Bandersnatch

One of my subscribers in a teacher at an international school in Thailand. He is planning a unit on sustainability with his students and wanted his students to interview me. I suggested that I make a video that covers my attempts to achieve self sufficiency in Thailand and that his students could interview me over zoom after watching the video. Anybody else working on self sufficiency in Thailand?

EV registrations (white plates) for the first three months of the year

You could be right I might have been fooled by painted roof on the base model and the black roof - thought it was glass on the top model

One thing I really like about these cars is no sunroof. Thais are complaining on the Tesla forums that Model Y and 3 in Thailand are getting too hot. Teslas come with heated seats, heated steering wheels but no cooled seats. In Thailand Black is the Free colour and you can’t even select a white interior. I previously test drove the MG 4 which is a great car and it comes 2 trim levels One has a sunroof and the cheaper one doesn’t - choose wisely https://www.mgcars.com/th/pdf/RequestBrochure/30/MG4ElectricBrochure_2022.pdf

Driving past my local MG dealer and saw that they had MG EPs in stock, so popped in for a closer look. This is not the new shape which is called MG ES in Thailand (both models are called MG 5 else where) The EP is ฿1,000,000 but with the government incentive only ฿771,000 really great value. https://www.mgcars.com/th/pdf/RequestBrochure/18/NEW_MG_EP_Brochure.pdf

Tesla offering free insurance on model 3s - I’d take a price cut instead. In the USA now selling for under $40k before government incentives ฿1,374,000 no price changes here since launch

NETA GT is launched at Auto Shanghai 2023 “Sport” “Fashion” “ Young” Clearly I’m not the target market!

One big advantage of electricity cars is sitting in stationary traffic the engine isn’t running and you’re not breathing in your own exhaust fumes. My EV has traffic jam assist, which is like adaptive cruise control for traffic jams. The car follows the car in front moving when it moves and breaking when it breaks. With regenerative breaking you are recharging your batteries all the time.

There was no way to edit the video once it had been uploaded, so I have deleted the original video, tweaked the levels and and uploaded a new version - apologies

Yes sorry about that, I used 2 different Microphones - one during the opening video - a Lightning Lavalier Microphone on my iPhone and then a Sure SM58 on my Mac - tried increasing the mic input on my Fast Track to match the opening sound level but just got too much distortion. I considered recording all the second half audio again on Audacity but was too tired at that point. I have now ordered a matching USB TYPE C Lavalier Microphone so hopefully they will produce a matching sound level.

In a previous discussion in the Renewable Energy Forum I was asked about my home battery storage and how I calculated my battery storage requirement. At the time I did promise to make a video on the subject. So here it is: <EDIT By Crossy, updated video with fixed sound is in a later post>

Tesla Powerwall installations available in Thailand starting at 699,000 baht The Tesla Powerwall starts at 699,000 baht ($20,574.86). For comparison, the Tesla Powerwall costs $9,200 in the United States www.teslarati.com/tesla-powerwall-installation-thailand/

I don’t want to cross-post, but just want to direct your attention to a post that I have made over in the alternative/renewable energy forum. https://aseannow.com/topic/1292076-solar-powered-hybrid-dc-bi-directional-fast-ev-charging/

I have decided to post this in the alternative energy forum rather than in my EVs in Thailand discussion over in the Thailand Motor Forum as it is quite technical and we would probably get more discussion here. https://aseannow.com/topic/1257405-electric-vehicles-in-thailand I am not sure how many readers of this Forum are EV owners or are considering an EV, but this has been my experience powering an EV from solar in Thailand: Overnight I power my house from my home batteries. As soon as the sun comes up my solar panels start to produce power and start to meet the power needs of the house along side the batteries until there is enough sunshine to meet the power needs of the house and start to charge the home batteries. By mid morning my home batteries are full and I can start to charge my electric car and electric motorbike. All good so far. First problem is that domestic EV wall chargers (yes I know they are not really charger) are AC. Solar DC is converted to AC by the home inverter (power loss) then sent to the car where the car’s on-board inverter converts AC back to DC (power loss) to charge the batteries. So a lot of power loss due to inefficiency. Second problem is that the speed of AC charging is determined by the EVs on-board charger - normally 7kW although some cars have higher 3 phase charging of 11kW - I am not going to pay for 3 phase. My home solar makes more power than the house, home batteries or EV can use, so my excess solar is curtailed, because I can’t put into the car fast enough. Solution: There is now a way to have a switch to switch DC power from the home inverter into the car and charge the car at up to 25kW and so not waste any solar production. This technology has not been released yet but it looks very promising.. https://enteligent.com/dc-coupled-dc-evses

Tesla Model 3 upgrade code named “Project Highland” Soon to be followed by “Project Juniper” upgrade to the model Y. Obscure movie references:

“We all seen how rubbish most are” can you post what batteries you are using. My nRuit LFPs have a 6,000 cycle life and I haven’t seen any capacity loss in 2 years. If you have discovered a battery that others shouldn’t buy that information would be helpful to others. As for expensive, I paid ฿7/Wh for CATL cells which I think is very reasonable, but @Seeall what do you consider expensive?

Many BYDs sold in China are PHEVs that is not the case with those sold here in Asia and Australasia. I have been unable to find any results for BYD car fires in Thailand, Aus or NZ. It is not clear in the video if the fires originated in the ICE BYD blade batteries use a LiFePO4 chemistry which is inherently safer than lithium ion and is one of the reasons I chose LFP for my home batteries.

Judge for yourself about the integrity of the battery system after these crashes. euro NCAP Crashes of EVs have never resulted in an EV fire.

When I lived in the UK, I never considered purchasing a new car as used cars represented far better value. I have lived and worked in Thailand for 15 years and I purchased 6 vehicles here in that time, all of them were purchased new from a dealer. The commonly accepted advice was that used cars in Thailand may never have had an oil change and only to consider buying a used car if you knew the owner and the car’s full history. EVs don’t need oil changes, Teslas don’t even have a recommended service interval. I would certainly consider buying a used Tesla if I could get it for a reasonable price.

I actually like hub motors as they don’t need a belt/chain drive. The motor is sealed/waterproof as you wouldn’t be able to wash it or drive in the rain. If you want a more professional bike and are happy to pay three times the price I have posted before about the sleek it does have three times the power, but our use case is for my wife to pop round the village and local shops, we couldn’t justify it when we have an EV as well.

Don’t have power cuts myself as I power my house and EV from my solar system. All the villages around me were without power yesterday for 3 hours in the middle of the day and it was scorching???? I would be happy to share my excess back to the grid, but someone at EGAT has decided that’s a bad idea..

Tesla - Big Price cuts in Aus; NZ; USA but not Thailand.....yet.

The bike has 3 power modes In addition it also has a super sport button that gives 15 seconds of boost for overtaking. Top speed is 65km/hr. If you want more power then move up from the 1 kW motor as this is the base model. It seems fine for driving on dual carriage ways compared to my Honda Click. Quality seems good

Top tip for buying an electric motorbike - check that it can be registered for the road. My Deco Hannah was plated, taxed and insured by the dealer for free within 24hours - good service.