As a true petrolhead, I am struggling with the idea of
the global switch to Electric Vehicles.
Like Ferrari
chief executive, Sergio Marchionne, I don’t like them. When
journalists at the 2016 Geneva Motor Show asked Sergio about
the possibility of an all-electric Ferrari, Marchionne harrumphed:
“It’s almost an obscene concept! You’d have to shoot me
first.”
I would like you to picture the scenario:
A typical South African family planning their yearly holiday down to the coast. They try to manage their journey in one
go – leaving at midnight, to reach their destination during
daytime the following day. Colour your picture by thinking
of the annual exodus to Hartenbos and Mossel Bay.
With the normal aspiration vehicle, this is quite possible.
Refuel three times and have a Wimpy breakfast (that adds
90 mins to your travelling time), yet you can have your
feet in the ocean after ± 12 hours.
Now let me take
you along on our recent journey in our newly acquired EV.
No need to set the midnight alarm, as we can only drive
a maximum of 300 km before recharging. And night driving
also shortens the distance that you can travel. (Studies
show that most electric vehicles currently on the market,
can only handle between 120 km to 320 km on a single charge.)
We will have to recharge in Kroonstad, because the
next recharge facility is Bloemfontein – and that is out
of our range. (It currently takes 3-4 hours to fully charge
an electric vehicle at super-charging stations and 6-8 hours
at home.)
So, two hours’ drive time to Kroonstad
and four hours of sitting at Steers – at the recharging
station – watching thousands of petrol vehicles refuelling
and speeding off with their Venter trailers. (We opted to
leave the trailer behind, as this extra load would shorten
the distance we can travel before recharging).
And
we’re on the road again. Luckily, we have family in Bloemfontein, where we can overnight and recharge at their home base for
eight hours. We used to visit them on weekends, but with
our EV, it will now become an annual visit only.
On the
way to our family, I nearly ran over a guide dog and his
owner. They did not hear our approach and we narrowly missed
one another. (Last year, a report by the UK Guide Dogs charity
found a 54% increase in pedestrian injuries involving ‘quiet’
cars between 2012 and 2013. The report stated that people
crossing the street are 40% more likely to be hit by a silent
hybrid or EV than by one with a petrol or diesel engine.)
That night, we agreed that – in future – we would use the EV’s horn whenever we see pedestrians along the
way. (We later discovered that this idea was not a good
one; we were often mistaken for a taxi and were given the finger
for not stopping to pick up the passengers.)
Fully
charged! We hit the road the next morning and our destination,
Colesberg, is 204 kilometres away. (We declined the family’s
breakfast offer, as we would have another 3-4 hours to kill
at the Wimpy in Colesberg.)
Wimpy’s offer of bottomless
coffee had us more charged than our EV. A big discussion
followed on whether we were to test the EV’s capacity and
“aim for” Beaufort West – 319 kilometres away. This was
the maximum distance – under perfect conditions, as stipulated
by the manufacturer of our EV.
Being explorers at
heart, we gave the thumbs up to head straight for Beaufort
West. Unfortunately, we hit a headwind and barely made Three
Sisters. Here, we were greeted by long queues of EVs, waiting
for a vacant charge point. Our pit stop took six hours in
total (of which two hours were spent waiting for a charge
point.)
With so much time on my hands, I started
daydreaming about a Formula 1 race with EVs. Pit crews sleeping
while the race cars are recharging and spectators carrying
sleeping bags with them – as this would be a two-day affair
(the coffee had worn off and we took the opportunity to
have a little shut- eye during the charging process).
At first light, we hit the road again – Oudtshoorn being the next goal. On arrival though, our EV’s batteries were
depleted and we overdosed on caffeine once more. Three and
a half hours later, we were on our way to Mossel Bay – 80km
to go.
At the top of Robertson Pass, we made a quick
stop to take in the view of the bay. Our holiday had officially
started!
So back to the question: Will I switch
on? Yes, I will – in 2040, when EV technology has run the
course of the cell phone battery development since inception.
I remember when the battery life of the best phone on the
market was six hours.
Tesla... get your back into it.
July 2017 Sales in a nutshell
We share the best used car sellers (only IDA dealers on the Signio platform)
The top 5 used passenger vehicle sales per manufacturer
VOLKSWAGEN
FORD
TOYOTA
BMW
NISSAN
The top three used commercial vehicle sales per manufacturer (bakkies)
RANGER 2.2TDCi XL P/U D/C
UTILITY 1.4 A/C P/U S/C
RANGER 2.2TDCi XL P/U SUP/CAB
Top 10 derivatives used car sales
POLO 1.4 COMFORTLINE 5DR
FIGO 1.4 AMBIENTE
RANGER 2.2TDCi XL P/U D/C
POLO VIVO GP 1.4 CONCEPTLINE 5DR
POLO VIVO GP 1.4 TRENDLINE 5DR
UTILITY 1.4 A/C P/U S/C
POLO GP 1.2 TSI COMFORTLINE (66KW)
ECOSPORT 1.5TiVCT AMBIENTE
FIESTA 1.4 AMBIENTE 5 Dr
POLO GP 1.2 TSI TRENDLINE (66KW)
The average age of used vehicles sold in July was 3.93 years.
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