Charging
With over 100 instances of charging on the public infrastructure, I feel confident in saying that it’s actually pretty good, despite what the mainstream media would have you believe. The number of failed chargers/charges I have had have been just a handful. Excepting that I refuse to try or trust Ecotricity, on the whole, the rest have been reliable and accessible. Some of the original Polar ‘Ultra Rapid’ 50kW chargers are showing their age now and I am keen to see how these will be replaced or maintained going forward. Instavolt have become my charger of choice for mid-journey charging with Polar in second place or when I need a longer charge as the reduced rate of my Polar subscription is handy compared to others. Overall, I have averaged a kWh price of 17.25 pence in the last year which is actually lower than the peak rate cost at home.
Tip 1: Unless you’re confident with the process to get the charger started it is always worth locking and unlocking the car just before you plugin or start the charge as the car has a fairly short timeout on the gateway to allow charging and this can cause issues.
Tip 2: When using an AC charger, the charge will stop if you unlock the car and need to be re-initiated. So, if you’re using a fast charger at a supermarket/shopping centre and you return mid visit to put your shopping in the car. Remember to unplug and re-plug the charger cable to set it off again. I also got caught out when registering the car at a hotel charger and being given a slip for the windscreen. I forgot to re-start the charge and lost precious hours of electrons as a result.
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