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I Just recently joined the forum as I am hopefully getting my e:Ny1 delivered in around a week or so. It doesn't look like we have many 'E' owners here or are most 'lurkers' lol. Shout up and be counted, add a couple of pics of your ride for us all to look at! 🙂

An Ode to the Internal Combustion Engine and me having to eat a lot of my earlier words! OK for those who know me well, I think its fair to describe me as a self confessed 'Petrol Head' In both business and pleasure much of my time has had something to do with cars, bikes, motorsport etc. I have heavily modified a LOT of cars and bikes over the years, engines, chassis, body etc etc. Designed and built chassis for companies such as Fraser Nash and some others as well as individual projects. I still love my cars and especially my motorbike and enjoy riding and driving as much for pleasure as transport itself Well, I found myself recently in the fortunate position of being able to order a new car, I quite enjoyed doing my research on various cars and after the usual due diligence something surprising repeatedly came up. The correct car, based on my usage case, economy etc was a full electric Battery EV... I ignored this for a bit, dismissing the gains as minor and I didn't want an EV, soulless and with dubious environment gains, range issues and lack of charging network were my excuses. However, the more I looked, the more an EV stood head and shoulders above an ICE (internal combustion engine) car. I mused this for quite some time and eventually, almost reluctantly decided to order a BEV (Battery Electric vehicle). More research and due diligence later and two particular cars were chosen as the most suitable candidates and one was ordered based on availability more than anything else... This brings me on to last Monday when I went and collected the car. Right, I'm sat in my new car, the handover and paperwork complete as well as a quick rundown on controls and charging etc etc, but due to a lack of demonstrator, I still had never driven an EV, nor even a Hybrid lol. Was I in for a shock! I started or rather turned on the car, and began to pull off, it was steady away, no gears other than forwards or backwards and the usual park and neutral (buttons rather than a gear stick or lever). The car moves forward in near silence, emitting only an almost ethereal whooshy sound, partly by the electric motor and partly from a sound system designed to alert pedestrians and such of your presence. Its most peculiar at first, its so much smoother, silent and refined, although I got used to it very quickly. At this point I was far from sold, yes it was really nice to drive, but it seemed initially to be equally soulless and devoid of character as I had feared and I was oddly missing the sound of an ICE engine and to a lesser degree gears... Next I decided to punch in 'Sport Mode' and test out the acceleration, on paper it should be reasonably brisk with an output over 200BHP and in excess of 320 Nm of torque. A nice straight, even and empty stretch of road that I deemed suitable was found for a quick test of the 0-60 acceleration. I have owned and driven plenty of cars with well above this level of power and was expecting it to be fun and brisk but not hugely impressive. Well, I hit the gas and to my amazement the car launched forward at a most surprising rate, especially from 0-50, where the instant and linear power delivery felt more like 300BHP plus due to that lack of power curve and instant power delivery! OK score one for the BEV! One of the main reasons for choosing the BEV was its economy, I am fortunate in that I have been able to fit a Home charger, meaning I can have extremely cheap 'off peak' electricity to charge the BEV every night. Based on my 'cheap rate' overnight charging this equates to less than 2 pence a mile, yes LESS than £0.02p a mile or put another way 200 miles for well under £4!! OK score two for the BEV! This is a game changer for me! One of my biggest worries was how far in the real world can I drive on a single charge and how bad is the public charging network in reality. This was a big part of my scepticism, 'Range Anxiety' is oft talked about by new EV drivers from my research and I too was worried about it. Firstly, I have seen figures of between 3.5 and 4 miles per kilowatt (Think of this as 'Lekky MPG') This was much closer to the range figures the manufacturer had given than I had expected and was oft reported by reviewers. It will drop lower in the winter for sure and using the heater / AC will also affect it to some degree also, but again a good start! As for the charger network in most places its actually pretty good, once I found a couple of apps for my phone I was amazed as to how many public charging points are available UK wide. Yes, some could charge a bit faster, some areas have less charge points than others, but I have found suitable charging spots for every conceivable journey I'm likely to make and a few crazy ones I doubt I would ever do! The truth of it is I don't ever really drive more than 200 miles without needing to have a break and a pee lol, you can fast charge the car at a motorway services in anything from 20-45 minutes, even 11 minutes will add 60 miles range! By the time you have had a bite to eat or a coffee its going to be pretty much ready for the next part of your journey. OK score three for the BEV! The BEVs are only getting better, in many ways I'm an early adopter of this technology and its very much still in its early days with big improvements in range and efficiency coming almost weekly! The main reason for me writing all this is because I was an EV 'doubter' in fact I was a 'hater' of EV's and didn't like the thought of such a profound change in my beloved cars and bikes etc. Notice I have said nothing about the 'environmental gains' associated with EV's? I have not done so because too much is made of this, it makes running an EV sound like an 'important sacrifice' we should feel compelled to make, where as in reality, they are actually really good fun to drive, massively cheaper to run (not to mention much cheaper to service and more reliable) as well as more comfortable. The fact that they emit 0 pollution is just a great bonus, but before we all feel very smug and green, we need to think about where and how our 'green' electricity is made!! (But that's a whole 'nother' story as they say) I hope this might make another Petrol head like myself give EV's a fair shot before listening to the 'Herd' You will very likely be quite surprised. There is one caveat though, I DONT want an electric motorbike (yet at anyways lol)