[Phil Himsworth]

In the process of replacing the Zoe with probably another Zoe we had half an hour to kill before an appointment at a Renault dealer, so nipped over to look at ioniqs even though they were probably out of our budget.

Oops

Used from last year; basically agreed to buy it, even had a test drive in it, thinking it was a 28kwh before realising it was actually a 38kwh; chuffed to bits with it. Nice to drive, so many clever gadgets, first few trips have all been over 6m/kwh!

We haven't rapid charged it yet and probably won't for ages at this rate, but the only thing I'm not sure about is the location of the charge port relative to rapid chargers; we reverse onto our drive so it's in a much better place than the Zoe for that, but what about rapids? Are there any networks or kinds of charger that can be a pain or even impossible because the cable doesn't reach or is awkward in some way?

 

[dk6780]

Nice! So much more efficient than a Zoe (or LEAF ). I bet that the handling and ride are better too.

That'll teach the Renault dealer to play hard to get!

 

[Hitstirrer]

............ what about rapids? Are there any networks or kinds of charger that can be a pain or even impossible because the cable doesn't reach or is awkward in some way?

Funny you should ask that but I have found that you need to reverse quite close to some chargers to reach. Much closer to the protection bars than you would normally be comfortable doing. And that then makes it more difficult to use the screen as you have to squeeze in between the car and charger.

In particular, I found the Instavolt Rapids quite prone to that problem as the CCS lead comes from the left of the unit and then has to reach right around the back of the car to the charge door on the passenger side. You need to reverse park well over to the left of the bay, on the driver side, rather than central to the bay to gain another foot of lead and avoid a stretch.

It can be such a pain that if there are two vacant Instavolt units side by side I now reverse park centrally in the left-hand bay but use the other Rapid in the next bay to charge from as that lead is much closer to the car's charge door. And then hope that nobody else turns up wanting to use that other unit causing me to have to disconnect and move.

 

[80698]

Used from last year; basically agreed to buy it, even had a test drive in it, thinking it was a 28kwh before realising it was actually a 38kwh; chuffed to bits with it. Nice to drive, so many clever gadgets, first few trips have all been over 6m/kwh!

We haven't rapid charged it yet and probably won't for ages at this rate, but the only thing I'm not sure about is the location of the charge port relative to rapid chargers; we reverse onto our drive so it's in a much better place than the Zoe for that, but what about rapids? Are there any networks or kinds of charger that can be a pain or even impossible because the cable doesn't reach or is awkward in some way?

You should be fine at most rapid chargers as long as you reverse into the bay. Just at certain locations where there are Polar Ultracharge units for example with one charger sharing two bays, you will typically only be able to use one of the two bays. I've had the same trouble with a BMW i3 for example. Most of the time its absolutely fine however.

The 38kWh model is actually slower to rapid charge than the original 28kWh especially if you are plugging in to a charger that can do more than 50kW speeds. Thats pretty much the one and only downside to this model. But as a plus it means you can go further before you need to plug in. Unless you are going VERY long distance where you need to charge a number of times on the way, you should be very happy with it.

 

[Phil Himsworth]

That'll teach the Renault dealer to play hard to get!

Two Renault places missed out on an almost guaranteed sale, we must have been the easiest customers in the world as we knew the Zoe would work for us and that we were willing to pay for it. Bizarre...

 

[Phil Himsworth]

In particular, I found the Instavolt Rapids quite prone to that problem as the CCS lead comes from the left of the unit

It was seeing a picture of an Instavolt charger that started me thinking about this, so that's useful, thanks.

 

[Phil Himsworth]

The 38kWh model is actually slower to rapid charge than the original 28kWh especially if you are plugging in to a charger that can do more than 50kW speeds. Thats pretty much the one and only downside to this model.

We're used to the 22kw of the Zoe, so anything is faster! It is a bit funny they did that to the new model but for us it's a very minor disadvantage well compensated for by a long list of things we really like about it. The extra range is more useful to us, and the gadgets, oh the gadgets...

 

[EVJourney]

Oops indeed.
Out of pure curiosity how much is the total cost of the vehicle? e.g. before trade in and after APR etc. (if there was any of those)

 

[SCanfer]

We're used to the 22kw of the Zoe, so anything is faster! It is a bit funny they did that to the new model but for us it's a very minor disadvantage well compensated for by a long list of things we really like about it. The extra range is more useful to us, and the gadgets, oh the gadgets...

To my mind, the '38 is a stop-gap model. Why? Seems they took the 38kWh pack they had from the Kona, which has a lower voltage than the previous Ioniq. With a fixed max current available at any charger, the result is lower max charging power. As you say, if the car does what you want then its fine. However I find a splash-and-dash at 68kW in the Mk1 really handy on occasions!

 

[Phil Himsworth]

I think you're right. It's a bit of a pity as it would be an exceptional car if they had retained the charging speed of the original. I wonder why they even made a 350v battery in the first place given the effect on charging speed and that somewhere around 400v is practically industry standard as far as I know.

For us it's a very minor problem, but I could see how it could be a show stopper for many. Maybe they'll fix it for the 2023 Ioniq

 

[Patteri]

I think you're right. It's a bit of a pity as it would be an exceptional car if they had retained the charging speed of the original. I wonder why they even made a 350v battery in the first place given the effect on charging speed and that somewhere around 400v is practically industry standard as far as I know.

For us it's a very minor problem, but I could see how it could be a show stopper for many. Maybe they'll fix it for the 2023 Ioniq

Surely the reason for lower voltage comes from the fact that 39kWh Kona is the cheap version of the 64kWh Kona. Hyundai/Kia wants to buy their cells as cheap as possible so the architecture is designed for x amount of cells (the 64kWh) and lower capacity is achieved by leaving out modules from the pack. Economy of scale is in work here, it would have been even more uneconomical to produce an proprietary system for the facelift Ioniq and 39kWh Kona.

 

[Phil Himsworth]

lower capacity is achieved by leaving out modules from the pack.

I had always assumed each module works at the full voltage of the pack, so adding (or in this case removing) modules changes the capacity but doesn't affect the pack voltage.

They must have had their reasons, but it still seems an odd compromise to make.

 

[E7EV]

Are there any networks or kinds of charger that can be a pain or even impossible because the cable doesn't reach or is awkward in some way?

This is how you do it...Bjorn style

 

[SCanfer]

I had always assumed each module works at the full voltage of the pack, so adding (or in this case removing) modules changes the capacity but doesn't affect the pack voltage.

They must have had their reasons, but it still seems an odd compromise to make.

The Ioniq 28 has two parallel strings of 96 cells. The physical modules (maybe 8 or 10) work at a fraction of the voltage of the overall pack.

 

[Phil Himsworth]

The Ioniq 28 has two parallel strings of 96 cells. The physical modules (maybe 8 or 10) work at a fraction of the voltage of the overall pack.

That's interesting and explains a lot, thank you.

 

[Phil Himsworth]

This is how you do it...Bjorn style

All well and good until there's a wall or another car in the bit you need to stick your front end in!

 

[Bodgerx]

To my mind, the '38 is a stop-gap model. Why? Seems they took the 38kWh pack they had from the Kona, which has a lower voltage than the previous Ioniq. With a fixed max current available at any charger, the result is lower max charging power. As you say, if the car does what you want then its fine. However I find a splash-and-dash at 68kW in the Mk1 really handy on occasions!

Yes, if you are mostly using 100kw+ chargers.

The majority of rapid chargers are still 50kw in the UK though. And at 50kw, the charging speed isn't too different between the two. Bjorn's in Norway where there are a lot more 100kw+ chargers, so it is easy to be mislead here.

If you mostly charge from home, and most of your trips are less than 170-180 miles (no doubt a lot of people that have EV) the new 38kwh Ioniq is a better option, even with 100% use or 100kw+ chargers - especially when you factor in the improved interior and infotainment + app.

Another scenario is that you are doing a lot of 140-160 mile round trips from home - you'd always have to charge away from home in the old Ioniq, whereas in the new one you wouldn't. The time saved negates the occasion where you drive 300+ miles when you have to charge multiple times and wait a bit longer than the old one to charge.

 

[SCanfer]

As I said, if the car does what you need it to, then great. However Bjorn Nyland showed that you'll not get as much as 50kW in the cold. And it's the cold where I would most likely need to charge since efficiency drops. There the charging time could be as much as twice as long (32 compared to 68kW) which really put me off this Ioniq. Hopefully Hyundai will sort this out in updates.

 

[Bodgerx]

As I said, if the car does what you need it to, then great. However Bjorn Nyland showed that you'll not get as much as 50kW in the cold. And it's the cold where I would most likely need to charge since efficiency drops. There the charging time could be as much as twice as long (32 compared to 68kW) which really put me off this Ioniq. Hopefully Hyundai will sort this out in updates.

You won't get as much as 50kw in the old Ioniq either if you are using a 50kw rapid charger which, as I say, the majority of the UK rapid chargers at the moment. New would be getting 32, old maybe low 40's.

If you are in Norway with 150kw rapids everywhere and subzero temps 6 months of the year, fair enough, but that's not a UK situation.

 

[Phil Himsworth]

Even in ideal conditions on a 50kw charger there is a fair bit of difference in the charge rate at higher SOCs; look at the gap between yellow and green:

The new ioniq starts dropping at ~52% (19kwh), whereas the old one keeps going until ~78% (24kwh, if that 30.5kwh capacity is right, 21kwh if using 28kwh total (which is it? That's the first time I've seen 30.5...))

The new one is definitely suboptimal in this regard, so if you want to do very long journeys in the shortest possible time it's not ideal. That isn't us, though; the longer initial range is more useful to us than a faster charging rate, and for the few journeys we need to charge more we're generally not in a rush so happy to make the compromise.