The first months driving with an electrical vehicle
It's been almost 4 months that I started driving my electric vehicle and I'm quite used to it already. It's quite a change though. Not only do I go from driving for over 18 years a grey car, to a bright red one , which is the change that makes me the most happy. But I also moved from driving a manual shift gear car to an automatic and from a diesel to an electrical vehicle. Quite an update!
Loading:
I must admit that I had had quite some loading stress beforehand though. While most of my colleagues get a loading device at home, we live in the city centre with no garage or private drive-way where we can install one. Instead, we always park along the road at the nearest spot available. expectations
As a consequence, I am forced to load on public loading points, that are in a city difficult to predict when they are available. As a matter of fact, there's quite some within eyesight from our house, but on many evenings they are all taken and once someone has parked there to charge, the spot is taken until the next morning for sure (also I will not go and spot late at night to potentially move my car anymore).
I can load at work but also there, there are a lot less loading points than colleagues with an electrical vehicle. So where would I load?
I expected and assumed I'd always have to take any opportunity to load when I got it: at a big supermarket parking, at home, further in the neighbourhood. And I assumed I'd need to drive to a supercharger near the highway quite frequently.
Of course to avoid all that, I have used the battery autonomy as one of the main criteria to chose my car, as well as the trunk volume. I checked official data, deducted a percentage...and then once more for winter temperatures and then hoped to find the distance that I could drive up and down in the weekend to my mother or to the east of the country.
Reality
It took me a while to dare to allow my car to go well below 200km distance. I also always charged to 100% at first. But my car app , as well as the leasing company newsletters that the spam new EV users with, keep telling me I'd better not charge to 100% . Pff, fine but I do my long distances in the weekend and I'd prefer not to stop at supercharges while on the road, extending my driving time. So I prefer to start well loaded. Right now I manage to go to my mom and mother-in-law in one go up and down, but that will be tight in winter. And I might manage push it to the limit up and down right now to the East of Belgium but that surely won't be the case anymore in the winter.
But ...when fully loaded, I learn quickly that I don't need to load each time at work at all, as my work-office trips aren't that far. And since I can actually quite easily load at work - hanks to a little teams group, people always move as soon as somebody needs a spot on busy days - I can always arrive fully loaded at home so I rarely look for a spot at home. Only potentially at the end of the weekend. So my image of constantly loading and using /needing each potential loading opportunity is not true at all.
If we are in the east of Belgium, I charge there. The first drive up there ate substantially more from my battery than the projected distance: driving uphill seems to be a killer. And we did not have any loading pole in the area so I charged the first weekends on a simple plug, which took about 28 hours to fully load. Ouch that didn't seem nice. But once again: I learned I do not need a full battery to return : driving downhill actually does not take any energy ;) and in the meantime we got a charging station at our place so now I fully charge in just a few hours.
The only times I needed a supercharger are twice now in 4 months that I combined a drive from the east of Belgium with another drive across the country. When you compare waiting 10 minutes at a supercharger to pumping gas, it seems like a enormous nerve-wrecking waste of time but if you take the mindset to have a nice little break with good music, a moment to stretch the legs (since I've only done it on days with hours of driving) and checking my phone a bit, time flies actually and I was impressed with the quick charging.
So over those months, I've lost my charging stress. I load once or twice a week, mostly at work and usually not to 100% anymore but to 70-80%. I do check my calendar's regularly and the last office day before the weekend is my important charging moment where I load according to plans.
I also find that Flanders has plenty of charging possibilities. Although I can't load near home at whatever moment I'd want, I've been able to do so mostly when I needed (I even once charged because it was the only parking spot I could find in the neighbourhood...ooh the irony). But it is especially the choice of fastchargers within several kms that give me peace of mind now.
But ...when fully loaded, I learn quickly that I don't need to load each time at work at all, as my work-office trips aren't that far. And since I can actually quite easily load at work - hanks to a little teams group, people always move as soon as somebody needs a spot on busy days - I can always arrive fully loaded at home so I rarely look for a spot at home. Only potentially at the end of the weekend. So my image of constantly loading and using /needing each potential loading opportunity is not true at all.
If we are in the east of Belgium, I charge there. The first drive up there ate substantially more from my battery than the projected distance: driving uphill seems to be a killer. And we did not have any loading pole in the area so I charged the first weekends on a simple plug, which took about 28 hours to fully load. Ouch that didn't seem nice. But once again: I learned I do not need a full battery to return : driving downhill actually does not take any energy ;) and in the meantime we got a charging station at our place so now I fully charge in just a few hours.
The only times I needed a supercharger are twice now in 4 months that I combined a drive from the east of Belgium with another drive across the country. When you compare waiting 10 minutes at a supercharger to pumping gas, it seems like a enormous nerve-wrecking waste of time but if you take the mindset to have a nice little break with good music, a moment to stretch the legs (since I've only done it on days with hours of driving) and checking my phone a bit, time flies actually and I was impressed with the quick charging.
So over those months, I've lost my charging stress. I load once or twice a week, mostly at work and usually not to 100% anymore but to 70-80%. I do check my calendar's regularly and the last office day before the weekend is my important charging moment where I load according to plans.
I also find that Flanders has plenty of charging possibilities. Although I can't load near home at whatever moment I'd want, I've been able to do so mostly when I needed (I even once charged because it was the only parking spot I could find in the neighbourhood...ooh the irony). But it is especially the choice of fastchargers within several kms that give me peace of mind now.
Wallonia still has quite a bit less charges though. Eupen has quite some options and Malmedy has some, but the smaller towns have scarce options. So we've already helped out a Dutch tourist at our home. I thought that was funny. We don't put our point publicly though as I'm sure we'd never be able to park in our driveway anymore and we'd always find foreign cars on our spot.
I have also driving in the Netherlands already but that gave me no stress whatsoever as they have so many loading points and also hotels and offices are all equiped with them. Driving electrically, there is a breeze.
I have also driving in the Netherlands already but that gave me no stress whatsoever as they have so many loading points and also hotels and offices are all equiped with them. Driving electrically, there is a breeze.
Oh a last point on the loading: rolling up a wet loading cable in the pouring rain, sucks big time. Ugh. So new thing to take into account when to plan my loadings a bit is the meteo. We are several now at work that rush out at lunch to go and disconnect the cable already at lunch if we are sufficiently loaded when we suspect that rain is coming later that afternoon. (or vice versa)
The driving sensation:
I love the silence of electrical driving. As a pedestrian, I love the increasing number of electrical vehicles on the street and the sound of noisy diesels become ever more irritating.
As a driver or passenger of an electrical vehicle, we have been puzzled a few times of a sound that we couldn't place and then we realized there was a little creek with running water or so outside: things you'd never hear with an fuel based car in the past due to the noise.
As a driver or passenger of an electrical vehicle, we have been puzzled a few times of a sound that we couldn't place and then we realized there was a little creek with running water or so outside: things you'd never hear with an fuel based car in the past due to the noise.
I also enjoy the one peddle experience, which I adopted right away.
Furthermore, I use the adoptive speed control extensively. My EV pulls up so much easier and faster than my former diesel and now I also set the speed control in urban area's to ensure I don't go speeding as a responsible civilian. The only option I can't use is the speed control based on the recognized speed limits as it's too often faulty. My navigation is based on TomTom and it's either TomTom or Mercedes that for example does not know how to deal with the default speeds after you pass a crossing and the differences between Flanders and Wallonia. Too bad, it would have been nice and relax if that worked.
Finally I love not shifting gears anymore, to have more DAB radio channels but also internet radio , super cool interior lightning and all those things, but that's not linked to driving electrically.
I miss the bigger size of trunk from my old VW Touran and the more practical hood cover in there. I also miss the dozen little storage corners in the VW while this Mercedes absolutely has no storage boxes.: I struggle to keep my sunglasses practical at hand but store them without them rolling around. The latter is a true frustration. Keys, bottle, glasses, phone: I all need to prop them in the 2 bottle holders in the middle or push them in the side door with the risk of losing or breaking them.
Furthermore, I use the adoptive speed control extensively. My EV pulls up so much easier and faster than my former diesel and now I also set the speed control in urban area's to ensure I don't go speeding as a responsible civilian. The only option I can't use is the speed control based on the recognized speed limits as it's too often faulty. My navigation is based on TomTom and it's either TomTom or Mercedes that for example does not know how to deal with the default speeds after you pass a crossing and the differences between Flanders and Wallonia. Too bad, it would have been nice and relax if that worked.
Finally I love not shifting gears anymore, to have more DAB radio channels but also internet radio , super cool interior lightning and all those things, but that's not linked to driving electrically.
I miss the bigger size of trunk from my old VW Touran and the more practical hood cover in there. I also miss the dozen little storage corners in the VW while this Mercedes absolutely has no storage boxes.: I struggle to keep my sunglasses practical at hand but store them without them rolling around. The latter is a true frustration. Keys, bottle, glasses, phone: I all need to prop them in the 2 bottle holders in the middle or push them in the side door with the risk of losing or breaking them.
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