Taxi - powered by coal, nuclear and gas

[forddeliveryboy]

When the Octavia started appearing in numbers on Britain's taxi ranks, it gained credibility. So is the Leaf approaching mainstream acceptance?

 

http://insideevs.com/nissan-leaf-taxi-hits-100000-miles-still-battery-bars/

 

 

[Asimo]

They seem to have sold about 7000 in the UK, of which about 400 are for sale: 

 

 

(How many left, Nissan approved used, Autotrader)

 

I am surprised it is so many as I only recall seeing one, and I have seen one Twizzy.

[dollywobbler]

I have seen loads of LEAFs. There's one that lives a couple of villages away. The taxi results are very impressive. 

 

Quite a lot are for sale because owners have upgraded to a new one. There's still a fair amount of out-of-warranty fear out there. It must be said though, there are some staggering lease deals out there. Saw one the other day - £150 a month (including battery lease) for two years. That's tempting, even for me. 

 

EDIT - Just seen another one. £1999 deposit, £120 per month for two years. 0% APR. Jeepers.

[lisbon_road]

Well I am impressed too.  I wonder how they do it though as it must spend a lot of time on charge?

[willswitchengage]

The BMW i3 is gaining popularity in these southern parts, even seen one or two of those Mitsuboshi and Vauxhall PHEVs (all with their engines running of course). I find the Leaf a surprising success story

 

York has purely battery powered buses now too

[Luxxo Waftybarger]

Exeter is rammed with Leafs, see loads of them with local dealer sticker so they must be selling. Probably even more than the Mitsubishi phevs, suppose if you always wanted a Lexus 450h but couldn't afford it they might be worth a go. Even saw a BMW i8 the other day. If you buy a new car every 3 years anyway they probably aren't so ridiculous.

[cort16]

I see lots of leafs and i3s in glasgow. I also regularly see a Chevy volt.... I mean vauxhall ampera in the m77.

[cort16]

1700 charges on 100k. At say 500 miles a tank of fuel 100k would be 200 full tanks. I wonder if it's charging more then once a day?

[NorfolkNWeigh]

I think a lot of these shitty little electric things are tight fisted company car drivers. The benefit in kind charge is either nothing or at least significantly reduced for plugins , so if the co.car is purely a perk and not needed to actually drive places it's almost understandable. Looks good for the firms green* credentials too.

I've considered a hybrid Lexus for my,predominantly airport , work but they're crap on fuel and have tiny boots- the GS450h cannot take even a medium size suitcase , although they are properly quick. The RX is slightly better but is even worse on fuel ,on a 200 mile test drive I couldn't manage better than 24 mpg and that was trying to drive economically.

[Tayne]

A rep who comes to see us at work took a Mitsubisher Outlander PHEEVV thing instead of his diseasel Passat wagon.

He's saving £150 a month in tax but his employers are spending more on fuel and he's taken to carrying a Jerry can of petrol around with him....

[cort16]

I think Mitsubishi have been grassed into to the trading standards as the claimed 120 mpg is so obviously bullshit. It's a bloody horrible looking thing too .

 

I was in North berwick last week and a guy parked next to me in a tesla model s. I said to him I liked his car and tried to engage him in conversation about it but I think he thought I was trying to car jack him. Either that or he saw my juke and deduced (correctly) I know fuck all about cars so it would have been a waste of oxygen .

[brickwall]

A house here has two of them and the charger thingy on the wall of the house.

[Squire_Dawson]

I suggest the following for avoidance of OMG GOEBBEL WARNING -

 

1) Keep old chod running to obviate the need for wasteful modern hokum;

2) Re-discover the legs as a means of locomotion;

3) Make use of magic sardine-tin more frequently, i.e. railways.

[Guest gostin]

My mum has a leaf and its the weirdest thing to drive!

She gets 80 miles per charge which isn't much when you look at it but costs 2p to charge fully and takes 12hrs

[dollywobbler]

1700 charges on 100k. At say 500 miles a tank of fuel 100k would be 200 full tanks. I wonder if it's charging more then once a day?

Yes, two or three times a day. That company has entirely disproved the myth that rapid charging is bad for batteries. They have a fleet. Saw a couple of them when we were in Cornwall.

[stephen01]

Been living with the leaf for a few weeks now, It's bloody brilliant, I've just clicked over 500 miles in it. 

 

whats also great is the traffic light grand prix, left a fiesta st with 4 lads in easily, I also had a car full and a boot full of shopping. It'll surprise  a lot of cars on the road. 

[forddeliveryboy]

My mum has a leaf and its the weirdest thing to drive!

She gets 80 miles per charge which isn't much when you look at it but costs 2p to charge fully and takes 12hrs

 

Given a full charge uses over 20kWh of leccy, please send me details of your Mum's supplier - I'd like some at under 0.1p per kWh too. Most of us pay at least 10p.

 

The clever thing about using electric cars is that the electricity makers (those who burn the coal, gas or whatever to make it) pay for the loss of about 70% of the energy (in conversion and transmission) whereas those of us buying petrol or diesel pay for this 70% we don't use.

 

So about 30% of it is used to move the car. Given the cost of petrol/diesel is 70% tax, this means that at most, £1 in £10 goes to moving the car, the rest to the government and in heat.

[Guest gostin]

Given a full charge uses over 20kWh of leccy, please send me details of your Mum's supplier - I'd like some at under 0.1p per kWh too. Most of us pay at least 10p.

 

The clever thing about using electric cars is that the electricity makers (those who burn the coal, gas or whatever to make it) pay for the loss of about 70% of the energy (in conversion and transmission) whereas those of us buying petrol or diesel pay for this 70% we don't use.

 

So about 30% of it is used to move the car. Given the cost of petrol/diesel is 70% tax, this means that at most, £1 in £10 goes to moving the car, the rest to the government and in heat.

SSE. 2p was what she was quoted by the salesman

[Ghosty]

I see a reasonable amount of Leaves in Manchester - the local Nissan dealer uses them as courtesy cars, but that's hardly surprising seeing as they don't need petrol. I've seen a couple of BMW i8s, but the i3 isn't doing well, probably down to it being hideous. When I'm down in that there Londinium I see quite a few though.

Outlander PHEV seems to be catching on.

 

Considering the amount of the bloody things fouling our roads, I'm surprised there isn't a hybrid Kia fucking Sportage.

 

I'm seeing a lot less Priuses than I used to, too - though my mate's dad has a battered 06 one, and he's not afraid to throw it about - if you need it to, it really goes.

I never see Honda hybrids any more aside the odd CRZ.

Vauxhall Ampera I never see either - shame as I like the styling.

I see the occasional Twizy, and when I'm in London I might spot a Zoe if I'm lucky.

Never, ever seen a Renault efFluence - then again, HML claims there are 74 in the whole country, compared to ~300 Twizzies and 1400 Zoes.

 

 

I'm bored so here's some HML stats for hybrids:

 

~40000+ Toyota Prius

~22000 Lexus RX (big thing) hybrid

~16000 Lexus CT200h (hatchback thing)

~15000 Toyota Yaris Hybrid

~10500 Toyota Auris Hybrid

~9500 Honda Insight

~6500 Nissan Leaf

~5300 Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV

~5300 Lexus IS hybrid

~5000 Honda Civic Hybrid (2006-9)

~5000 Lexus IS hybrids

~4500 Honda CRZ

~3400 Lexus GS hybrid

~1500 BMW i3

~1400 Renault Zoe

~1000 GM Volt/Vauxhall Ampera

~700 Tesla Model S

~500 Lexus LS hybrid (big big luxury saloon)

~400 Nissan e-NV200 (plug-in van! probably mostly British Gas)

~370 Peugeot iOn*

~300 Renault Twizy

~280 BMW i8 (okay, maybe I keep seeing the same i8)

~250 Mitsubishi i-MIEV*

~200 Citroen C-Zero*

~74 Renault Fluence

~50 Tesla Roadster

 

* - same car badge engineered. total  = ~820

Note how the only hybrids seeing any real success are Japanese...

 

I tried to search for 'geoff' because of Top Gear, but then I remembered geoff is a rebodied, re-engined TVR Cerbera.

[warren t claim]

 

I think I'll redress the balance with a Maserati taxi.

[cort16]

The i3 seems to be doing well around these parts 1500 isn't bad given the time period they've been out. I can't believe there are 5000 Mitsubishi phews they're gawping .

[dollywobbler]

My estimate to charge a LEAF was £10 per go at least. 2p? I don't think so unless you've got a solar farm in he back garden.

 

2p per mile would be plausible I think. S

 

I'm testing a VW e-Golf later in the month. I'll try and do some more sums then.

[cros]

SSE. 2p was what she was quoted by the salesman

Unusual for a salesman to get something like that wrong.

[Pillock]

Yeah, one unit of electricity (aka 1KWh) is 15.7p on average, across suppliers across the country, last year.

 

A 13A plug-in device (kettle, toaster, leccy car etc) can be 3KW Max, that's 13A at 230V. So assuming it's charging as fast as it can from a socket and you've not got it hard wired into the consumer unit, 3KW for 12 hours is 36KWh, or £5.60 per charge.

[jonny69]

Don't see many Leafs used as taxis but there are a handful in my local area being used as runabouts. When I go into London (which isn't that often these days) I notice the number of Priuses now being used instead of black cabs - probably reflective of New York which I visited about 5 years ago and they had pretty much ditched all the old yellow cabs for either Priuses or their purpose-built hybrid cabs. I noticed a big EV I hadn't seen before being used  as a taxi when I was last in London, then this morning there was something which I thought was a Kia MPV in front of me but it was in fact an EV from a brand I'd never heard of before and it was running a lot of re-gen by the sound of it.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Don't see many Leafs used as taxis but there are a handful in my local area being used as runabouts. When I go into London (which isn't that often these days) I notice the number of Priuses now being used instead of black cabs - probably reflective of New York which I visited about 5 years ago and they had pretty much ditched all the old yellow cabs for either Priuses or their purpose-built hybrid cabs. I noticed a big EV I hadn't seen before being used  as a taxi when I was last in London, then this morning there was something which I thought was a Kia MPV in front of me but it was in fact an EV from a brand I'd never heard of before and it was running a lot of re-gen by the sound of it.

That would be one of these

A company called Thriev have got 20 of them . A BYD E6.

[forddeliveryboy]

I've seen a couple of BMW i8s, but the i3 isn't doing well, probably down to it being hideous. When I'm down in that there Londinium I see quite a few though.

 

That's odd, the Leeds dealership can't get hold of enough to sell. I thought it was a success story. Do you mean it's hideous aesthetically, or just hideous altogether?

 

 

 and it was running a lot of re-gen by the sound of it.

 

Regen technology has to become commonplace for stop-start use. With battery cars it's good, but so inefficient since the batts can't take the energy in fast enough, offhand about a quarter of the energy can be captured, on a good day.

 

There's no reason regen tech can't be applied to vehicles without leccy motors, Bosch is trialling a system with refuse lorries which compress air and PSA are intending making a regen vehicle using something similar. Using hydraulics and compressed air, regen is more than 3 times more efficient compared with batteries. Courier firms are using it in the States, too.

 

I'd say tiny petrol/gas engines running as generators for hydraulic hybrids which use compressed air to store energy would be great for lighter vehicles if batteries don't get several times lighter, which is unlikely. Hydraulic motors are a fifth of the weight of electric motors and work easily with air storage. Fashion-followers seem to be in love with electric cars at the moment - our grid electricity is not the clean or efficient thing it's made out to be, at all. Robert Llewellyn, listen up!

[HillmanImp]

Saw a LEAF and an i3 last night at IKEA. There were a few of them all charging there. Not sure if they were staff cars or not?

[Taff]

My mum has a leaf and its the weirdest thing to drive!

She gets 80 miles per charge which isn't much when you look at it but costs 2p to charge fully and takes 12hrs

 

2p a mile, surely?

 

80 miles per charge and a 12 hour charge would suit my work pattern. where do I sign?

[Inspector Morose]

Hydraulic hybrid you say?

 

 

 

This was a Volvo hydraulic hybrid built in 1985 using a combined pump/motor and long banks of nitrogen filled accumulators down the chassis. It ran in London for a time but wasn't that great and was stripped of its hybrid drive and sold to A1 services.