Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

My F-I-L only slow charges, and he has the chevy bolt.  He reasons that by slow charging the battery will last longer, and plus he doesn't want to expend the cash to install a 240V Level 2 Charger.  I personally think it's stupid because when you're driving you're discharging the battery much faster than slow charging replenishes it.  Of course, he doesn't travel any meaningful distance, and has three other ICE vehicles, so he doesn't mind if it takes all day to recharge.  


We figured out that he gets about 5 miles per KWH, or 20 KWH per 100 miles of effeciency.  So at $.12 per KWH it cost him about $2.40 cents to travel 100 miles.  Not sure what it would cost to fill up a commercially available charger, but there lots of place around where  you can charge for free, even in my rural area.  I think it's in novelty stage right now.  I'm almost certain that once those "free" charges start to become occupied all day every day the business owners will realize that people are taking advantage of their generosity and start charging.  

At some point economics will be the driver.  When I can do 80% of what I need to do with an electric F-150 (like tow my 20' boat to the harbor and back ~80 miles) cheaper with an EV than I can do with gas then it's game over.  Right now I don't think an electric F-150 would quite do the job I need.  The Electric F-150 is supposed to be starting at $40,000, which is right in line with what a gas F-150 would cost.  The range is not the same, and of course it will take longer to "refuel".  I'd love to see the range/specs when towing medium loads like a boat.  

I think they will appeal the most to people like myself who own 3-4 pickups/vehicles that don't have to rely on one truck to do it all.  I currently own 5 trucks, two for my business, two for personal, and then my sons.  Give the EV a couple of battery capacity upgrades over the next 5-10 year I can easily see that EV 150 fitting nicely in my fleet. Remember, the price of lithium batteries has went down ten fold over ten years.  I'm not sure if we'll still see a drop in price like that but as more and more economies of scale come online I expect them to still drop some, even with increased demand.  

I'm an individual like you

it's got to save me BIG money before it will drive me to buying an EV

One of the big things for me if I were looking right now is that I don't typically buy brand new vehicles. Get them lightly used, let someone else eat the initial depreciation, and I'll still get a decade out of any decent car.

I understand that used EVs right now aren't much of a discount to new. 

Hopefully by the time I'm in the market (5-6 years) there will be a more reasonable supply of quality used EVs on the market at reasonable discounts to brand new.

Or at least if there aren't, that I can find some sort of 0% financing deal, because that's one of the few things that can somewhat offset the penalty for buying brand new. 

electric golf carts don't hold their value like gasser cause the batteries are expensive to replace

I enjoy faster acceleration, but I usually have the V8 which is probably fast enough for me to get in trouble