How To Drive An Electric Car Efficiently!
I’ve seen people drive clear across town to save one maybe two pence per liter on some petrol but when it comes to changing a driving habit or checking something or turning something off just something simple that can save you considerably more money whether it’s electric petrol or diesel again people
Tend not to do that maybe it’s because they’re not aware of it they didn’t know it was a thing or they didn’t know it was more efficient to do this instead of that that’s what essentially this video is about to give you my eight nine years of EV experience and test driving pretty
Much everyone in existence to say well this is how to get the most out of it I’ve got a lot of comments recently from people asking how I’m getting so much efficiency out of this car or another car or a press car and they’ve got the
Same one and it’s it’s just miles apart and it’s not a car fault I don’t think it’s anything to do with that I think it’s just a case of change a few things and it can make a big difference one thing that can make a huge difference to an electric car anyway is
Having somewhere to charge at home that’s a huge contentious issue because some have it some don’t it’s roughly 50% of the UK households can charge from home but to be able charge from home you’d need a home charge point and for that you need a home charge installer
Such as these guys now if I needed a home charger they installed mine would be getting one from smarthome charge. co.uk they have a huge array of chargers you can scroll down the list there’s ton of them you’ve got a comparison tool so you tell them what car you’ve got and
They will pick the best one for your particular vehicle they’ve got loads of accessories cables different lengths if you need public charging type two for example they’ve got all that you can pay in full you can pay in monthly installments and you’ve got all options I’ve had mine installed by them my
Brothers Harry’s all by smart home charge and it’s been faultless check their trust pilot score and please thank them for sponsoring this channel so it’s that’s smome charge. co.uk a lot of what I’m about to tell you is probably going to be obvious to quite a lot of people it should be
Fairly straightforward but there are some EV specific things in this video that well it might help you out it might make things more efficiently cuz I am seeing a lot of uh misconceptions out there from new EV drivers because it is slightly different from driving a petrol
Or diesel car but again a lot of what I’m saying will apply to any vehicle whether it’s petrol diesel or electric powered the first one is one that I’m in the wrong place for for that I need to be outside the car it’s tire pressures something that everybody should be aware
Of and due to the inclusion of tire pressure sensors and even the cheapest cars these days I think it’s something that made people a little bit lazy me included but for me they’re a backup at best they to tell you if there’s a slow puncher or a puncher in general a backup
A warning whatever you want to call it they’re not there for what we’re trying to achieve in this video and that’s optimal tire pressures now the savings aren’t massive on this one if you’re 10% too low for example you meant to be at 40 PSI but you’re at 36 then you’re
Probably only going to save about maybe two 3% in terms of fuel costs in any car by having the correct tire pressures but there’s another saving which I think is worth Len into more than that and that’s for every 10% too low the tire pressure is you will increase the tires where by
Up to an around 10% now obviously there’s many variables in this and many different cars many different tires that will change that reading but essentially if they’re not right the tire will not last as long and these are bloody expensive these days so little bit of fuel saving possibly a little bit of
Tire savings as well is worth doing and then of course there’s the safety aspect that alone should be worth people checking their tire pressures and don’t forget about the seasonal change if you last checked yours in August when it was 17° it’s minus5 right now the tire
Pressures will not be optimal at all they would be dangerous but they will be too low because well it’s much colder and that changes everything so for me this is a one some month check for safety and then for optimal reasons the next thing that makes probably the
Biggest change of all is driving Style again quite obvious but a lot of people drive like a lunatic or drive fast hard acceleration you know quick if you want to do that that’s up to you but if we’re talking about pure money saving efficiency then that’s the biggest
Easiest thing to change to have the biggest effect on how much it cost cost you if you drive like a lunatic if you drive at uh BMW spec Motorway speeds for example it’s going to cost you more money in any car because it will use
More fuel now just to put it into some sort of EV context if I drive down to my parents and back again in the Tesla for example when it was summer I did this a few times so I had some good data should we say I got 250 260 miles wow that
Sounds bright out of an economical Journey should we say so over 500 Mi I got about 260 from a single charge driving it at uh more Audi speeds should we say their run back I got about 200 miles so we’re looking at an extra 50 60
Mil worth of range and they for Less fuel just by driving more economically you don’t have to drive like a saint or eek out every little bit just change how fast you accelerate change the maximum speed use on a Motorway for example again fairly obvious but it makes a huge
Difference the next one I want to talk about is regen so this is very EV specific and it’s something which again I think trips people up certainly when you’re you’re new to EVS for example if you’re at 70 M hour on a Moto a just driving forwards the level of reg in
You’re in makes absolutely no difference at all it has no effect on efficiency all it does is it changes what the accelerator pedal does when you lift off it will break hard or it will not break at all depending on what car and what level of regen you’ve picked so
Essentially the efficiency of the car doesn’t change one jot if you’re in a higher level of regen or a lower level level of regen or anywhere in between for me to make it easy for new EV drivers until you get used to them just turn Regent off for to its lowest
Setting whatever your car does because then it’s far easier to drive more efficiently than it is with the regen on its highest level this is quite difficult to explain so I’ll try my best right now I have no regen activated if you will I’m on my lowest level in this
Car which means if I take my foot off the accelerator it just curs forward if you will the only speed I lose is from natural causes should we say but if I’m in the highest level of regen be mode in this case then when I take my foot off
The accelerator whether I’m going uphill downhill doesn’t matter the car breaks not hard but you know quite reasonably hard for reging the reason I say turn it off is because it’s very easy to accidentally scrub off more speed especially when you’re on a long journey or a faster journey by taking
Your foot off the accelerator because Something’s Happened in front of you the regen slows you down quite you know harshly and all of a sudden you’re doing 60 MPH instead of 70 but you didn’t really want to do that so then you have to accelerate back up to 70 m per hour
That will use considerably more energy getting back up to speed than the regen will ever give you I mean hugely more whereas if I’d have just been in no regen or the lowest setting when I let off my my foot off the accelerator it would have just cured at the same speed
It lost very little should we say so what I’m saying is if you want to accelerate that’s what the accelerator pedal does if you want to slow down that’s what the brake pedal does if you do genuinely want to slow down roundabout or traffic or whatever pressing the brake pedal activates the
Regen before the friction breaks so you’re not losing regen At All by changing the mod it’s just changing how the car operates it gives you more regen without asking essentially so again it’s easier to accidentally screw up more speed than you want so therefore do What Porsche have always done with their
Electric cars or car the Tian they don’t have any regen at all they say that the brake pedal does that the accelerator pedal does that so when you let off there it doesn’t slow you down at all automatically and some people prefer that don’t get me wrong if you got
Careful enough right foot then you can drive just as efficiently in any mode but it needs more fness it needs more practice so therefore even the most careful driver in the world will probably again occasionally slow down more than the wanted to just to put that
Into some sort of EV context in my previous previous EV the Nissan Leaf I did this a few times as a test I drove up a continuous gradient it’s about 3 or 4 miles I think it was I can’t remember exactly but essentially I used 7% to get
To the top of this hill I then turned around and went driving down the hill in regen mode of course so so I’m regenerating power and putting it back into the battery which is good but the ratio of that I think is what people think is a lot different than it
Actually is for every 7% I used going up to the top of this hill I got about one and a half% back via regen so if we go off that ratio and every EV will be different there’s many variables 1 and a half to S it’s very poor keeping a speed
Especially again on more on a long journey than in town driving is key maintaining that speed every time you slowed down when you didn’t want to or mean to you have to use a lot more energy getting back up to speed again another thing which a lot of people
Again I think get quite wrong um that are new or have just never driven an EV is using things like heating and air conditioning now I’m not going to suggest turning them off to save fuel that’s ridiculous it’s a car you want to be comfortable and without it it’s kind
Of pointless having it I don’t prescribe to that unless you absolutely have to however if you are on a faster Journey a longer Journey you’re on a motor we dual carriageway something like that it is more efficient to use the air conditioning than it is to put your
Window down to cool yourself down so if it’s too hot all right around town but on a Motorway windows up air conditioning on the heater now this again is something which a lot of people who don’t like electric vehicles seem to think is a negative that when you use the heater
You use a lot of range and it indeed does use range whether you see that as a lot or not is IM material you lose battery because that’s where the heat comes from it comes from your battery the main traction battery look at it this way with a petrol diesel car that
Is always producing a huge amount of heat so you think you’re getting Heat free because you just turn the heater on it doesn’t affect miles per gallon but you’re not because the engine is constantly losing a huge amount of heat and energy and burning all that petrol
Or diesel to just heat up well the atmosphere I guess I mean that’s why they need huge radiators to cool them down otherwise they would literally go BL so an EV only loses heat when you call for it a petrol diesel car loses heat every single Journey it could be
40° Centigrade outside and the engine is still producing a tremendous amount of heat you don’t want that is wasteful obviously doesn’t affect this video in terms of how do I use less but one little tip I do have if I put this on auto and it gives it at 20 Dees for
Example just stick it down to 19 and 1 half or even 19 I bet 90% of people watching this won’t notice any difference of the internal temperature but that one degree it can make enough of a difference to use a little bit less energy we’re not talking huge savings
Here but enough to add to the mix so to speak and one thing that I wish a lot of people would do more of and this does have a substantial difference on fuel efficiency is forward planning if you don’t believe me on this one just watch
Any UK dash cam video and you’ll know exactly what I mean essentially if you’re coming up to a set of traffic lights that are red don’t race up to them and then break hard and sit there stationary and then move off you’ll sometimes get it wrong but
Basically try and drive up to it gently and then wait until it turns green and then you can just keep going basically try to do it so you don’t stop the car stoping the car and starting again stop in the car and starting again in any car
Is inefficient so try and do it less for example if you can up to a set of traffic lights you we say certainly after a a dual carriageway or a Motorway off a slip Road something yeah high speed if you can see they’re red then well slow down try and keep going try
And keep that momentum going so you time it so just as you approach the traffic or the lights they go green that’s the hard bit predicting it and obviously if you’re familiar with the road that helps but essentially not stopping will save you a good wedge of fuel and therefore
Money so many times you see people flying past you to just stop quickly so you can see they can see it’s red just the same as you can and they accelerate past you into stationary traffic so not only are you using more of your brake paths for example you’re wearing them
Down quicker why have you accelerated into essentially a dead end it makes no sense it’s not got you any further you’re not getting in there any quicker it’s Bonkers I mean a lot of what of them saying like the forward planning is really from a safety perspective it’s
Better again just look at the dash cam stuff it’s just you can see what’s coming but they can another EV specific thing which again can help with efficiency on the journey at least is preheating the car now not every car can do this but the majority can certainly
The newer ones these days where you get your phone out and you press the you know heater on the app you you preheat the car and a lot of those will also heat up the battery the difference being in terms of efficiency if you plugged into a charge Point whether it’s at home
Home or anywhere else the electricity or fuel can come from the charge Point rather than depleting the battery first so you’re setting off with a near Dam it full battery but the car’s already up to temperature so you’re not scraping it down in Winter which is a brilliant
Thing and the battery is warmer as well therefore will operate more efficiently and use less fuel like a petrol or diesel car when they’re cold they use more so to summarize forward planning tire pressures weight I didn’t mention that actually but any unnecessary way out of the car how you drive the driving
Style that’s a huge one if you just drive more sedately or H to slightly lower speed on the motorway that will have a big difference you’ve also got the air conditioning instead of using your windows down that can make a little bit of a difference but not a huge
Amount the regen thing there’ll be people in the comments saying I use the highest level all the time because I prefer one pedal driving and that’s fine but in pure terms of efficiency and the ease of getting that efficiency out of the car for me stick it to its lowest
Setting because then again you’re not screwing off speed accidentally and using a hell of a lot more energy to get back up to speed right uh I think that’s it again a lot of this will be fairly obvious to a lot of people some of it
May not be but that’s you know if one person gets something out of this my job is done uh so thank you for watching thank you for the channel existing because if you didn’t it wouldn’t if you want to help the channel out at all become a member that’s 99p a month you
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Most of this applies to any car but some specific electric car ‘driving habits’ can trip people up when it comes to using as little fuel as possible.
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