Possibly the biggest single conversation that people have had around the adoption of electric cars is range and if an electric car meet their needs.
Despite the fact that the average daily mileage in the UK is around 20, most people still want to have the assurance that they can make the occasional long-distance trip without having to stop and use the public charging network which is perceived - with some occasional justification – to be time consuming, expensive and unreliable (its really not that bad….}
The net effect of that is that car manufacturers have been stuck in a range race, installing ever bigger batteries into cars to get them to go further so that there’s a bigger number on the label to satisfy people’s desire for the odd road trip.
But what if you live on the Isle of Wight and you don’t have the nagging feeling that you might want to dash off to John O’Groats on a whim? Then you can benefit from a bargain EV with a smaller battery, that whilst not so attractive to those on ‘north island’ will still run you from Bembridge to Freshwater or Ventnor to Cowes multiple times between charges.
In this blog I take a quick look at those cars, picking out three that I have a soft spot for that are ideal for local use with a great price tag.
First up: the Mazda MX-30
From a commercial point of view it seems Mazda made a mistake with this car, they were banking on people being comfortable with a small battery low range car that would do 99% of trips, in reality the MX-30 has not sold well and the cars on the second-hand market are now bargains.
The MX-30 is equipped with a 35kWh battery that will take the car a comfortable 120 miles, more than enough for local use. Reviewers praise the high build quality of both the interior and the car itself; the car features rear hinged passenger doors that are not everyone’s cup of tea. In general the space in the back is limited and further diminished by small rear passenger windows.
This is a car that you want to be sat in the front of, which for many users is 99% of the cars jobs anyway. Performance is good without being hair-raising with 143 horsepower at the front wheels.
The really exciting thing about the Maxda MX-30 is the price with astonishing bargains whether new or old.
Some examples from Autotrader include:
An older 2021 model with 28,000 miles for £8,500.
Through to a 2025 model with 450 miles for just £13,999!
Next up is another quirky car that goes back a bit further in time, the BMW i3 (not to be confused with the recent BMW i3 (NAO)
This car was produced between September 2013 – August 2022, sold 250,000 units around the world and won the prestigious car of the year award in 2014, personally I think it looks great, and I recon it’ll be an EV classic in years to come.
BMW designed this car from the scratch as an electric platform with an emphasis on lightweight construction and sustainability, it features an all-carbon composite body and an aluminium chassis. Like the Mazda the i3 has rear hinged rear passenger doors that might not please everyone, but let’s face it if you are buying a compact car then the rear seats and their accessibility are not that high on the priority list.
i3’s came in three versions with a 33 and 42kWh battery and a third version with a range extending petrol motor tucked away in the rear of the car to provide additional range. The 33 will manage everything the Isle of Wight will throw at it and I have looked at both here.
Example prices:
A 33kWh 2018 model with 66,000 miles for just over £7,000
To a 42kWh 2022 with 45,000 miles for around £13,000
No post like this could go without the inclusion of the orignial mass market car in the EV world, the Nissan Leaf.
Available since 2011 the car is now in its third iteration, but here I will concentrate on the first and second generation models that are both perfectly capable for island life and possibly the best bargains on the market of any car!
Note, these are full size cars without the rear seat squish that both the Mazda and BMW i3 suffer from.
The first generation models were available with either a 24 and 30kWh battery, the 24s are known to be robust and a ten year old model may still have around 75% of its capacity and usable range left (not bad for an ‘old tech’ car without any flashy battery management that nay-sayers thought would be disposable). In practice that means a ten year old 24 will roughly go from Cowes to Ventnor and back twice on a charge.
In early 2018 the second generation leaf was released to the market with refreshed looks, and new interior and a new 40kWh battery. Overall, this car is much more modern that its predecessor, but it still has a smallish battery and is it a rehash of an old idea meaning that this particular model is a steal on the second hand market.
Some examples from the market:
A 2016 24kWh with a good battery for around £3,500
To a: low milage 2023 40kWh model for just £11,000
Conclusion, the real bargains here are the Maxda MX-30 and the Nissan Leaf. The BMW is less of a deal, but I wanted to include it as it receives such high praise from owners and it is a bit more compact which helps when your commute is down Isle of Wight country lanes…
*Buyer beware!! – among the older first generation Nissan Leafs are a few ‘lemons’, mostly the imported ones before the Sunderland factory was up and running in 2014, any Leaf buyers should familiarise themselves with the displayed ‘bars’ that show the remaining capacity, or better still request the battery data that can be obtained through an app.
As mentioned at the beginning there are many many more second-hand full size EVs out there for under £15,000, other notable cars would be the VW iD3, MG4 and the Hyundai Kona.
If you you are hankering after the famous 'new car smell' then you can even get a brand new compact EV for around £12k (Dacia Spring and Leapmotor TC02).
At Wight Community Energy we are encouraging the electric transition for a multitude of reasons, if you have any questions about 'Going Electric' then feel free to drop us a message via our contact page.
