Rwbill said:
I should mention I'm kind of winging it here, trying to figure it out and make the best of it. Working with electronics, radios, and rechargeable batteries I was always intrigued with the concept of an electric car but didn't think an EV would be practical. But studying what Ford has done, the battery characteristics and its hopeful life, and the generous range per charge of the Focus and everything they built into this car, it struck me that this would cover 99% of my weekly driving to work and weekend errands, and with the deeply discounted charging rates under Dominion Virgina Power, made easy with Ford's software, it seemed worth a bit of a gamble.
As far as the car goes, I have little doubt you are going to love it. As you have figured out it will handle 99% of your daily commuting.
I had forgotten that when you do EV + Home the rate plan is different. Thanks for the link. It is very difficult to figure out if the plan is worthwhile without some way to monitor your "current" energy usage.
I bought this from Amazon when they were on sale for $38, looks like they have gone back up to $65
http://www.amazon.com/Black-Decker-EM100B-Energy-Monitor/dp/B001ELJKLE/ref=sr_1_1?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1343832392&sr=1-1&keywords=black+%26+decker+energy+saver+monitor
If you have the right kind of meter it reads the info from your meter and sends it to the monitor unit. Using this you might be able to get a sense of how much power you use during the day and if it would be worth to switch over.
My wife and I sometimes work from home and during the summer the kids are frequently home, so the EV+Home plan would probably bankrupt us
When they had the hearings for this plan I think I was the only citizen to comment on the plan. I offered the opinion that because of the way the plan is structured what they would get is ONLY the people who for whom it "works" to always be able to charge at night.
There are many nights when I could charge at night, but there are frequently times when I need to charge during the day as well. I think they should have kept the rate during the day the same, and simply gave you are reduced rate for charging the vehicle at night. I know there are many people for whom charging only at night will work. But there are also many people, like me, who often need to charge at least somewhat during the day, at least that is the case for the Volt, the FFE may be different. I think their plan misses the opportunity to get people like me to move a significant portion of their charging to off peak.
Very interested to hear about your experiences with this program, please keep us posted. Probably we should an appropriately titled thread on this discussion.
Did you go with leather or cloth? I wanted the leather, but it was so light colored I was afraid it would stain too easily so I am looking at getting custom seat covers. The kids and I both play sports, so we are often very dirty/muddy.
