For the first time, I started thinking of EVs as fun-to-drive vehicles instead of thinking of them as some sort of glorified golf carts.
BHPian shyampsunder recently shared this with other enthusiasts.
I bought the MG ZS EV going against most conventional wisdom around EVs. Here are the major ones:
- This will be my primary car
- The majority of my driving will be on highways on long drives
- I plan to keep this car for at least a decade
After having clocked 7k KMs in 5 months with the majority of them on highways, let’s dive in
Background
I started driving at the age of 21 on the Hyundai i10 1.2 MT. The car is still going strong after 12 years, while it was a hoot to drive given that I had no experience driving performance cars. The car has always been very forgiving and easy to drive as a newbie. The gear recommender is a neat touch. Short and precise gear throws make driving it in thick traffic bearable. This was my ride during my undergrad and hence plenty of memories of it. I have decided to retain this car for short city errands since the car is already pretty old and hence won’t fetch much in terms of resale value.
While the i10 was a competent city car, the lack of a safe body shell or airbags was something we realized later as a critical miss. This was also the time as a family we were doing occasional long drives across TN and hence needed a solid primary SUV. We test-drove pretty much everything in the market in 2014 and froze on the legendary Fortuner. My dad was finding the car a bit too big to navigate on city roads but nonetheless such was the allure of the Fortuner that we were pretty close to booking it. My dad is a big fan of Honda and asked me to check if there was any SUV that they were selling, I did see the CRV on their website but on reading Teambhp realized that its mileage is pretty poor. But decided to go ahead and do a TD. We got the 2.4L AWD CRV as the TD vehicle, one drive on the Chennai OMR and I was sold. Just the engine note and acceleration were something else. But at the end of the TD, my dad checked the mileage and it was a shocking 5.6 KMPL. As a compromise, we got the 2.0L AT and it has been a blissful 10 years of ownership racking up 60K KMs. The Honda CRV was leagues above the i10 in terms of comfort, power, and refinement. The ownership experience has been pure bliss although, I always miss not getting the 2.4L engine, one of the best Honda engines to ever be sold in India in my opinion.
For the longest time, I have had this itch to replace the i10 with a Polo GT. The 1.2L with the DSG was an absolute dream to drive. When I got my first job, the first thing I did was crunch the numbers to see if I could afford the EMI. While the EMI was affordable, it felt like an extravagance that would set me back financially in life, so I postponed that dream.
Soon life happened and I had forgotten about the Polo GT for a while till I heard that the DSG was being discontinued. While I heard good stuff about the new TC unit, the DSG transmission was what made the Polo GT special for me and I couldn’t come to even TD the new Polo GT.
After getting married and having spent 7 years working, I had to shift with my wife to Bangalore with my parents based out of Chennai. This meant lots of highway drives and since the Honda CRV was my dad’s daily driver and driving the i10 on highways was a no-no, decided that this was the time to buy a new car.
The EV fascination
In 2014, I randomly encountered a company called Tesla trying to disrupt the entire automotive industry and I got into the rabbit hole of understanding EVs and what made them different. As a first principles thinker, the tradeoffs made by EVs seemed to hit a sweet spot. Most cars spend their time parked and while they are running they are primarily moving about in cities with a lot of stop-and-go traffic. Fundamentally cars can be charged while parked and in city usage, their regen function increases efficiency. For the first time, I started thinking of EVs as fun-to-drive vehicles instead of thinking of them as some sort of glorified golf carts. I decided to badger my dad to invest some money in Tesla stock, over the next few years it was a roller coaster ride with many prominent folks calling Tesla investors as fools. In the first year of my career 50% of my savings were fully invested in Tesla with the following thought process: “If at all Tesla lives up to the vision, this money should be sufficient to buy a Tesla whenever it launches in India”. Eventually making around 6x on the original investment, while it is not enough to buy a Tesla, was a pretty sweet moment to see Tesla do so well in the market. (For those who are wondering, the other 50% of my money was invested in Reliance Industries prior to the launch of Jio. Needless to say, that has done very well as well).
While I was keenly following Tesla’s revolution in the US, I was following the EV revolution in India, initially, it was a 2W-only phenomenon led by Ather. But soon enough the first proper 4W EVs started entering the market.
Which EV to go for?
My hunt for a new car began at the start of 2022, given my history with EVs and the market’s rapid adoption, I had pretty much decided that my new car will be an EV. The following were the requirements:
Having followed the EV revolution abroad, I was fairly clued into the latest tech in EVs and I don’t want to buy an outdated product
I love to drive and the new car should have plenty of power
It will be my primary car and has to be pretty reliable. I want to keep this car for at least a decade which is another reason to go for an EV because knowing myself if I buy an ICE there is no way I will be able to avoid the temptation of upgrading to an EV in a few years
Good tech inside the car, don’t want tiny screens which in my opinion don’t age well
These were the cars considered:
Hyundai Kona
The first proper international EV to be launched in India ended up reading the team-bhp review on this so many times! This car was top on my list.
Pros:
- The reliability associated with Hyundai. Given that this is an international product being brought in as CKD, the quality was as expected pretty good.
- Hyundai has made a name for itself in the EV market by building extremely efficient EVs next only to Tesla. Case in point: the ARAI range of the Kona is pretty much the same as the ZS EV even though it has a 20% smaller battery
- Good performance as expected
- Some unique EV features such as the option to lower the current draw during AC/DC sessions. This is useful if you are plugged into a socket connected to old wiring in the building
- The probability of Hyundai India being around for the next 8 years was pretty high which is important in case of battery warranty claims
- Ventilated seats are a boon in our weather conditions
- Pretty well priced
Cons:
- The interiors felt quite outdated, especially since the instrument panel was quite basic. This was the deal breaker for me.
- Interior space is quite limited. Pretty much comparable to a hatchback like an i20 rather than a CSUV like the Creta
- An impending facelift meant that this car would quickly become outdated
- The sunroof is pretty small and not a panoramic unit.
- NMC battery pack. Not as durable as modern LFP batteries. Recommended to charge only upto 80%
- I wish Hyundai had launched the facelift in India, would’ve definitely gone for it.
Volvo XC40
I have always been a fan of Volvo and was eagerly waiting for it to launch knowing full well that it was most likely to be above my budget.
Pros:
- Insane performance! I pushed the throttle on an empty stretch of road and I felt my vision blur around me. 600+ NM of torque available on tap was something else
- Android Automotive was pretty seamless, for the first time I was seeing Google Maps navigation inputs appear in the instrument panel
- Decently priced when compared to ICE options in this price range with very poor performance figures. I am looking at you, BMW X1
Cons:
- Very poor efficiency, real-world range lesser than the MG ZS EV or Kona in spite of having a massive battery (50% bigger than the ZS EV)
- Due to the low efficiency and with most DC chargers capping out at 50 KW in India, you will be spending 2x the time to charge. Matters are worse if you stop at 25 KW chargers
- The car as expected was outside my budget and hence dropped. But this is one of the best cars to buy in India if you want incredible power at a relatively good price.
Hyundai Ioniq 5
Pros:
- Excellent EV first design is a real head turner
- Rave reviews globally on the product
- 800V architecture means that your car is future-proofed to take advantage of future high-speed charging stations.
- Plenty of space on the inside, interiors definitely feel futuristic
- Priced well. Prices are very similar to what customers in the US pay which is a big change for us Indian buyers.
- Great efficiency, with a lightfoot, can easily do 500 KMs with 400 – 450 KMs being the norm for most drivers.
Cons:
- Hyundai didn’t launch the standard range 58 KW model in India.
- Performance wise not that different from cheaper options like the Atto 3 or ZS EV
- The car is very wide, which will make it hard to manoeuvre in narrow streets
- NMC battery instead of LFP, battery degradation will be faster than BYD or MG cars
I was desperately hoping that Hyundai launches the standard range model but unfortunately, only the long-range model was launched and hence had to decide against it.
Enter: Firebolt
Booked the MG ZS EV in May 2022 in both Bangalore and Chennai since due to professional reasons I wasn’t sure where I would be to take delivery of the car. I cancelled the Chennai booking after relocating to Bangalore. In the meantime, the excite variant was starting to get delivered, and from a value-for-money perspective, it sounded great. Just to hedge my bets, I decided to make another booking for the Excite variant at another dealer.
After receiving no updates from either dealer, I was approached for the white colour Excite variant in December. I wanted Silver or Red and that was not going to be available anytime soon. Since I knew that there was an impending price hike, I asked the dealer if the exclusive variant can be made available in my preferred colours since the sunroof was anyway something I was interested in. He confirmed and I decided to bite the bullet and make the purchase even though I was traveling in another state.
Had a friend do the PDI by following the team bhp checklist and then asked my bank to release the loan amount. At this point, the dealer threw a curve ball and told me that the car which was inspected had already been invoiced and I will be allocated another car. Had to go through the process all over again but luckily both cars were perfect from a PDI perspective. I only wish that they came with Michelins that the initial set of MG ZS EVs came with. Not complaining because the Continental UC6 set of tires are pretty good as well.
Installed the 15A plug point manufactured by Legrand for the base Nexon EV variant because I live in a rented apartment and didn’t want to bother increasing the electricity load. Hence didn’t install the Exicom 7.2 KW unit that MG provides free with this car. I later found out that several owners in the community got approval from MG India to lower the power draw on their 7.2 KW unit so that it stays within their sanctioned load. So this is another approach that prospective ZS EV buyers apprehensive about the sanctioned load problems can consider.
Named the car Firebolt as a homage to my love for Harry Potter and the solar-powered Pikachu that sits on the car’s dash gifted by mom
Major road trips
Bangalore – Mysore
I had decided that the first road trip on this car would be Bangalore – Mysore for the following reasons:
- Distance wise travelling to Mysore would not stretch the car in any way. Didn’t want to stretch too much on my very first road trip with an EV.
- Good availability of charging infra in Mysore. Booked a hotel with a Zeon AC charger to be extra safe.
- Brand new expressway I was itching to experience.
An absolute breeze to drive this car on the expressway. Thoroughly enjoyed all the power on sports mode without any worry about range. Covered roughly 150 km and reached the hotel with 40% of the charge remaining. Regular EV drivers will be shocked by such poor efficiency but was pretty happy with what I got. The lack of any significant running-in for EVs was another added benefit. Charging at the hotel was smooth. Car was juiced up to 80% by the time we were done with a short afternoon nap and decided to do some afternoon sightseeing in the beautiful city of Mysore.
The AC charger at the hotel is part of the ever-dependable Zeon charging network which is always my first choice for charging the Firebolt on public chargers.
Bangalore – Chennai
For the first trip where I would have to definitely depend on the public charging infra to complete my trip. Although I was reading and researching about EV chargers on my route for more than a year, this was definitely something of a big step.
While it is definitely possible to travel between Bangalore and Chennai with only one charging stop, I decided to play it safe by stopping at two locations. The charging sessions were super smooth and we made it to Chennai in pretty much the same time we take in our ICE cars.
Surya Complex: A gem of a food court with plenty of parking and food options on NH44 70 KMs from Bangalore with very reliable EV charging powered by Zeon. I have even been recommending this place to my friends who drive ICE vehicles.
We generally stop here for breakfast but since it’s pretty close to Bangalore, this means that the car’s battery is 75%+. So I plug into the slower 24 KW charger and leave the 50 KW charger for someone else who may need it to go back to Bangalore. By the time we are done with our breakfast, the car is usually done charging as well.
Aryaas Pallikonda: This is the best place to charge up on this route for the following reasons:
- Falls roughly at the midpoint between these two large cities which means that your car’s battery percentage is below 40% and this allows your car to charge at its peak rate for a longer period of time.
- It’s a 50 KW charger which means faster charging. Charging up from 30% to 90% should take around 40 minutes which is pretty much how much time one need needs for a meal.
- Unlike the ICE world, the charging network operator and the equipment they use are very important for reliability and ease of use. Zeon uses ABB which supports Autocharge which means you simply plug into any DC charger of the Zeon network and it starts charging your car without fiddling with any app or RFID.
- Great South Indian food. Another place I recommend to friends and family.
Bangalore – Coimbatore
The NH44 road is one of the best in the country both in terms of road quality as well as due to the abundance of DC fast charging on this route with 17+ DC fast chargers on this route of ~360 KMs. I look forward to driving on this route every single time.
Brand new 50 KW charger at Omalur near Salem which we used instead of stopping at Surya Complex. Plugged in at 45% and charged up to 90% during our meal. This one-stop was enough for us to comfortably reach home with 35% to spare.
Would I recommend an EV to friends and family?
Mainly City usage:
Absolutely yes if you have a dedicated car parking and the ability to add a 15A power socket, an EV will any day beat an ICE vehicle in terms of convenience because at the end of the day when you come home if you notice that the battery charge is low, you simply plug it in and go home. The next day morning you are greeted with a car at 100%. Range simply doesn’t matter for city usage because of the ability to charge at home.
Another underappreciated point is that as a passenger the EV experience is sublime. No vibrations, no hard jerks due to gear changes, and gradual speed reduction due to regenerative breaking all add up to a great experience. Nowadays when I travel on poorly maintained Uber/Ola cabs, I feel nauseous by the end of the trip. That never happens if I am travelling on a blusmart.
EVs shine in stop-and-go traffic, regenerative braking helps you hate the traffic a bit less.
As someone who loves to spend a lot of time sitting in the car with AC running, EVs are a great fit. Since you don’t have a big engine running, they are very economical. The ZS EV loses roughly 1.5% per hour while idling with AC at 24C. With ICE, there is this nagging fear of idling for too long, especially in closed environments due to the potential build-up of carbon monoxide.
Mainly Highway usage:
This is a bit tricky and it’s something I will recommend to folks if they meet the following conditions:
- Check out your usually frequented routes on plugshare.com, and ensure that there are multiple highly rated chargers on them.
- You love the driving experience of EVs
- You are a tech geek and are ready to put up with the occasional hitches or changes of plans. Your drives are not going to be 100% perfect. In my opinion, all major routes will be fully electrified in a year but you will not have the 100% seamless experience that city drives give you.
Parting thoughts
I see plenty of scepticism and worry about EVs on this forum. Will the battery last? Are EVs a scam? Do they pollute more than ICE vehicles? What if they break down?
While many of us try to share data and mitigate such fears, fundamentally I believe the motorhead community is simply worried about what the future holds for them. The genuine fear is that all the knowledge gained about ICE vehicles over the years will simply become obsolete and driving will no longer provide any pleasure.
While I can’t dispel all the fears, here is my opinion: Before the end of one road trip, I start planning for the next. Every single time I drive this car, it brings me a lot of joy to me as it did when I drove my ICE vehicles.
Driving will always be close to our hearts no matter the powertrain, EVs are not perfect but give them a genuine chance and I am sure the majority of us will find it to be a rewarding experience both from the sheer joy of driving and also from the feeling of satisfaction that we derive from giving back to the society.
Keyword: Why I bought the MG ZS EV: Pros, cons, range & my ownership experience