This was supposed to be a post about the first 10,000 km in a Honda e, but life happens. So, here we are on a 1-year anniversary to the day. Together with my wife, we’ve driven 16,100 km in this small electric car. Both during the hottest days of summer and the coldest winter days. We’ve mostly used it to get to work and get around the city, but also for some farther drives.
I still haven’t done a proper road-trip in it (the idea was to drive to Vilnius), but maybe next summer. We’ve done a 150 km trip each way and it was fun and not stressful at all.
We both love this car and drive it not out of the necessity, but because we want to, I would say that is the biggest compliment.
Real Range
Every electric car owner knows by now not to believe the advertised range, so every time you say someone the range, there is a question “no, but really, how far can you drive?”.
The only reasonable and truthful answer is – it depends. And it depends a lot. Putting 1” smaller wheels will give you an extra 10% of a range. Fast speed kills the battery, so does the cold weather. It is cheaper for a battery to run AC, than to run a heater (around 5-6 times cheaper).
My usual daily drive (getting a kid to a daycare and going to work) is about 57 km, of which 35 are on a highway and 22 km are in a city. So, I’m getting lower range than you would’ve had just driving around the city.
During warm weather the normal range I can expect is 180 km, if you turn on AC, around 6-8 km less. During the coldest days (we’ve had a couple of days with -25ºC this winter) the range was 100 km (135 if you turn off heating, but I wouldn’t recommend doing it). Although 100 km seems like not much (and it’s not), but this is if you drive normally, have a heater turned on and to a comfortable temperature (so I could drive in a T-shirt), preheat the car from home and again, consider that most of my drive is with a speed of around 100kmh. I think for a small city car, it is an ok result. In the “normal” winter temperatures (+/- 7ºC, the range is about 120 km).
Honda says that the range is 220 km (200 km for an Advanced version, which I have), so I can only confirm that it is very true to real results, considering my driving.
The Expenses
The second most popular question after the range is the price. And here again, everything very much depends on your driving style, weather and speeds. For the whole 16,100 km, my average consumption was 18.1 kWh/100 km. You then calculate this according to the price of the electricity at home. I’ve mostly charged the car at home, and starting from February the electricity cost me €0.14/kWh (it was a bit cheaper before that). So, even if I count it at the latest price, 100 km costs me €2.53. Which I consider to be a very fair price. Of course, if you charge mostly outside or you have higher tariff at home, your price will wary very much.
To drive 16,100 km, I’ve spent around €400 on fuel. Which is not even 3 full tanks of fuel in my diesel BMW at current prices (of course you can drive almost 3,000 km on 3 tanks, but it’s still a lot less).
Apart from the lease itself, during the year I’ve spent:
MOD (KASKO) – €523.80
MTPL (OCTA) – €73
Car Wash – €84
Some small accessories/liquids etc. – €86
Yearly checkup at a dealer – €210
Parking – €5
2 summer wheels – €210
I’ve had to park a car once in a place that didn’t have free municipal parking, otherwise enjoyed free parking in the city for the whole year. Regarding the wheels, I had one blow up while driving and during the changing saw a bump on another one, so had to throw it out. I blame our roads here in Latvia and the size of the wheels (it has a pair of 205/45R17 and a pair of 225/45R17), so that combination cost me 2 wheels in a season.
All The Little Things
As I said in the beginning, overall, I’ve enjoyed the experience. It is a small, nimble car. It drives well, it has a remarkable corner radius for the city. Although considering the size of the car it is on a bit of expensive side (but not compared to other electric cars) its running costs I would say are low. There are still benefits in Latvia, like using bus lanes and most importantly for me – free parking in Riga.
It’s still an attention grabber. I’ve had numerous people asking me questions when I was leaving the car or coming to it. I’ve had to wait for an American woman to take a photo of the car. I’ve had one driver from Germany, who stepped out of his SUV just to tell that he liked the car. I’ve had a nice conversation with a tourist from Belgium, who was considering buying the same car at home. And numerous other conversations with locals. This also brings some responsibility, since the car is so memorable, you won’t get away with doing something bad on the road.
The one big downside during this time we have found is an amount of trunk space, which is almost none. Sure, it is enough for groceries and some small things, but you won’t be able to fit a stroller (only a travel one). Because of that, sometimes, even if the drive was manageable in terms of range, we chose the diesel because we needed to take a stroller with us.
This is also the first car with CarPlay for me, and I wouldn’t even consider getting another car without it. It’s so comfortable and easy to use, you don’t notice when you have it, but instantly miss it when it is not there. If you can get a wireless CarPlay, like we have, I would suggest it.
Of course, I’ve connected PS5 to it, since it has a proper outlet and an HDMI port, that was just for fun, but why not?
Winter Problems
Although overall, I would say it went through the winter with grace, there were a couple of things that I didn’t like and that could’ve been solved.
Door handles. I don’t know what is a deal with car manufacturers, but as soon as they decide to make an electric car, they try to do something clever with door handles. In Honda e it is the most common one – pop-out handles that are flush with a door when closed. Honda says it is done to improve airflow and not loose range due to resistance, I’m not an engineer, so can only agree. But during the winter, they can sometimes freeze. One time one of the handles froze and I couldn’t open the door (thankfully the one on the other side worked fine). But more often they wouldn’t close. So, you had to manually close the handle or drive with handles popped-out, removing the advantage promised by Honda.
Windows. Another pain during the winter – windows without the edge. They look nice, but they start malfunctioning under freezing temperatures. So much so, I had to go to the service once because of that. Of course, applying some silicone to the edge of the window helped, but it is still the weak point of the car.
Charging port. At first, when I saw the port, I was worried about the rain, since it looks like a bucket. I was reassured that there are holes and water doesn’t stay there. All was good until the first snow, when after a night I came to a car with a full “bucket” of what is a charging port with snow. It is hard to get snow out of there, so after a while it is a bit of a mess. There is snow, ice, thankfully it worked perfectly all the winter, but I think the port on the side is a bit more practical.
I know most of the problems are solved with keeping a car in the garage, but it is a city car, where that is not an option, so I do think those are real problems in our climate.
The manual says (and yes, I did read it) that the car won’t even start if the air reaches a temperature of -30ºC, but we came close to that only a couple of days and it worked all the time.
Multimedia screen. When you get into a car in freezing weather, it is slow. Like a minute reacting to a touch slow. After it gets warmer, it starts working normally. And if you preheat the car, it works perfectly from the beginning.
I loved using preheating, it is very aggressive in turning everything on – heating, seat, both front and back window and a steering wheel warming. So, when you get into a car after 10 minutes in freezing temperature, it is completely warm and you can take off your winter coat.
In the end, I still love the car. I love looking at it and driving it. If I had to buy a small electric car today, I don’t think my choice would’ve been different. Even though the market is much bigger. If you understand the purpose of the car and are okay with all the deficiencies, I can’t recommend it enough.
