Help me decide???

Hi everyone, For the last two years I have been enjoying my 2011 Chevrolet Volt. I love driving electric and I love saving money on all the gas I don't need. My car is fabulous and I have never owned a car I like better. I would love to get one for my wife so that she's not putting $200 a month in gas in her '97 mini van (16.5 mpg OUCH!), but I can't afford it. Recently I found a used 2012 iMiev with 8800 miles, ES with QC (except there are no QC stations in our area). The dealership has had it since November and I negotiated a price of $10,500 which is only slightly more than i'd pay for a golf cart. My monthly payment if I finance for six years would be $203 a month ($3 more than my wife spends in gas) plus this frees up the Van for my son to use, he's currently car-less.

My wife is a homemaker who does a lot of short trips (grocery store, church, takes my daughter to school, takes my son to work), so I think the car would work for her. We have the car on a three-day test drive to decide. Here are my worries: the range seems low to me? In my Volt 40 miles of range seems fine because if I go over the engine comes on, but in the I after full charge it reads 69 miles with the A/c off but only 50 with it on. When i first got the Volt it's estimator read low but improved after the car got used to my driving. Does the I's estimator improve over time as well? Also after reading the Owner's manual it talks about battery degradation. Mitsubishi estimates a 20% decrease over 5 years and another 10% at 10 years. Of course I could replace the battery at that time but a replacement may cost more than I payed for the car originally....in other words I don't have money to throw away on a toy, I need a real, useful vehicle for short range duties. In addition I'm worried that with such lackluster sales Mitsubishi may abandon this product within 10 years.

Here's what I need. Any thoughts from forum members that address these concerns or any pointers that I may not have considered. Thanks, I'll be looking forward to any help

The RR meter makes it's computation based on the actual energy usage over the previous 15 miles, so yes, it does 'learn' your conservative driving technique and give you a higher number on your next recharge - Of course, if your previous 15 miles was running the freeway at 70, it will then give you a lower number. The number on the gauge immediately after recharge actually has little to do with how far you can go on that recharge, since it's estimate is wholly based on how you drove during the previous charge

I lose 10 to 15% when I switch on the A/C, but even using it everyday, I can still drive an average of 65 to 70 miles. Can't tell you much about battery degradation as few of us have experienced much if any - I still get the same RR numbers after a charge now after 2 years and 18,000 miles as I got on day one. I think 20% at 5 years it probably a bit high, but then I suppose Mitsu is covering it's bases by preparing us for a worst case scenario

Sounds like you found a great deal! - I predict 2 or 3 years from now, you'll be really glad it came with the QC option . . . . mine didn't

Don

Hi,

I will just tell you about our 2 years experience with the european sister of i-miev (the Citroen C-zero) : it has same motor 67HP and same battery pack 16kwh !

My wife works form 9am to 12am and then from 3pm to 7pm.
In the morning, she drives 30km (19miles to work) and again back, so 38 miles.
During her lunch break, the car is plugged with a 240v - 10A charger during 2,5 hours.

In the afternoon, she drives again same way, so again 38 miles. In total, 76 miles, in summer as in winter.
And it's really all right working.

Now, the car has 18500km (11500 miles) and does not show a relevent decrase of autonomy ! Thas fine and we are happy with the car

Test it both ways: driving fast and driving slow and see if your wife can make all daily commute. After 46.000 km and 20 months my range is at least 70 km in the winter driving fast, AC on, heater on and can be more than 150 km driving slow (under 60 km/h in the summer).

So, if your wife's commute is less then 50 miles, I-miev's range should be enough. If she can charge between trips, even better. However, she always has a choice to drive slower to extend the range if needed.

iwatson said:

...My wife is a homemaker who does a lot of short trips (grocery store, church, takes my daughter to school, takes my son to work), so I think the car would work for her...

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Absolutely! The i-MiEV is simply great for that type of local use. She can plug in anytime she comes home and the trick is to make this very easy: locate the EVSE so the right rear of the car is right next to it and thus all you need to do is unwind maybe 3' of power cord to plug the car in. This business of dragging long dirty power cords around that I see my friends with Leafs and Volts doing is a disincentive to charging, IMO.

+1 what Joe said
Just get in the habit of plugging in if you're going to be parked for more than 1 hour during the daily running around.

JoeS said:

the trick is to make this very easy: locate the EVSE so the right rear of the car is right next to it and thus all you need to do is unwind maybe 3' of power cord to plug the car in.

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The EVSE is a 240v blink unit that is installed in my garage. It was positioned for my Volt since the Volt's charge door is on the left front fender, it's positioned on the wall in front of the car as you pull into the garage. Since the imiev is so short it works just fine but there is more unwinding of the cord to deal with unless she backs in. However, I think it would be better for her to pull straight in (based upon her backing skills). Having the charge door at the right rear of the car is without a doubt, the worst location they could possibly come up with, but I'm sure we'll adjust. She's decided that she likes it, so we're going to keep it.

iwatson said:

The EVSE is a 240v blink unit that is installed in my garage. It was positioned for my Volt since the Volt's charge door is on the left front fender, it's positioned on the wall in front of the car as you pull into the garage. Since the imiev is so short it works just fine but there is more unwinding of the cord to deal with unless she backs in. However, I think it would be better for her to pull straight in (based upon her backing skills). Having the charge door at the right rear of the car is without a doubt, the worst location they could possibly come up with, but I'm sure we'll adjust. She's decided that she likes it, so we're going to keep it.

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iwatson, with all due respect, I completely disagree with you as to the charging port location on the vehicle, as I consider the i-MiEV's location ideal, and it also works very well with curbside EVSEs.

First, locating the EVSE in a garage on either the right side by the garage door or on the left side further in allows having to only unwind 3' of charging cord - quick and clean as it never touches the ground.

Except for my own garage (because my EVSEs are located on the right close to the door and are able to charge cars outside), I invariably back into all parking spots and public EVSEs - it is a lot safer when pulling out into cross traffic. Sorry, but IMO backing cars up safely is a simple skill that all drivers should be proficient at.

As an aside, lot has been written on this subject - a couple of examples:
http://theweek.com/article/index/212052/why-back-in-parking-is-safer#axzz349jvidFm
http://www.indy.gov/eGov/City/DMD/Planning/Projects/Village Documents/Back-In-Angled-Pkg.pdf

The Volt's left-side charging port location means that when parking the car in the garage there has to be a gap between the car and the wall of about 4' to keep from dinging the door. This means two things:
1. If it's a two-car garage then the car now takes up an inordinate amount of space in the middle that could be utilized for a wider passageway.
2. The charging powercord needs to be unwound at least 6'-8', certainly less convenient than 3', and now risks dragging the cable on the ground, getting it dirty.

We've had these discussions many times with other EVers and, sorry, the iMiEV's location wins the argument. But that's ok: offer to park the i-MiEV backwards for your wife into the garage in the Volt's spot and she'll appreciate the ease of pulling out of the garage and being on her way immediately - who knows, she may even try to do it herself eventually.

I tend to agree with Joe. I always back into EVSE spots, and the way my driveway is set up, I hung my EVSE on the wall between our garage doors and ran the cord under the door to a box outside. I can park either in the garage or outside (which is the norm now) and charge, backing up the driveway (which I've always done, even before the i-MiEV) and right into my spot. I stay forward and block the left garage door since the car in the garage is rarely driven, leaving open a path for the ATV and tractor in the other spot to get out of the garage without moving any cars. With the LEAF, I'd either have to nose-in park in the same spot or have the EVSE on the other side in the garage. With the Volt or any of Ford's plug-ins, I'd have to back down the driveway or turn around in the morning, which would wreak havoc on the grass. It's much nicer to unplug and drive away, already facing the way I want to go.

69 miles is around what I see in the winter. In the summer, I see 74-80 miles remaining. If the normal use of the car are multiple short trips with breaks in between, you can probably get away just using the cord included with the car. Is there an outlet by the right rear of the car when parked in the garage? You could use the i-MiEV's included cable to charge from a 120 volt outlet and have your Blink unit moved to where you park your Volt.

JoeS said:

We've had these discussions many times with other EVers and, sorry, the iMiEV's location wins the argument.

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Whoa Joe- debating the merit of charging door locations may be second only to determining whether dark brown upholstery was a valuable interior upgrade.

I've actually had to park my i backwards on a one-way street and have also double-parked a few times to be able to reach EVSE that was apparently installed with only the LEAF in mind (front of the stall with a short cord). There's no clear winner for all situations. I've been tempted to do what Tacoma Power did. Our local electric utility requires all fleet vehicles to back-in for parking as a safety measure, so when they added LEAFs to the fleet, they spliced into the J1772 cabling on brand new vehicles and added a second charging port on the back bumper of their cars! I've tried and failed to find the electrician who actually did the mods to see if that means the second inlet goes hot (energized and exposed pins) when the other is in use. Safety First! :?

Almost makes me wonder when we'll see the first flip-up license plate charging door. Sure seemed like a good idea in 1970, when gas tanks were part of the rear crumple zone....

iwatson said:

...I negotiated a price of $10,500 which is only slightly more than i'd pay for a golf cart. My monthly payment if I finance for six years would be $203 a month ...

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Something seems wrong. 72 payments of $203 equals 11.5% loan. If you can get a 4% loan, you can knock the payments to $165/month --- less than what your wife pays on gas.

-Barry

JoeS said:

iwatson, with all due respect, I completely disagree with you as to the charging port location on the vehicle, as I consider the i-MiEV's location ideal, and it also works very well with curbside EVSEs..

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Oh, I agree 100% - The passenger side rear is the perfect place - Thank heavens they didn'tput it in front like on the Leaf

When parked, the charge door is about 24 inches from our EVSE location on the narrow wall between our two garage doors. We keep both the charge handles in a plastic bucket on the wall and we only use about 3 feet of cord. In two years and many hundreds of recharges, neither cord on either of our EVSE's has ever touched the garage floor - The way they are stowed, they aren't long enough to reach the floor when plugged into the car or when resting in the bucket

Having the charge port on the drivers side would require a couple less steps, but then the cord would be in the way when walking from the drivers door out the garage door. The pax side rear is *perfect*!!

Don

jray3 said:

JoeS said:

We've had these discussions many times with other EVers and, sorry, the iMiEV's location wins the argument.

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Whoa Joe- debating the merit of charging door locations may be second only to determining whether dark brown upholstery was a valuable interior upgrade. ...

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Jay, you're right, I misspoke, and I like your analogy. Nevertheless, I stick with my opinion as to the i-MiEV's charging port location and arguments in favor of it. Other than it being more convenient to back into a public EVSE, what are the arguments against this location?

JoeS said:

Nevertheless, I stick with my opinion as to the i-MiEV's charging port location and arguments in favor of it. Other than it being more convenient to back into a public EVSE, what are the arguments against this location?

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I think the main disadvantage of a rear passenger quarter charging port is that the driver has to walk all the way to the opposite corner of the car (34 feet for a round trip!), while the Focus/Volt front driver quarter panel location is more convenient for the driver- especially when you've forgotten to release the charging door, and have to do a second lap around the car! ;-)

The LEAF must have the most convenient/unforgettable location, but it's in a very vulnerable position...
Nevertheless, I'm quite satisfied with the i-spot.

jray3 said:

I think the main disadvantage of a rear passenger quarter charging port is that the driver has to walk all the way to the opposite corner of the car (34 feet for a round trip!), while the Focus/Volt front driver quarter panel location is more convenient for the driver- especially when you've forgotten to release the charging door, and have to do a second lap around the car! ;-)

The LEAF must have the most convenient/unforgettable location, but it's in a very vulnerable position...

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Let's see... I pull the lever inside to open the port, get out of the car, shut the door, walk the twelve feet around to the right rear of the car and plug it in with its 3' cable, and then go off on my merry way. Reversing the process gives me a total of about 25' walking. Don't forget the distance for the Focus/Volt to walk to/from the EVSE with the cable. Less total walking distance and time consumed than handling/coiling a dirty longer cable. All I can say is that it's a helluva lot faster and simpler than what my friends with the Leaf and Volt do. If a Leaf's EVSE is mounted on a garage wall straight in front of the car, then the run can be short but the car cannot be squished up against the wall as you need access to the front. The i-MiEV can be snuggled right up against the right wall as the J1772 can be plugged in while standing behind the car.

As I said earlier, making it very quick and easy to plug in fosters daily opportunity charging at home. I suspect with forethought the EVSE location can be optimized for each car. 'Nuff.

BarryP said:

Something seems wrong. 72 payments of $203 equals 11.5% loan. If you can get a 4% loan, you can knock the payments to $165/month --- less than what your wife pays on gas.

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I think you forgot the sales tax and Doc fee. Interest rates are based on credit. Let's not talk about that! Suffice to say it's not as low as 4% but not as high as 11%

JoeS said:

with all due respect, I completely disagree with you as to the charging port location on the vehicle, as I consider the i-MiEV's location ideal, and it also works very well with curbside EVSEs.

First, locating the EVSE in a garage on either the right side by the garage door or on the left side further in allows having to only unwind 3' of charging cord - quick and clean as it never touches the ground.

Except for my own garage (because my EVSEs are located on the right close to the door and are able to charge cars outside), I invariably back into all parking spots and public EVSEs - it is a lot safer when pulling out into cross traffic. Sorry, but IMO backing cars up safely is a simple skill that all drivers should be proficient at.

We've had these discussions many times with other EVers and, sorry, the iMiEV's location wins the argument. But that's ok: offer to park the i-MiEV backwards for your wife into the garage in the Volt's spot and she'll appreciate the ease of pulling out of the garage and being on her way immediately - who knows, she may even try to do it herself eventually.

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Let me respond to your points:
1. You certainly can disagree with me as long as you understand that I can disagree with you. Even though you've had these disussions with other EVers and you think it's all settled, each garage or parking location is certainly different, but for me as soon as I exit my Volt i make two steps ahead to pick up the handle of the charging cable, plug it in and then the door to the house is right there. Your's was set up for your i, but mine was set up for a Volt. You claim that you've had this discussion many times and the imiev wins the argument. Based on what?

2. You sure obsess a lot about a dirty cord, it's in every post. Maybe my garage floor is so clean that it's not a problem, or maybe I always use the handle when I use it!

3. I agree that every driver should be proficient at backing, but since "should" is the operative word, I don't think the "Edith Bunker's" of the world should be denied the pleasure of enjoying an EV and saving money in the process. I say if they can't back, life will just be a little less convenient than someone who can or someone who drives a Volt.

4. Never have seen a curbside charging station. I'm sure your right and they do exist, just not around here, doubt if I will ever see one.

5. Regardless of whether you back in or pull straight in, regardless of how your garage is configured, regardless of whether or not you get your cord dirty, you can't get away from one inescapable fact. The charge port on the Volt is right by the driver's door where the driver gets in and out of the car, and the charge port on the i is in the back on the opposite side where the driver must walk several paces to the rear and around the back of the car.

I didn't come on this forum to insult any of you. I am thrilled with my wife's car, she likes it as well but the charge door location is less convenient than the Volt!

It's as if i-miev owner's have an inferiority complex and get very defensive about their car. It should be noted that I have been aware of the i-miev since 2008 when Mitsubishi began toying with the notion of bringing this car to the U.S. This was before Nissan announced the Leaf. I even looked at a right-hand spec I-miev at an auto show in 2010. I have tried (since purchasing my Volt) to get my wife interested in a BEV, but she has resisted until now. We have taken two test drives in a Leaf but she did'nt like it. My main interest in this car was price, I realized that the Chevy dealer that had it could not get rid of it since the car had been in their inventory since November. The original owner traded it in for a Volt.

This is a great little car, and it suits our needs. Sales of this model have not done well compared to the leafs, volts, prius plug-ins and Tesla's. There are many reasons, one of which may be convenience when plugging in. My wife says it's no big deal and she adds that "I can't understand why I like this car but I didn't like the Leaf".

iwatson said:

5. Regardless of whether you back in or pull straight in, regardless of how your garage is configured, regardless of whether or not you get your cord dirty, you can't get away from one inescapable fact. The charge port on the Volt is right by the driver's door where the driver gets in and out of the car, and the charge port on the i is in the back on the opposite side where the driver must walk several paces to the rear and around the back of the car.

I didn't come on this forum to insult any of you. I am thrilled with my wife's car, she likes it as well but the charge door location is less convenient than the Volt!

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My Smart ED has a passenger side rear charge port location.
My EVSE is directly beside that location when I park my car in the garage, so I have a 4 foot cord length configured.
My garage is detached from the house, so when I get out of my Smart, I walk to the back of the car, plug in, and close the garage door.
Obviously, this is more efficient in my case.
Also, because my car is so small, it leaves a huge amount of room in front of it that would otherwise be compromised if I had a different charger location.

To each their own.

The i's charge port is more useful for curbside charging than the Volt's, at least on left-hand drive models. It's the same old gas filler argument, should it be on the right, left, or in the back under the tag?

iwatson said:

... each garage or parking location is certainly different...

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Yep, in my case the electric power gods blessed me by having the iMiev car charging port where it is because that’s right where the 240V comes in my house--- actually on the outside of the garage is an RV panel. The electrician punched a hole through that panel and then into the garage and wired my 240V outlet (11” distance). He then charged 10x less than what he expected (if running power from my basement panel).

Also next to it, he put a dedicated 120V 20A socket if I wanted to slow charge. But it ended up being slightly cheaper to just charge at 240V and I believe the balancing works better at this voltage. And that’s what we use. I use the 120V 20A outlet for my electric lawn mower (I sure like electric stuff).

iwatson said:

…Sales of this model have not done well compared to the LEAFs, volts, prius plug-ins and Tesla's. There are many reasons, one of which may be convenience when plugging in…

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Just bad advertising. All my acquaintances never heard of a Miev. If everyone knew that iMiev’s are the cheapest to buy AND charge (and maybe the most EV cargo room), they’d sell more. Money talks.

It’s funny, I have two Prius’s. One’s gas tank is on the left, the other is on the right. I keep forgetting…

BTW, for me, it’s safer to back out of the garage instead of back in. I’ve done more damage backing in and zilch damaging ‘pulling/driving’ in; same with my wife.


-Barry
(knock on wood)