400kW CHAdeMO, SUVs Galore and Tesla Dual Motor | 3 Mar 2018
Tesla Dual Motor Seen | Golf And Passat GTE Hybrids Get A Big Brother | eGolf Tops Sales Charts For First Time | EVgo Gets A Makeover | CHAdeMO Gets Ludicrous Mode | Merc EQC Shots Published
Saturday 3rd March 2018.
DUAL MOTOR DELIGHT
Firstly some news in brief, and this a tweet coming from Ride The Lightning podcasts Ryan McCaffrey, or DMC Ryan on twitter…the first dual motor Tesla Model 3 seen on the road: ”I spotted #8370 in the wild this weekend in San Francisco. It’s red with 19″ Sport wheels, if you’re curious.”
GTE BECOMES THREE
…but first, where do you stand on Plug In Hybrids? I think they’re the gateway drug of the next 5 years to get people used to driving on electric. They provide the safety net for those who worry that, for the one long trip they do each year, somehow the tabloid newspapers are right and batteries don’t go very far.
Others say that if you’re going to plug a car in, just plug in a pure battery electric car.
One of the most effective engineering solutions is the way VW’s drivetrain works so well in the Golf GTE and Passat GTE. All electric when you want, up to 80mph, and it seamlessly works with a petrol motor when for either range or power.
Well now the third GTE has been spotted and it’s the ever popular crossover SUV size car, of a Tiguan. It’s been spied testing without camouflage and with the GTE badges on so it’s almost ready. Due to be unveiled in April, production starting later this year in Germany with deliveries before the year end. The Tiguan will probably do 0-60 in that 8 second range if it uses the same 10kWh-ish battery and powertrain from the Passat.
https://www.carscoops.com/2018/03/vw-tiguan-gte-scooped-plenty-plug-hybrid-badging/
EGOLF SALES RECORDS
Meanwhile, in the bit of VW which makes rather larger battery packs, the new eGolf is going down well in Western Europe. According the InsideEVs it was the best selling BEV in Western Europe in January 2018 with 1,864 registered. That’s only a few more than the Zoe and i3 but a win’s a win! The 36kWh battery is nothing to write home about but on recent cold weather test video on YouTube it fared the same as the new LEAF – both of which were beaten by the ridiculously efficient IONIQ with it’s teeny weeny battery.
However Renault will point out that the Zoe is production constrained and they could have sold more – well, they should have built more!
https://insideevs.com/vw-e-golf-was-1-selling-bev-in-western-europe-in-january/
EVgo RAPID PLANS
In North America EVgo is cutting the cost of public charging and they say “drastically simplifying”. Public charging seems to be a bit of a battlefront with a lot activity around chargepoint makers, installers and even the businesses who often foot the costs of having them installed.
EVgo is launching a simple Pay As You Go option alongside a $9.99 / month membership, although there’s a caveat to say what you’ll pay depends on where you are. Membership pricing is by the minute and costs $0.15 to $0.21 per minute. As they’re rapid chargers you’re limited to 60 minutes off peak and 45 minutes during daytime.
NEW MEGA MEGA CHAdeMO
Staying with charging and CHAdeMo could be getting even faster. It’s called CHAdeMO 2.0 and increases the theoretical voltage to 1000volts, and 400kW of power. You may have heard about the recent wave of new 150kW chargers due to be installed this year, or even the 350kW CCS chargers VW’s Porsche are installing at every dealership to promote the Mission-E, or even the new rapid charging networks arriving in Europe.
It’s the ever-present chicken and egg debate – there aren’t any cars to use the spec yet but when someone like Jaguar launch the I-PACE yesterday with 100kW charging, you see all those internet haters pointing out chargers don’t get that powerful.
With almost 20,000 CHAdeMO chargers worldwide, used by the 775,000 cars sold with a compatible plug, it’s great to see investment in future charging needs.
MERCEDES RELEASE EQC PICS
Finally, anything you can do, I can do better. Toady has seen a slew of articles about the Mercedes-Benz EQC electric SUV, the day after the release of the I-PACE got everyone’s attention. It could just be a coincidence, but it’s interesting timing for Merc to release new shots and details of the testing program. I’ll put a link in the podcast description and on the blog at evnewsdaily.com if you want to read “Five questions for Michael Kelz, Chief Engineer EQC”.
https://www.motor1.com/news/234658/mercedes-releases-first-image-eqc/
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