Opinions on the best value in a used EV

[rmay635703]

https://www.insideevsforum.com/commu...a-soul-ev.169/

Reminds me of bmw

[Hersbird]

Now the Spark is looking good 400 ft-lbs is much higher and seems to be one of the few liquid cooled batteries.

[oil pan 4]

Don't buy a VW.
My leaf was 7 years old and only sold for about 15% of its msrp.
If you are going to drive it 40 miles a day you will need 240v charging. To replace 10kw you will need to charge for up to 10 hours per day, probably around 8. Plus 240v charging is over all more efficient. You will use a lot more electricity in the winter time, around 25% more.
120v charging wastes nearly 20% in conversion losses, running pumps, fans, ect and just keeping the electrical system powered up all that additional time compared to 240v charging.

[jcp123]

Jon Guzik’s Borrow seems to like SmartEVs. Borrow is a short-term EV-only leasing service in California, and they’ll get you anything you want, but they seem to like Smarts. Not to mention that BBI Motorsport, a fairly acclaimed Porsche tuner, uses one as a shop vehicle.

The Spark EV is sort of the hot rod of the budget EV world though.

Honestly, there’s enough out there that I’d just pick one you like and go with it.

With regards to battery longevity, it’s always hard to say. The sample size is small, and you don’t know who is more likely to abuse their batteries yet.

[ksa8907]

I vote Spark EV.
For what it's worth, I have 129,000 miles and almost 8 years on my Volt which equates to around 40-45,000 EV miles with a maximum of 5% degradation.

I regularly get 9.5 kwh battery "consumption" out of 10kwh when new, when its warm it generally is up around 9.6 to 9.8kwh.
I would put significant importance on active thermal management for the battery in an EV.

Edit: I did the math wrong, about 1/3 miles are EV.

[redpoint5]

Montana is a terrible place to own an EV. That said, I'd get a used Bolt. Your winters will cut the range by 1/3 or so, and you need to leave a buffer for degradation.

[Hersbird]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Montana is a terrible place to own an EV. That said, I'd get a used Bolt. Your winters will cut the range by 1/3 or so, and you need to leave a buffer for degradation.

Last time I saw in 2017 there were under 500 registered in the state although 1/2 of them were in my county. We have 2 free level 2 chargers in a garage downtown, one Tesla supercharger station at a Marriott across town, some kind of charge station at the Nissan dealer, and another Tesla destination charger at a B&B some of my friends own that's actually pretty close to me. I think the Spark can fast charge on that destination charger and technically it would be on the way home ot to work if we did move out to the country. I bet even 10-15 mins on a level 3 would do it.

[redpoint5]

I thought by definition a destination charger was AC slow charging.

Anyhow, the Spark is known to recharge relatively quickly on DCFC, and it's what I most anticipated I would own.

I'm not one to even mention vanity, but in the case of the Spark it's just bad enough for me to slightly care, not that the gen I Leaf is any better.

The thing is, considering degradation and winter range impact, I wouldn't be surprised if the Spark has more like a 45 mile range during the worst part of winter... and I think I read something about defrost being very weak.

I'm curious about the i3 also, but generally the price is higher.

[Hersbird]

I'm trying to figure out the different charges. I know some Sparks have the added fast chargers but they use a unique plug? Somebody online said the Tesla superchargers wont work because there is no way to pay and connect, but the Tesla destination chargers have an adapter and do work but maybe they aren't better than a level 2 home charger. If that's the case where can the Spark be fast charged?
I could also probably convince my work to make at least a 110v outlet available to me while I work which is at least 8 hours a day. They made special spaces available to motorcycles, and years ago I remember an old timer being able to plug in his old Ford diesel to be able to start it after a cold workday.

[redpoint5]

The Spark has an optional DCFC (L3) CCS port. Only CCS chargers will work with the Spark for fast charging, which means no Tesla Superchargers or Chademo (Leaf fast chargers). Sites like Plugshare.com can help you locate CCS chargers.

Tesla destination chargers are AC. AC charging goes through the charging circuit on the car, so it's limited to 3.3 kW.

When you DCFC, the charger is located outside the vehicle, and allows up to 48 kW on the Spark.