So obviously this is just my opinion, and you should assume it's worth what you paid for it. ;-)
That said I do keep an eye on the electric vehicle market and it's possible I've noticed a few things:
Should I still consider an iMiev?
If you average less than 40 miles use per day and can find a used 2014 (there were very few 2016's sold) for $5000 or less then that could still be a reasonable deal. Make sure there is a viable Mitsubishi dealer that will work on the EV's not too far away from you. Mitsubishi isn't doing to well in the US market and the number of dealers seems to be shrinking. A fact you'll want to consider as part of your risk assessment. The oncoming 'Charge Ahead' $2500 rebate for low-moderate income Oregonians can also apply to used cars, making this potentially much cheaper if you qualify. Oregon only, sorry.
If you need a bit longer range and/or better dealer support, I'd consider a 2015 Nissan Leaf, especially if I could find a ~30K miles unit for around (or under) $10K. Yes they're out there. These are just coming off a lease deal so there's quite a few, especially in California. 2016's have a larger battery (on some models) and cost around twice as much. 2015 seems like the sweet-spot on these now.
[Edit Aug.'17: See other post about 2017 Leaf closeouts]
If you need more range and/or really want a new rig then in the $19K-21K (after incentives) area the Hyundai Ioniq (my pick) or the Kia Soul EV are worth a look.
If the Chevy Bolt really does get enough overproduction such that the dealers with stock discount them down into the $32-33K range then that would get the nod. It's a really nice car (My neighbor just got one) and if the federal+state incentives dropped the 'all-in' cost down to $23K I'd STRONGLY consider getting one. You don't have to wait two years unlike..
Yeah, yeah, but ... What About Tesla?
Tesla is almost surely the best EV ever, and the Model3 maybe even the best choice per dollar too.
I know several people who were thinking "Wow, a new Tesla for only $35K and then subtract federal and state credits and I'll have mine for only $25K total. Yay!!" and hey, I'd like that too.
If you already have an early reservation and the $1000 deposit on file with Tesla then congratulations, you're golden! If however you don't have an early reservation (first 2-300,000 or are just thinking about it now) then there's a few things to ponder:
Under current law the $7500 Federal tax credit begins phase-out after 200.000 total vehicles are sold by a manufacturer in the US. In Tesla's case that makes end of Q2 2018 or possibly Q3 as the point where the credit drops in half, given how the phase-out is structured. With around 500K reservations already in the hopper it's VERY unlikely that someone without an early-ish reservation is going to get a meaningful federal credit. Especially if you're looking for a base model, since those are not the production priority.
Note, this is current law. Who knows what will happen in Trumpville.
Hmmm, which Model3 to get? $9000 for the big (300 miles instead of 220mi.) battery. All the autopilot/self-driving hardware comes built in, but if you want it all turned on it's like $8000 more. Need 4WD? It's coming. Add another $4-5K though. I think we're up over $55K here, and we haven't even gotten into the premium packages for the interior. Note that some states (Oregon and...) kill their credit if the car is over $50K...
So lets consider the tradeoffs. The Tesla SuperCharger network is spaced out about 120-150 miles apart. So unless you're doing long drives on a regular basis that extra $9000 may not be well spent, especially since the extra range would only rarely allow you to 'skip' a charge stop. Long distance commuters (or those with lots of traffic) may find Full-Self-Driving to be well worth it. The rest of us maybe not so much considering that it's something the Service Centers can turn on later for an additional charge. Obviously folks with lots of snow and ice may want the 'D' all wheel drive version, but the wait until next summer for that feature will make the federal credit highly improbable.
___________
So, if a base Tesla ordered now with a two year wait and only the state credit(s) still looks like a good deal then off you go. If you need it sooner and are in that market segment, consider a Bolt. If you only do local short range stuff and money is tight an iMiev may still make pretty good sense.
Personally I'm looking at used 2014 Tesla Model S's with high miles on them
Monday, July 31, 2017
Wednesday, May 31, 2017
BatteryBasics
Somebody asked for a short easy to understand "what/not to do to the batteries" post.
Batteries for dummies: the short version of what not to do.
(look at previous posts for details):
There are basically two ways to shorten the life of your battery pack by a bunch
1. Always charge to 100% and then let it sit around for days, especially when it's hot out.
2. Run it dead every time. Drive until the range shows '---' on a regular basis.
And another couple ways to shorten it's life a little bit:
3. If you have ChaDeMo fast charging use it all the time. Every charge if possible.
4. Never let it charge all the way. (yes I know, seems to conflict with #1 but the key parts are 'always' and 'let it sit in the heat at 100% for days')
Note: We're really only talking about chewing off an extra 10-20% of the battery capacity here, absent an actual cell failure. Some folks would barely notice...
OK smart guy, so what --should-- I do?
Well for starters, if you know you're going to need something close to max range, especially in the cold rainy winter, go ahead and charge to 100% (16 bars on an iMiev, 12 ona Leaf). It's considerably less damaging to have it sit at 100% (especially when cold) than to run it flat and drag home in turtle mode.
It's actually good to get it fully charged every 2-4 weeks since the battery balancing system works during that last hour of charge, Just try not to let it sit out in the hot at 100% for long periods on a regular basis.
Every several (6?) months you should run it down to 'two bars' (iMiev) on the battery display (Leaf: when it just starts flashing, around 14 miles remaining?) and then charge it to 100%. It resets the battery/range assumptions in the controller.
If you have it, use fast charging on long trips or when away from home. Just not all the time, eh?
Most of the time just try and keep it between 4 bars and 14 bars (iMiev) 2 up from the bottom and 2 down from the top on a Leaf on the battery meter. Sure you can go slightly more in each direction regularly with no -real- problem, but that's not giving yourself much error room.
....AND.... don't stress about it!
Batteries for dummies: the short version of what not to do.
(look at previous posts for details):
There are basically two ways to shorten the life of your battery pack by a bunch
1. Always charge to 100% and then let it sit around for days, especially when it's hot out.
2. Run it dead every time. Drive until the range shows '---' on a regular basis.
And another couple ways to shorten it's life a little bit:
3. If you have ChaDeMo fast charging use it all the time. Every charge if possible.
4. Never let it charge all the way. (yes I know, seems to conflict with #1 but the key parts are 'always' and 'let it sit in the heat at 100% for days')
Note: We're really only talking about chewing off an extra 10-20% of the battery capacity here, absent an actual cell failure. Some folks would barely notice...
OK smart guy, so what --should-- I do?
Well for starters, if you know you're going to need something close to max range, especially in the cold rainy winter, go ahead and charge to 100% (16 bars on an iMiev, 12 ona Leaf). It's considerably less damaging to have it sit at 100% (especially when cold) than to run it flat and drag home in turtle mode.
It's actually good to get it fully charged every 2-4 weeks since the battery balancing system works during that last hour of charge, Just try not to let it sit out in the hot at 100% for long periods on a regular basis.
Every several (6?) months you should run it down to 'two bars' (iMiev) on the battery display (Leaf: when it just starts flashing, around 14 miles remaining?) and then charge it to 100%. It resets the battery/range assumptions in the controller.
If you have it, use fast charging on long trips or when away from home. Just not all the time, eh?
Most of the time just try and keep it between 4 bars and 14 bars (iMiev) 2 up from the bottom and 2 down from the top on a Leaf on the battery meter. Sure you can go slightly more in each direction regularly with no -real- problem, but that's not giving yourself much error room.
....AND.... don't stress about it!
Thursday, May 18, 2017
Updateration
Long time no post! Why? Because iMiev. "It just works!" No Drama, no failures nothing but drive and charge. Well, I did take it into the dealer for a bunch of airbag and brake system recalls, but they only had it for about 5 hours and they even washed, vacuumed and charged it. No $charge$. That's the total maintenance for the four years I've had it, excluding wiper blades and washer fluid.
I can (and have) gone almost 70 miles on my 60 mile range iMiev after 4 years of use. The battery is still going strong. Nothing to see here, move along. Resale value is down to around $7K but given that they were selling new ones for $9K two years ago, that's not so bad.
EDIT 2022: Still in the family. Still running strong.
Just had it's big birthday: 10 years since manufacturing. Huzzah!
Closing in on 50,000 miles. Still goes 60+ miles/charge in good conditions. We've had to replace tires, windshield wipers, wiper fluid and the 12V 'house' battery ($90). That's it for total maintenance over 10 years. There's a 'wear' mark on the edge of the driver's seat, the visor is slightly loose. The rear seat 'flop-down' control is sticky. Yep, that's about it. Been to the dealer exactly once (above).
Closing in on 50,000 miles. Still goes 60+ miles/charge in good conditions. We've had to replace tires, windshield wipers, wiper fluid and the 12V 'house' battery ($90). That's it for total maintenance over 10 years. There's a 'wear' mark on the edge of the driver's seat, the visor is slightly loose. The rear seat 'flop-down' control is sticky. Yep, that's about it. Been to the dealer exactly once (above).
It's used a bit over 12,000KWh (estimate) costing roughly $1500 to drive ten years including a total of 14 trips to public chargers. We know many people that exceed that $1500 in gas purchases Per Year!
"What, 14? You don't get out much do ya?"
To which we say:
Long distances, in this car? are you crazy?
end EDIT
Thursday, June 11, 2015
Cheezzeee home charge station
Done (as usual) the not so fancy way...
I've actually gotten questions about this and while it was just Maximum Expediency(tm) on my part I guess some details are in order:
It's just the EVSE (Charger cord) that came with the car, as modified by EVSE Upgrade (see earlier post HERE) and a white plastic desk-side trash basket
...tweaked a bit with some shears, a coat-hook and an old plastic flowerpot.
The rim and part of the side were cut off the trash basket and the bottom removed from the flowerpot (to create the 'holster') If you click on the picture you'll get more detail...
I needed a couple screws into the upper corners and it was hard to get those in, thus the holes you can see in the front. Those two screws plus the ones on the coat-hook are all that holds it to the wall.
The flower pot has the bottom cut off and a couple zip-ties hold it in place.
Hard to see, but there's a little block glued to the concrete in the lower right corner that keeps the garage door from coming down all the way. Even if your door doesn't normally close all that hard, it's sure to smash down harder on occasion. Smashing high current cords...can't be good...
One thing to think about: You don't want that cord exposed to strong sun for a long period every day. Couple years of that and you'll be looking at cracks. I'm guessing cracks and water are a bad combination...
It's just the EVSE (Charger cord) that came with the car, as modified by EVSE Upgrade (see earlier post HERE) and a white plastic desk-side trash basket
...tweaked a bit with some shears, a coat-hook and an old plastic flowerpot.
The rim and part of the side were cut off the trash basket and the bottom removed from the flowerpot (to create the 'holster') If you click on the picture you'll get more detail...
I needed a couple screws into the upper corners and it was hard to get those in, thus the holes you can see in the front. Those two screws plus the ones on the coat-hook are all that holds it to the wall.
The flower pot has the bottom cut off and a couple zip-ties hold it in place.
Hard to see, but there's a little block glued to the concrete in the lower right corner that keeps the garage door from coming down all the way. Even if your door doesn't normally close all that hard, it's sure to smash down harder on occasion. Smashing high current cords...can't be good...
One thing to think about: You don't want that cord exposed to strong sun for a long period every day. Couple years of that and you'll be looking at cracks. I'm guessing cracks and water are a bad combination...
Sunday, June 7, 2015
Pricing: New, Used and the vicious depriciation curve
First a short update on where new prices seem to be going: (subject to change, obviously)
Update to the update: O'Brian Mitsubishi (the 'home' dealer Mitsu-USA in Normal IL) seems to have the most new 2016 stock. I do not have any information on anyone's purchasing experiences with them. They quote a price of $12.9K which is not 'real' (It's after the federal credit)
As of last check they still had a dozen or so 2016's at around $20K. Even if you can't get exactly this deal, it does provide a useful 'line in the sand' for other negotiations. With around $1200 in delivery costs you're looking at a total around $21.2K, less the Federal Tax Credit of $7500 your final cost should be around $13,800-ish. Not bad, however, do keep an eye on what's happening on the used market. New LEAF's are also reduced somewhat and are now at these same levels for 2013 and 2014 models with low (under 10K miles) on them.
As mentioned in a previous post linked here, the depreciation curve for mass market electric vehicles doesn't look so hot. Tesla may (so far) be the exception. Everyone else is suffering a combination of things that drag the used valuations down; including but not limited to:
Battery life fears - The manufacturers seem to have roughly standardized on the 8yr/100K mi. battery warranty. This appears to have made the depreciation curve considerably steeper than 'normal.'
Off-Lease glut - When the manufacturers had some periods of slow unit sales a couple years ago they responded by offering amazingly low lease deals. This also helped with the customer's battery life fears issue(s). The result was a larger than normal percentage of these cars being leased rather than bought outright. Now all those leased vehicles are reaching the end of their 2 or 3 year lease periods and showing up on the used market. This is probably pushing used prices down $3-5K.
Obvious price adjustments - Pretty much everyone knows about the $7500 Federal Tax Credit, so you have to start the depreciation assumptions from (at the very least) that amount below the average new selling cost. There were also lots of relatively large dealer incentive/rebates flying around at various times, some as high as 30% off. This appears to have also affected prices by several thousand.
So what happens when you add all that up? The volume of iMiEV's is low enough that randomness and local influences have had significant impact on used pricing. Still; You probably shouldn't pay much more than $7-8K for even a great condition, under 10K mi. used 2014 iMiev.
The LEAF market is much bigger and the pricing there pretty much matches expectations: Lets say your 2013 LEAF was $33K minus some rebates and with the tax credit we're around $23K. Applying a steeper than average depreciation curve to the three years that's been out and a couple thousand for the other factors and we're probably looking at $11K-$15K as the current price for that car.
"That's Terrible!!" well, only if you're the seller. If you're the buyer it's GREAT.
Reality check: Good friend of mine just took delivery of a 2013 LEAF with under 5000 miles on it and near showroom condition. Not the bottom model either. Thanks to carlypso.com (now defunct) he paid $12.5K plus around $600 for delivery (they're based in CA). This car is in REALLY nice condition too. Delivery and transactions went pretty much without a hitch (it was a couple days late getting here.)
Looking at their website, that's a little below the average for the many LEAF's on there.
Not bad at all.
Update to the update: O'Brian Mitsubishi (the 'home' dealer Mitsu-USA in Normal IL) seems to have the most new 2016 stock. I do not have any information on anyone's purchasing experiences with them. They quote a price of $12.9K which is not 'real' (It's after the federal credit)
As of last check they still had a dozen or so 2016's at around $20K. Even if you can't get exactly this deal, it does provide a useful 'line in the sand' for other negotiations. With around $1200 in delivery costs you're looking at a total around $21.2K, less the Federal Tax Credit of $7500 your final cost should be around $13,800-ish. Not bad, however, do keep an eye on what's happening on the used market. New LEAF's are also reduced somewhat and are now at these same levels for 2013 and 2014 models with low (under 10K miles) on them.
As mentioned in a previous post linked here, the depreciation curve for mass market electric vehicles doesn't look so hot. Tesla may (so far) be the exception. Everyone else is suffering a combination of things that drag the used valuations down; including but not limited to:
Battery life fears - The manufacturers seem to have roughly standardized on the 8yr/100K mi. battery warranty. This appears to have made the depreciation curve considerably steeper than 'normal.'
Off-Lease glut - When the manufacturers had some periods of slow unit sales a couple years ago they responded by offering amazingly low lease deals. This also helped with the customer's battery life fears issue(s). The result was a larger than normal percentage of these cars being leased rather than bought outright. Now all those leased vehicles are reaching the end of their 2 or 3 year lease periods and showing up on the used market. This is probably pushing used prices down $3-5K.
Obvious price adjustments - Pretty much everyone knows about the $7500 Federal Tax Credit, so you have to start the depreciation assumptions from (at the very least) that amount below the average new selling cost. There were also lots of relatively large dealer incentive/rebates flying around at various times, some as high as 30% off. This appears to have also affected prices by several thousand.
So what happens when you add all that up? The volume of iMiEV's is low enough that randomness and local influences have had significant impact on used pricing. Still; You probably shouldn't pay much more than $7-8K for even a great condition, under 10K mi. used 2014 iMiev.
The LEAF market is much bigger and the pricing there pretty much matches expectations: Lets say your 2013 LEAF was $33K minus some rebates and with the tax credit we're around $23K. Applying a steeper than average depreciation curve to the three years that's been out and a couple thousand for the other factors and we're probably looking at $11K-$15K as the current price for that car.
"That's Terrible!!" well, only if you're the seller. If you're the buyer it's GREAT.
Reality check: Good friend of mine just took delivery of a 2013 LEAF with under 5000 miles on it and near showroom condition. Not the bottom model either. Thanks to carlypso.com (now defunct) he paid $12.5K plus around $600 for delivery (they're based in CA). This car is in REALLY nice condition too. Delivery and transactions went pretty much without a hitch (it was a couple days late getting here.)
Looking at their website, that's a little below the average for the many LEAF's on there.
Not bad at all.
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