Kelvin

There are a few conversion companies out there doing wheelchair access conversions of EVs.

Maybe I lead a blessed life. No problems going to the tip and no problems running an EV 😂 I have a friend who gave up on their EV and went back to a diesel. However, my view of their situation was more her attitude towards it. Constant panic over range anxiety despite only ever driving locally. I know many people with EVs. All of them have had our experience more or less. None will go back to ICE cars.

It’s not fortunate. It’s just how it is (well apart from the free charging) The practical difficulties are over stated. Sure if you have no off street parking it’s a challenge.

I’ve done 20,000 miles in mine in 9 months including many trips between Scotland and England. Other half has driven all over the country in it with work and neither of us has had any problems. I’ve come across two broken chargers in all that time but there are generally other chargers nearby. I’ve had to queue but only a handful of times. We went to Lewis , Harris and Skye for our summer holiday and again no issues. Do you need to plan a little more, yes but not much. It’s also not a Tesla so we are even at the mercy of the wider charging network. There are loads of new charging stations going live so much so that we can probably do Scotland to England (425 mile trip) in two stops. If that wasn’t good enough I’ve powered a concrete breaker from mine and all our camping stuff is now electric including a portable induction cooker all powered from the car. I won’t ever buy another ICE car. And for the time being most of the public chargers where I live are free.

What are the practical difficulties?

Like I said I’ve not had any of that experience in two counties. Just good fortune I guess.

That doesn’t make any logical sense because on any given stretch of road there will be someone that has gone way above the speed limit. The traffic survey results are used to show what the 85th percentile wet weather speeds are in each direction.

I’ve taken exactly those photographs. We’ve submitted the splays today and offered the photographs if they need some visual evidence. There shouldn’t be an issue with visibility as we meet the guidelines and I own all the land within the splays and there’s nothing now above 1.05m. The traffic survey is something that’s referenced in the traffic planning policy document they use as the guide. The company I spoke to about it conduct the survey over 7 days. Typically they look for at least 200 cars in the survey (100 each direction) so a few speeding cars won’t make a difference. I’ve spent weeks at the plot clearing the site of dead trees and gorse and never seen anyone speed on that road. I probably drive it faster than most. 😂 I’m surrounded by old folk and tractors so I reckon the average is below 30mph

Ours is a little bit bigger and the ASHP has been calculated at 8Kw. 3 phase adds some complication but for £1000 more it’s worth it even if you don’t use it initially. For us to get 3 phase it was going to cost many thousands compared to £750 for single phase so we went single phase. If the transformer ever gets reinforced I might revisit it. I put big enough ducting in to pull 3 phase cable through.

I must have been fortunate to live in Cambs and Perthshire as never had any trouble getting rid of stuff. I generally start off with trying to give stuff away for free on Facebook Marketplace.

Going off-grid is hard. I was speaking to a guy recently who does it and he is without power a lot of the time. He doesn’t need it for heating and hot water though. As above though you can save a lot of money with a grid supply if you do all the donkey work yourself. All SSEN had to do at my site was pull the cable through and connect it at either end. They even complimented me on my tidy cable trench and kiosk as apparently the previous job was a nightmare. Although it depends if they have to reinforce the grid supply to make your connection. The quotes don’t cost anything and you can extend them if you aren’t ready.

How hard is it to take your stuff to the tip? I’ve lived in Cambs now Perthshire and I’ve not come against any barriers. I had to get an approval form for a trailer in Perthshire but other than that

The average daily mileage is steadily falling and is now something like 20 miles a day. Most cars spend the majority of their time parked up. I live very rurally and our EV spends most of its outside the house. The issue is this new world of EVs, V2G, ASHP, flow rates, PV and battery storage, when best to consume electricity etc is far too complicated for your average punter to understand nor actually care about. Look at the complex discussions that happen on here about the most efficient way to run all of this. That’s the real barrier to adoption for a lot of this plus the cost of it all. Meanwhile typical housing stock is poorly insulated and badly built.

That’s partly why the tax dodge was put in. It doesn’t really matter why people change their habits as long as they do.

Exactly. The number of phone calls emails and chasing I’ve had to do and we’ve not started building yet.

If you are going to charge x% of the total build cost then you are taking on more responsibility for the whole build. It’s certainly what I would expect of someone charging me in such a way. If you are just offering advice/consultancy on aspects of it then figure out an hourly rate and charge her for time spent.

Thanks. I wasn’t going to draw a line to the bend on the submitted drawing. The picture above was just for reference. Over the weekend I cut the remaining hedging back to the boundary. I measured 2.4m in from the verge to the midpoint of the drive entrance then 1.05m up from the finished planned ground level and I can see well beyond 60m to the west (towards the bend) and to just over 60m east back up the hill. Something else to add to the plot buying due diligence whenever anyone asks what things should be considered.

Personally I wouldn’t.

It is rather scary yes. I haven’t told my other half as she’s away (dad died unexpectedly) but I think it puts the knackers on our self-build as I dread to think what the kit price will increase by if they pass the cost on to me. Have a meeting with them tomorrow.

By ‘leak filed’ do you mean a soakaway? If so you need a percolation test done to determine if the ground is suitable and where best to build it. Soakaway’s need to be 10m from a watercourse and 50m from a borehole and 15m from a house. The size needs to be calculated. Treatment plants need to 7m from a house. You also need to consider trees.

This is 2008 all over again only significantly worse.

Bloody hell. At least you’ve started! I’d be triple checking everything is in the right place.

Exactly. However, it seems to me the only way forward is to first freeze the price at the current rate and pay it back over many years. This addresses the current unaffordable prices. Then they do a complete review of how electricity is priced. The model was put together with an assumption that rates would never increase like this.

Indeed. I’m going to draw it out myself cut the hedge back and take some pictures with a 50mm lens.

My architect is being a bit difficult about this. Says we need another survey rather than him just doing another drawing with the splays added. The earliest I can get a survey done is 4 to 5 weeks. But I’ve been looking at splays on the planning portal and many are simply hand drawn red lines drawn to scale on block drawings to show the splays and maybe some photographs so not sure why it needs surveyed again. I have a meeting with the architect on Monday. I’ve been down at the plot today I don’t think we’ll have any trouble with visibility. I’m going to have to cut more of the hedge down though which I’ll do tomorrow.