You Bought Your First EV, Now What?
- numocity
- October 23, 2022
Globally automobile industry has witnessed strong growth in electric car sales for the year 2022. For those already owning an Electric vehicle, it is predicted are ahead of the curve. Recent research suggests that EVs require 30% less service and maintenance than gas-run vehicles. This is due to the absence of mechanical parts that otherwise regularly need maintenance in an ICE vehicle. However, a few misconceptions around the high maintenance cost of Electric vehicles act as a barrier preventing them to be buyers’ first choice. The longevity of your car depends on the model and make of it. However, the lifespan of your EV depends on how well you take care of your car. Here are 4 Tips Every New EV Owner Should Know to make their vehicle last longer
Intelligently Maintain Battery Life
In recent times, standard warranties are being offered for up to eight years/160,000km by most electric car manufacturers. If needed electric vehicles also come with a provision for replacing the batteries if required. However new EV owners can Intelligently Maintain Battery Life by following a few simple steps. It is important to recharge the EV’s battery between 20-80%. One should allow partial charging of up to 80% to leverage the usage of regenerative braking. It is also advised to prevent your EV battery from totally draining before recharging. This can lower overall battery life. The recommended lowest percentage bracket to recharge your EV before it goes down lower is 20-30%.
A fully charged or fully drained out non-functioning EV also causes the battery to degrade. Thus EV owners are advised to turn off the MCB in case they are not using the battery for more than four days. Fast and frequent charging also strains the vehicle’s battery life faster than standard charging. Too much electricity into the batteries in a short period affects the longevity of the EV’s battery life.
If the EV’s battery is not maintained well, it also impacts the EV’s performance as well. Other ways that you can maintain and sustain your EVs battery life are by –
- Using original chargers as they are compatible with the EV’s model and approved and provided by the same manufacturers. This remarkably reduces EV fires and decreases the chances of malfunction.
- Avoid incidental damages such as dropping the battery or bumping it with other objects. This increases the risk of fire and causes damage to the thermal management system inside the battery.
- Do not charge when the EV has a high temperature. Many EV owners make the mistake of recharging their vehicles immediately after riding them. This is when the temperature of the battery is extremely high. The battery and vehicle need to cool down before being put to recharge again to sustain the battery life.
Avoid Extreme Temperatures and Direct Sunlight
- It is highly advised to all EV owners to avoid parking their cars in direct sunlight. This is especially applicable in tropical countries like India. In such areas such negligence causes cases of vehicles catching fire due to high temperature. An automated temperature control system is
installed in the electric vehicle that drains the battery to maintain optimum efficiency and low temperature. This helps regulate the temperature while the EV is parked, thus decreasing the risk of vehicles catching fire. Thermal management system when not affected by direct sunlight functions using grid power. This safeguards EV from varying in temperature throughout operations. EV Owners should avoid charging an EV in direct sunlight or during cold seasons. This increases the risk of damaging the battery. Hence, EVs should be opted to be charged in the shade, especially in extreme temperatures and rainy seasons. The optimum solution to keep batteries is at room temperature.
Few tips to ensure to avoid EV from Extreme temperature
- For tropical countries experiencing direct sunlight and high temperature during the daytime, nighttime EV charging is best. Since the temperature during the night times is considerably low, it prevents the vehicle from overheating.
- For EV Owners underground or covered parking is considered the foremost choice. With optimum ventilation and without any direct sunlight the EV receives the perfect atmosphere to cool down before its next use.
- Another tip while parking your EV is to park it on a spot used by a car or a truck. This will prevent heat from radiating onto the EV, from the bottom surface. This is because the used parking in an open area is comparatively cooler than a space receiving direct rays of the sun.
- It is suggested to let the batteries settle down for some sometime before charging them. Avoid charging batteries within an hour after use.
Leverage usage of Regenerative Braking
That’s the basic concept of regenerative brakes, which are widely used in the latest electric cars. With cars requiring large amounts of input of power, every time the driver hits the brakes, all the energy collected tends to go to waste in form of brake pads as heat. Electricity has the flexibility to change into many other forms due to its high grade of energy. Whereas heat energy is hard to use in different ways being of a low grade. This heat energy through regenerative barking changes to high-grade electrical battery power and is reused to run the vehicle. Regenerative braking works on storing this lost energy and resuing it while accelerating the car next time. This provides an edge with using energy more wisely rather than wasting energy through frictional braking. It’s recommended to recharge lithium-ion batteries to roughly 80% rather than fully charged. Partially charging allows adequate room in your batteries. This permits regenerative braking in Electrical Vehicles to transform kinetic energy into useful energy.
Few Advantages of Regenerative Braking System for a new EV Owners are
- For owners experiencing stop-and-go traffic, regenerative braking supposedly provides most of the braking force.
- Regenerative braking is believed to extend electric vehicle ranges by around 10%-25%.
- The entire process leads to more fuel-efficient braking and better fuel consumption.
- Regenerative braking reduces wear and pollution by conservation of the energy lost earlier.
Install a charger at home with Smart Charging
With advancements in charging facilities, new EV Owners are advised to install a dedicated charging point at home. An EV Car Charger Station At Home is faster and has built-in safety features. Various governments globally are now encouraging and providing subsidies to help ease the cost of installing an EV charging infrastructure at home. Incentives such as tax exemptions, and waving some portion of their electricity bill can now smartly be availed by EV Owners. Home charging also lets owners benefit from the ease of selecting the right electricity tariff helping EV owners save money in the longer run. These rapid home charging facilities have now introduced smart charging apps. These applications let EV owners track and schedule an EV’s battery charge and get insights into their car’s usage.
EV Car Home charging facility brings features like
- Compatibility with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant,
- Allowing the owner to charge two cars from a single circuit.
- Load-balance between multiple units.
- The LCD Display showcasing EV Charging.
- All-Weather Compatible and Waterproof.
- Ability to schedule charging time, and send you reminders and notifications.
To make this more resourceful and affordable, under the Peer-to-Peer charging schemes, money can be made by renting out the EV chargers. To reduce this charging cost further, one can opt for methods using renewable energy systems. Green solutions like the usage of solar or wind power can be the best examples that, automatically help in reducing carbon footprint. Home charging helps you avail of this option of green energy tariff thus helping you save a fortune on electricity spent on charging your EV.