Thanks lndi, spoke with the car insurance dept who referred my query to the underwriters. They are happy to cover both the car and battery so long as I declare the combined value as the market value of the vehicle. They are also happy to cover the cable under the third party liability section.

Thanks again

The test drive yesterday was intended to be a definitive test to prove whether a Zoe is feasible for my needs. It was going to be a categoric ‘yes’ or ‘no’, either it passed or failed depending on whether it could manage my commute on a single charge. Unfortunately, the outcome was marginal, so the answer is ‘maybe’. Let me explain…

The commute I was testing, home->work->home is a 65 mile round trip. I was testing dealer->work->home->dealer. I figure that was a fair test since the dealership is more or less on route (just a slight detour). Also, being a cold winter day (4 deg C) it was a good test of the worst case scenario for performance with a cold battery.

The salesman assured me that it should be able to manage this journey. When I got in at the dealership, the demo Zoe was showing a range of 57 miles on a full charge, so in theory wasn’t going to pass. The salesman assured me that it was because the computer on the demo car is used to doing short test drives, and so would be more likely to give a pessimistic range. Sure enough, the range did waiver about a bit, and once I was going it started to look fine that it was going to pass the test.

Nine miles in, and I parked up at work (got my phone connected, put some music on, started to ‘bond’ with the car). I was also keen to check out a public charging point that was at a restaurant about a mile from my work and on my route back, partly to check that it really exists and is usable, partly to have a go at connecting it up, and also partly because the range was still looking marginal as to whether it would make the journey.

I wasted about a mile trying to find the restaurant, just because the pin on Open Charge Map was in the wrong place, but I eventually found it. It was a Zero Carbon World point, no smart card to scan and the restaurant was closed (nobody about to ask if it’s okay to just use without being a customer) so I just drove up and used it.

If I’m honest, it was all a bit of an ordeal. I got “Ongoing checks” on the dashboard and it clearly wasn’t charging. After ringing the salesman for advice, and some ‘fiddling’ with the cable, it did eventually start to charge. I left it charging for just ten minutes, taking the battery from 72% to 80%. In hindsight, this invalidated my experiment, but I was paranoid that I would end up stranded a few miles from the dealership at the end of the test, and I thought it was useful to have a go at using a public charging point.

It then came to disconnecting the cable. I managed to get the Zoe to release it’s end of the cable fine, but the charging point end just wouldn’t release the cable. Again, I had to ring the salesman for advice, and we tried various combinations of flicking the trip switch on the charging point, putting the Zoe back on charge etc. before finally the charging point spontaneously let go of the cable.

Back on the road and I completed the circuit, with the low battery warning coming on in the last few miles. I arrived back at the dealership with 5 miles of range left. The trip reading showed 67 miles (expected it to be 65), so I must have travelled an extra 2 miles in looking for that charge point and for the slight detour to get to/from the dealership from my commute route.

Hence the test result was a very marginal pass. Yes, I made the full journey, but not enough contingency for my liking, and I had done that small extra recharge too. Really I want to be able to get to work and back from a full charge at home without depending on a top up.

I’m convinced that without that ten minute top up I would have been ringing the dealership to bring out a tow-truck. However, there are a few other factors going through my mind…
– This was more or less a worst case scenario in terms of the temperature of the battery, and I’m led to believe that the range will be significantly better in Spring / Summer / Autumn.
– Whilst I really wanted to prove it can do it all year round, it’s not completely out of the question to have a contingency scenario of a ten minute top up near work at the coldest time of year (and I’m asking my employer if they’ll consider installing a charging point. Unfortunately a granny cable wouldn’t be feasible at my work car park).

So, my conclusion is that the Zoe is feasible for me, but only just. I’m in no rush to buy, so my gut instinct is that I would be best to wait for the newer engine to get that extra range that would make it comfortably capable all year round.

I think I would only be tempted to take the plunge now if the dealership were to offer me a deal that was ‘too good to be true’. As it stands, the deal is very competitive, but I’m fairly certain that good PCP deals aren’t going to disappear overnight, especially considering the recent news that the European Central Bank will soon be introducing quantitative easing in the Eurozone for the first time ever. Since Renault are very definitely a Euro company, I can only see PCP deals getting better, not worse.

On the positive side – absolutely loved the car itself. It was a joy to drive at either end of the journey and was brilliant on the dual carriageway – didn’t feel like a “small” car at all. The concept of switching to an EV suits me well. At the moment my old, high emissions, high tax and inefficient ICE is only used on evenings and weekends since I commute by train, so only doing 3000 miles per year. The financial case for a Zoe really stacks up well if I alternate between train and car commuting and increase my mileage to 7500 or 9000 per year. I wouldn’t want to completely give up the train for work since I value being able to read and do things on my commute, but I’d quite happily alternate have a month season ticket followed by a week or two of driving, and then back to the train for another month.

So, my conclusion: I love the Zoe, I’m completely on-board with the environmental side, and it stacks up well for my situation. I’m in no rush to buy, however, and that slightly higher range coming some time this year would make it more than feasible for my commute all year round, I’m thinking it really makes sense for me to sit tight for now. Meanwhile, I’ve not yet properly researched other options for a low-CO2, high MPG ICE, so even though Zoe is top of my list, I need to check out my other options before I’m certain.

Thanks lndi, I’m going to call the car insurance department on Monday to ask about the battery/cable.

I didn’t get the 17inch wheels in the end. I got a good deal (well I think I did) on an ex-demo. The ex-demos didn’t have the larger wheels and if I wanted them it was to be a factory order and a wait until the end of march so I sacrificed them for a good deal and delivery next week. May look to upgrade them later if that is an option.

I’ll need to have a look for mats. Any recommendations?