turnaround and that is "scary fast " alright, in the embarrassing a supercar league now I guess a Tesla could have been an option at this level did you consider one ? Ps I really hope they can actually deliver this one !

[X5Sport]

We did look at a Tesla but the costs were significantly higher for the lease due to second hand value being much lower for some reason. Tesla are also more to insure (repairs are very expensive), not as well equipped and didn’t really float our boat. It (a Model 3 Performance) didn’t seem that well screwed together either. Also looked at a Polestar but again the lease costs were much higher even though both were cheaper!

I wasn’t really convinced about electric but given the cost of diesel in particular is rising and will get worse as demand is much higher than for petrol, we’ve decided to take a chance. Also looked at hybrids but our use case doesn’t support them - mileage too high for the majority of the batteries meaning we’d be running on petrol a lot of the time and then carrying a heavy but dead battery! And hybrids are just as hard to get if you want factory build, with BMW removing most options to put on their top spec cars. My heart still screams M340d, but my head says otherwise.

…..and yes actually getting this one would be nice. The current view is a wait of 10 months, but could be more - a year. Ordering an M340d (or even a 330e) is about the same as a new model is due in July and it isn’t possible to get a quote on them.

[Leslie]

I'm surprised at the Tesla secondhand value being lower as these are a best seller here now by far for EV , (3 times the 2nd most popular ev )and really seen as the benchmark now, maybe they are too popular and the secondhand market is just not there in volume yet ? but as you say may be other factors at play and it's all about the total costs at the end of the day . I think hybrid is a bit of a waste of time with a tiny range on electric and in the past it was proved most never bother to charge them anyway, the newer self charging ones I don't even really understand , the only way forward is full electric and diesel is certainly set to get way more expensive by the look of it if things don't improve soon
Costs for now will be lower but you just know the government will soon change the rule book when tax revenue from fuel sales starts to tank in the next few years and road pricing here we come Enjoy it while you can !

[X5Sport]

I’m sure that you’re right about the ‘good times’ only lasting until the Chancellor realises there’s an EV shaped hole in his finances.

[pvr]

How are they going to do the planned blocking of too many EV cars charging at the same time?

I have econ 7, so come 2300 it would come on together with the rest of the UK bringing the network down

[Leslie]

Peak demand is likely to be a major issue once electric becomes the main mode of transport . at the minute demands drops off a lot at night so there is a lot of spare capacity but you can't run power stations 24/7 flat out , the night time is likely when any maintenance is scheduled as you can run with less generators online. You can be sure given past government performance it will take a crisis and the lights going out to get it sorted We need to be building more power stations now along with renewables as they take so long to build With the high cost of energy they are already looking at energy rationing as a solution in Europe

[X5Sport]

Perhaps smart meters will be able to signal the smart charging point to ramp down or limit peak current? Single phase homes are limited to 32A - 7.4kW circuits. But yes, there is an issue even though the generator companies say it’s all fine now can the infrastructure cope? My friend in Devon was told that in order to put a 3-phase 22kW point in at his new build, the entire village needed a new transformer as it was ‘on the limit’. My bet is there’ll be more of those as the switch to EV picks up pace.

[pvr]

Wait for the smart bypass software from eBay

[Leslie]

Really no need for 22kw is he running a taxi rank lol ? I remember many years ago the farmer a few doors over had to get a 3 phase transformer put in as everytime he was welding our lights dimmed right down and tv went off Tesla with their fast charging car parks are great rather than single homes having massive chargers although if people thing they are going to charge during the day they are likely to be disappointed as there just isn't the capacity in the uk at present.

[pvr]

Problem with non home charge points is the fact that you advertise that the car is abandoned for hours at a time. My nieces EV (VW) has now been stripped 3 times of the entire dashboard, about £7k damage each time.

We don’t have mains gas here so far chance of getting anything decent in the area for charging

[Leslie]

Problem with non home charge points is the fact that you advertise that the car is abandoned for hours at a time. My nieces EV (VW) has now been stripped 3 times of the entire dashboard, about £7k damage each time.

Security camera's should really be sorting that , mad that it can happen over and over and probably the same gang doing it . with the new Tesla chargers you shouldn't really need to leave the car for very long as you can get a decent charge in minutes but these are Tesla only the old ones are slow for sure.

[X5Sport]

Definitely sounds like the same gang - and there absolutely need to be cameras I agree.

My incoming i4 can charge at 250kW meaning about an hour from 10% to 80%. There are a growing number of these 350kW points about now, but no cars can use that much (yet). BMW themselves advise against repeated use of high speed DC charging because they can overheat the battery. The feee charging points - yes there are such things are the same as domestic capacity and as pvr says that could invite trouble if the local parts gang know.

We’ve been looking at charging points generally and some charge eye watering amounts - one Welsh supplier is £1.10 per kWh. Most are in the 25p to 50p space with home charging being the best. A full charge should be about 8 hours on a home charge circuit and about £12.50 if on an overnight EV tariff or Eco 7.

pvr - which charge point are you looking at? Zappi seem to be the firm favourite but have supply issues (chip shortages forced a redesign) meaning a 4-month lead time at present. I’ve got Hive heating & lighting but their customer support is abysmal and their products temperamental at best (will change to Tado at some point) plus theirs is 3G (going to be turned off fairly soon now) or hardwired Ethernet rather than WiFi as used by many others.

[pvr]

VW recommended Pod Point, but I have not got it installed yet as I still have to fit the fuse box in the garage loft that can support the charge. The electrician pulled a new massive cable to before the house fusebox to the main 100A fuse but could not connect the garage as otherwise he had to validate the entire house wiring which would be impossible to get to the current standard so I will be installing it myself instead.

[X5Sport]

OK. Useful. Hopefully our 1999 build might be up to code but I think we’ll need a new spur and circuit breaker in a consumer unit. We’ve got space in the CU but there are already two split loads and we’ll need three.

I’ll look at Pod Point too. BMW recommend BP Pulse, though that too has mixed reviews. I guess that’s the game.

Cheers