Budget Electric Vehicles (BYD, MG, ...)

[cove]

I have heard that comment in our work office too.
Not sure why the Chinese product is seen as a problem seeing they lead the world in production of EVs

 

[daft009]

I have heard that comment in our work office too.
Not sure why the Chinese product is seen as a problem seeing they lead the world in production of EVs

And the batteries. CATL anyone?!

 

[UP4014]

Any particular reason?

A few things i guess, high level is why buy Chinese when I can buy alternatives. Doesn't work for everything but I do try and stick to places with better human rights end enviro management and don't have a dummy spit ie when they changed the tariff on wine, coal, ag products against Australia.

Why would I support that if there is a choice.

 

[Cruiser Elite]

A few things i guess, high level is why buy Chinese when I can buy alternatives.

High level? Do you mean quality of product?

 

[hys]

Personally, if you don't need to change your vehicle today, Id consider waiting. Right now everyone (manufacturers) are in a massive race to catch Tesla and are throwing lots of R&D at EVs. I

'd like to think of it as the smartphone race, At the start there was the iPhone and then everyone scrambling to catch up to Apple. Then when it started to catch up in terms of parity, there were loads of very fast year by year improvements. Now the market is matured and even your average budget phone is quite capable.

I suspect we'll see something similar in the EV space with Tesla instead of iPhone.

No, I don't need to change today more of a want than need.

Also hearing there's new competitors in the market as well, ie Vinfast

 

[anat0l]

A few things i guess, high level is why buy Chinese when I can buy alternatives. Doesn't work for everything but I do try and stick to places with better human rights end enviro management and don't have a dummy spit ie when they changed the tariff on wine, coal, ag products against Australia.

Why would I support that if there is a choice.

...except that it's likely most of the components and assembly of the non-Chinese brands are still manufactured / done in China. Especially the batteries.



I test drove a MG ZS EV today. Compared to the BYD atto 3, I'm still partial to the latter, even though it seems like the latter is more expensive, pound for pound on features, save for range.

 

[Quickstatus]

high level is why buy Chinese when I can buy alternatives

Except this thread is about budget EV.
The Germans will make niche 6 figure $ EV
(iX, etron, EQ etc). Their "budget" brand EV - VW ID4 still not avail in AU but won't be budget in price

Toyota bZ4X and the identical Subaru Solterra won't be budget priced either

IMO an EV is Budget if the $ less than $50k. The other measure is a car that doesn't not have to pay the LCT.

 

[SOPOOR]

Does anyone have the mini EV?
Thd resolut is on special for another month,
Test drove it. I like it., but my gut is that it falls short in every department compared to others

Only problem is, reviews are terrible for it, and its virtually the first ev ive driven so ive got nothing to compare it to

 

[kookaburra75]

Does anyone have the mini EV?
Thd resolut is on special for another month,
Test drove it. I like it., but my gut is that it falls short in every department compared to others

Only problem is, reviews are terrible for it, and its virtually the first ev ive driven so ive got nothing to compare it to

I'd been checking it out as part of my searching for potential EVs in the $50k or less range. The reviews put me off, especially the short range, as I need something that can do longer trips out on the highway.
BYD have just released their new models, the Dolphin and Seal. I've driven the Atto3 when we hired it from Sixt. Now BYD have a dealership and yard in Canberra, I'll drop in to take both those models for a spin.

 

[SOPOOR]

I'd been checking it out as part of my searching for potential EVs in the $50k or less range. The reviews put me off, especially the short range, as I need something that can do longer trips out on the highway.
BYD have just released their new models, the Dolphin and Seal. I've driven the Atto3 when we hired it from Sixt. Now BYD have a dealership and yard in Canberra, I'll drop in to take both those models for a spin.

poor range doesnt affect me too much, i love minis but the car just seemed like a petrol car with an elec engine put in it

i kind of think that even the "cheaper" byd, attos etc. etc you will get the electric experience of gadgets, sounds, displays etc etc,
so i dont think i will be pursuing the mini, unless it dropped by another $10k

 

[Gremlin]

i kind of think that even the "cheaper" byd, attos etc. etc you will get the electric experience of gadgets, sounds, displays etc etc,

There's quite a bit of different tech on offer in the different electric cars. In a lot of cases, it may be tech you haven't used before in a car. I'd highly recommend test driving more thoroughly than you would for a commensurate ICE car. Think about how you'd use the tech in real life situations and put it through its paces as much as the steering, acceleration and braking. We found some of the tech varied quite considerably from brand to brand in its efficiency and useability.

Some of it was excellent - eg I love to be able to adjust regenerative braking levels depending on the conditions, traffic density, etc. My initial expectation was that regen braking levels was all about battery/range management, which I assumed was simply going to be rather meh, but NOOOOOOOO!!! I love, Love, LOVE the ability to use one pedal driving in heavy traffic.

We do a bit of heavy density freeway driving, so the autonomous driving capabilities were important for us. There was a noticeable difference between the Level 3 capabilities of the different brands - and not necessarily correlated with price. Some were quite jerky around curves, others very smooth. Some managed smooth acceleration and deceleration and kept at or below the set speed. One of the more expensive ones would routinely go more than 10km an hour above the set speed on downhill stretches, all the while bleating at you to slow down.

Some of the Smart Key stuff was done better than others - some of them won't let you test this in a test drive, but we generally got them to demonstrate, based on things that we'd heard from others. Often there's a 'driver profile' attached to your Smart Key. Or your phone/watch, if your phone/watch is your key. Again, some do this well, but others it can be quite annoying in certain circumstances. For example, it might be quite common to travel with your spouse and both have a key on you. Some would change the driver profile if the Smart Key was used to open the driver door. Others would change the driver profile if a Smart Key is sensed against ANY door. So the driver opens the door and it picks up their profile so the seat position adjusts for them, but then the passenger opens the passenger door (with their key in their pocket) and the driver profile, and the driver's seat, changes to the passenger's profile. Despite the fact that it's triggered against the PASSENGER door.

Some stuff seemed cool at first use, but became a pain when you had to do it repeatedly. Others were just complete gimmicks. Often quite expensive gimmicks.

 

[elanshin]

In all honesty, BYD and MG are cheap due to their subsidies. They're supposedly selling below true manufacturing costs (or close to cost) to try and get market share. So in that sense they're pretty reasonable value.

If Tesla wants to seriously compete on price they can also dtop their price a fair bit. In fact right now of you want the outgoing model 3 that's down to the low 50k price point.

 

[SOPOOR]

There's quite a bit of different tech on offer in the different electric cars. In a lot of cases, it may be tech you haven't used before in a car. I'd highly recommend test driving more thoroughly than you would for a commensurate ICE car. Think about how you'd use the tech in real life situations and put it through its paces as much as the steering, acceleration and braking. We found some of the tech varied quite considerably from brand to brand in its efficiency and useability.

Some of it was excellent - eg I love to be able to adjust regenerative braking levels depending on the conditions, traffic density, etc. My initial expectation was that regen braking levels was all about battery/range management, which I assumed was simply going to be rather meh, but NOOOOOOOO!!! I love, Love, LOVE the ability to use one pedal driving in heavy traffic.

We do a bit of heavy density freeway driving, so the autonomous driving capabilities were important for us. There was a noticeable difference between the Level 3 capabilities of the different brands - and not necessarily correlated with price. Some were quite jerky around curves, others very smooth. Some managed smooth acceleration and deceleration and kept at or below the set speed. One of the more expensive ones would routinely go more than 10km an hour above the set speed on downhill stretches, all the while bleating at you to slow down.

Some of the Smart Key stuff was done better than others - some of them won't let you test this in a test drive, but we generally got them to demonstrate, based on things that we'd heard from others. Often there's a 'driver profile' attached to your Smart Key. Or your phone/watch, if your phone/watch is your key. Again, some do this well, but others it can be quite annoying in certain circumstances. For example, it might be quite common to travel with your spouse and both have a key on you. Some would change the driver profile if the Smart Key was used to open the driver door. Others would change the driver profile if a Smart Key is sensed against ANY door. So the driver opens the door and it picks up their profile so the seat position adjusts for them, but then the passenger opens the passenger door (with their key in their pocket) and the driver profile, and the driver's seat, changes to the passenger's profile. Despite the fact that it's triggered against the PASSENGER door.

Some stuff seemed cool at first use, but became a pain when you had to do it repeatedly. Others were just complete gimmicks. Often quite expensive gimmicks.

Thanks for your commenting on your experience.

Another reason why when someone says oh this cheap chinese ev can do 0-100 in 4.5s, whilst a $100k petrol does it in 4.6s
Totally unfair comparison as its different tech!

 

[Gremlin]

In all honesty, BYD and MG are cheap due to their subsidies. They're supposedly selling below true manufacturing costs (or close to cost) to try and get market share. So in that sense they're pretty reasonable value.

If Tesla wants to seriously compete on price they can also dtop their price a fair bit. In fact right now of you want the outgoing model 3 that's down to the low 50k price point.

Based on test driving them all, for me the outgoing Model 3 was a clear third behind both the Atto3 and the ZS EV Essence, even before price came into it. Which I didn't expect going in. Obviously YMMV (or should this be YRMV - Your Range May Vary?)?

 

[daft009]

The new model 3 has deleted the indicator stalks too.. that's a step too far imo

I must have a car with Android Auto, I can't do without it in my use cases.

ICE for me till the VW EVs hit Australia