charging on the move question

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musicman1812

New member
Joined
Jul 13, 2018
Messages
2
I have just purchased a late 15 phev ..... and ok with home charging but a little unsure on charging away from home do I need to subscribe to a charging card/scheme ...with an account based payment system or are you able to pay as you go ...?

if i have to subscribe to a payment /charging provider who is the best to go with and why?
 
Hi Musicman,

this forum has readers from all over the world. It therefore is a bit tricky to give any suggestions without knowing if you come from America, Australia, GB, ...

But in this specific case, I think an answer is possible nevertheless:
A charging station on the road can help you in case that it just fits nicely with your travel plan and the tariff is acceptable.

In all other cases, it will be more economical for you to use the enigne and run on fuel.

Best regards, Harald
 
There are numerous UK-based charging networks, each with their own foibles and peculiarities. Each has different pricing structures; some are subscription-based and some are PAYG, and many aren't available where you want them! There are various apps out there like ZapMap which consolidates the various networks onto a single map, and shows you which ones are suitable for your car, which ones are reported as working and which are available.

But before you get too involved, you need to work out if it's actually worth your while to charge. Assuming you're mid-journey, you'll probably want to rapid-charge rather than wait 4-5 hours to recharge the battery via the Type 1 socket. This means using the Chademo socket, which only charges to 80% in 20 minutes or so to preserve battery life. So you'll get another 20 miles (or less) of range. That would cost around £3 in petrol. How much would it cost to recharge the battery? Well, it depends (of course!), but you might be able to get it for less than £3 if there's an available (and working) charge point where you need it. On motorways in England, it's often Electric Highway, which sometimes vends free, but otherwise costs 30p per kWh, which would be cheaper by around 60p

So would it be worth the hassle of finding a working, vacant charge point to save 60p? Unless you can find one on free vend, many people would say it's not worth the hassle. YMMV
 
musicman1812 said:
I have just purchased a late 15 phev ..... and ok with home charging but a little unsure on charging away from home do I need to subscribe to a charging card/scheme ...with an account based payment system or are you able to pay as you go ...?

if i have to subscribe to a payment /charging provider who is the best to go with and why?

In the U.K. Ovo the domestic energy supplier have created a domestic electricity tariff called EV Everywhere. The domestic electricity is from 100% green sources and the tariff is fixed for 2 years. I am currently paying 13.4p per kWh which is ok though not the best. Apparently they also support Economy 7 though I don’t have it. The relevant feature is that this tariff also includes 2 years free membership of the Polar plus EV charging network which would normally cost £7.85 per month. Polar, which claims to be the largest public charger network in the U.K., is owned by Chargemaster and was recently bought by BP.

Having said all of the above, I agree with other commentators that for most of us charging the Outlander PHEV en route is seldom convenient and worth the time and effort. Since I have had free membership of Polar I have only used it twice and on one of those occasions I only did it to preserve my Polar membership which lapses if you go six months without charging.
 
ThudnBlundr said:
There are numerous UK-based charging networks, each with their own foibles and peculiarities. Each has different pricing structures; some are subscription-based and some are PAYG, and many aren't available where you want them! There are various apps out there like ZapMap which consolidates the various networks onto a single map, and shows you which ones are suitable for your car, which ones are reported as working and which are available.

But before you get too involved, you need to work out if it's actually worth your while to charge. Assuming you're mid-journey, you'll probably want to rapid-charge rather than wait 4-5 hours to recharge the battery via the Type 1 socket. This means using the Chademo socket, which only charges to 80% in 20 minutes or so to preserve battery life. So you'll get another 20 miles (or less) of range. That would cost around £3 in petrol. How much would it cost to recharge the battery? Well, it depends (of course!), but you might be able to get it for less than £3 if there's an available (and working) charge point where you need it. On motorways in England, it's often Electric Highway, which sometimes vends free, but otherwise costs 30p per kWh, which would be cheaper by around 60p

So would it be worth the hassle of finding a working, vacant charge point to save 60p? Unless you can find one on free vend, many people would say it's not worth the hassle. YMMV
The 4/5 hours charge might be worth it if it gains you a free parking spot.
 
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