[John Kelly]

I've heard some weird arguments against buying an EV since I got mine. From those you can understand ("nowhere to charge it", and "too expensive up front") to those where you're not sure whether theyre taking the mick or not. Three of the most recent strange ones have been

"I love the smell of petrol"
"I have no solar panels so no point in an electric car"
"I don't like the idea that the car will just stop on the motorway if I don't charge it"

Any memorable ones you've heard?

 

[RicM]

"I heard it takes 24 hours to fully charge an EV"

 

[Aragorn]

I can understand the first one, especially in the context of more "special" cars, be it older classics or sports cars etc. The sounds and smells of such vehicles do add quite a lot to the experience. However evidently, buying a Nissan LEAF is not really in the same vein as buying a Caterham.

The last two, well those are just faulty thinking.

I've not had anything particularly out-there, the usual ones are range concerns, which is entirely justifiable in many cases, misunderstandings about charging times, which again, is understandable given the amount of misinformation. People moaning about the cost too, but again, these are usually folk who are running older cars, and clearly as a result ANY new car is "too expensive" compared to their £2k 10 year old Golf, and older cheaper EV's have really hopeless range so you end up reinforcing those points if you try to suggest an older cheaper EV.

 

[srichards]

You have to rent the batteries and they use lithium and cobalt and that's mining something out of the ground and moving it all over the world (forgetting oil is no better)

EVs are massively over priced still. Leasing is about the only way they make some financial sense as normal list prices are usually £10-£15k over the normal ICE version (which is already ££ over priced due to PCP trickery anyway).

 

[cah197]

"I heard it takes 24 hours to fully charge an EV"

That’s what a soldier on the gate said as I drove past the other day in the Tesla.

I didn’t argue. He had a weapon.

 

[Aragorn]

"I heard it takes 24 hours to fully charge an EV"

In some cases, it would
Its not a lie as such, just sort of not quite the whole picture.

 

[RicM]

Yes, MG ZS EV takes about 22 hours on the granny! So yes its true! When I hear that I just try and educate saying yes but on a rapid its only 40 minutes or so. Their interest perks up at that!

 

[mad_rich]

Not heard any crazy excuses. My elderly neighbour has come up with every complaint in the book though

"There aren't enough ... But what about ... They're isn't any ... But you can't ... Where are you going to .... How will they ... We don't have any"

I patiently refuted every argument, then had the exact same conversation with him a month later. I may as well go and bang my head against a wall.

Totally agree with the 'they're too expensive and there aren't enough places to charge' argument though. Nobody I know has ever bought a new car, and for a lot of people a new EV is the only one that's going to fit the bill. Even with zero charging costs, my Zoe cost me 50% more in total per month than my most expensive ICE, a three year old Octavia.

 

[JWilde]

"I heard it takes 24 hours to fully charge an EV"

That one never seems to go away. It's the default reason these days. Consider people who say that would never buy an EV anyway.

 

[ElectricIan]

One that always befuddles me is "if you think you are going to get away with paying road tax forever then you are wrong, you will be fleeced like us lot"
So examining the thinking, they will not do something today because in some distant scenario there may/or may not be a tax that at the very most will be the equivalent of what everyone else is paying. Not even considering that RFL changes have not been applied retrospectively.
I give my view that petrol and diesel will get progressively more taxed going forward to drive the move to EV prior to 2035.

 

[ElectricIan]

Had one yesterday "they are just golf carts no good for towing".
Oh so you have a caravan or trailer? No but if I had an EV I couldn't get one.
I asked if he had ever looked at torque curves on comparable EVs to Ices?

 

[Big277wave]

I get the feeling that some people like the sound of a powerful engine, manufacturers know it, they put a lot of effort into making a V6 'sound right'. When you drive an EV you appreciate just how quiet the are.

 

[Bill N]

Excuses I hear are mostly just a perceived lack of chargers.

Visibility and therefore awareness of chargers is really not great. It’s improved a little recently with more chargers appearing at petrol stations and more prominently at some supermarkets etc.

Yet another area where I think Government is missing a trick, and where some advertising about charger numbers and location could be a good investment.

 

[AndyWilson]

I never understand people who repeatably claim that if you get stuck in a winter snow traffic jam you'll run out of battery and be sitting there shivering and unable to move with no power for heating or traction.

 

[Big277wave]

I've head 'Electric cars give off particulates from the tyres and brakes' as if that makes them as bad at polluting as a knackered old Diesel which produces more particulates from the brakes and shed loads from the exhaust,

 

[i-s]

I get the feeling that some people like the sound of a powerful engine, manufacturers know it, they put a lot of effort into making a V6 'sound right'. When you drive an EV you appreciate just how quiet the are.

True.

But people loving how a V8 sounds doesn't explain why they seem to prefer a diesel 4 over an EV? Most modern performance cars have fake noise piped into the cabin anyway to make up for poorer sounding turbo 4s etc.

 

[Aragorn]

A big part of it is fear of change and fear of something new. And in a way i get that. Mix in a bit of newspaper hysteria and the usual comments that seem to get passed around (every non-EV owner seems to "know" the batteries only last 5 years and then need replaced for £93938882)

If i gave my mother in law my Range Rover, and asked her to fill up the LPG tank... She probably wouldn't manage it. Most folk would struggle on the first go i recon. Its fiddly and awkward and some portion of the time doesnt work right. I've had the car years and even now i still find it fiddly at times. And thats just a slight modification to the normal fuelling-up process. LPG didnt catch on in the 90's/00's and i can see exactly why. The fuelling process is crap, and the conversions almost always had poor range. All sounds a bit familiar really!! Now imagine those same folk trying to operate a rapid charger... They're not the best with tech anyway, apps and cards and stuff? Nope.

I got my mum to drop me at the airport when i had the previous EV and mum drove the car back to her house. She was literally terrified of it to begin with, but she managed to drive it home without issue (i let her drive TO the airport so she got a feel for it while i was there). I suggested she might want to plug it in and charge it up, and said to use it as she liked while we were away. She didnt charge it because "wires" (i'd left the granny plug in the boot) and didnt drive it at all for the 2+ weeks i was away. My brother ended up going over and taking the car to a nearby rapid to charge it up the day we were arriving home so it actually had sufficient range to get us home again.

So yeah, i can understand it. Fear of change, mixed in with lots of BS, and some actual real concerns such as available range, charging issues and cost, and a very real chance of being inconvenienced by it.

I try to correct people, but i often find, despite being an EV owner, that people dont actually seem to believe you when you tell them it charges in 7 hours while i'm asleep, or in 30mins at a rapid or whatever other falsehood. You get a sort of "oh yea?" but with a layer of incredulity...

 

[RichA]

From FB comments (I will try to find it later)..
What happens if you have an emergency 700 mile drive to deliver STEM cells ?

 

[AndyK]

I'm not buying another EV because, frankly, they're all ridiculously expensive and sold to people on the false basis that they'll make all their money back in having no running costs. Manufacturers are treating them as a cash cow because they can claim to not have manufacturing capacity.

 

[firetrax]

-- because hydrogen is the future
-- because the batteries will need replacing every other year
-- because they don't produce an EV (not hybrid) Touran, 3 series, C class etc (actually quite valid)
-- because I can't use / charge them in the rain
-- because electricity is generated using coal so is much worse for the environment than petrol / diesel
- because they’re not self charging
-- because Clarkson thinks they are rubbish
-- because a real man would never drive an EV (or be vegan)
-- because, because, because ....