Driving from to Scotland from London

[Chrisd]

Can anyone tell their experiences of deriving from London to the NW coast of Scotland and more specifically how much longer it takes than with an ICE.
First experience with an EV (ZS LR) and am a little concerned about the long range trips (about 650 miles each way).

 

[Maciej]

I didn't drive SR that far but recently drove from Lincoln to London and back with 2 kids and a Mrs it didn't take much longer at all. It was 170 miles is on first way we stopped twice for about 15 min each time not due to charging but due to kids needing a wee. Each time I plugged in before we went to toilets and unplugged as soon as we were done. Got to London fine charged at hotel to full over night. On the way back we stopped once for tea, by the time we have eaten Mcdonald and used toilet car went from 30% to 86% no extra time wasted.

You will need to stop for about 25 to 30 min once every 2.5 to 3 hours of driving. It may sound like a lot but if you aren't doing it already in the ice car you are just driving tired and it's dangerous.

We used gridserve services to charge no apps just contact less payment super easy.

If I were to travel 600 miles in SR I would plan a break every 100 miles or so if I were to go in LR I would add break every 150-180 miles or so which will be 3h of driving because you almost never get to do consistently 70mph on motorway. So you are looking at 3 to 4 stops for 25 min on a 8 hour journey. Plan those around toilet and meal breaks and hardly any extra time at all.

You will need to stop probably at least twice to go to toilet and once to eat anyway on such travel

 

[biffo]

Can anyone tell their experiences of deriving from London to the NW coast of Scotland and more specifically how much longer it takes than with an ICE.
First experience with an EV (ZS LR) and am a little concerned about the long range trips (about 650 miles each way).

ABRP or ZapMap are you friends here - also depends if going A1 or M6 I guess. Some nice new hubs appearing on both and all Gridserve units should be replaced so more reliable. I’m looking forward to the Burton-In-Kendal hub on M6 North as well as the usual MFG locations.

I only do 300 miles from Scotland to North Wales but tend to make two stops - first one being longest as I’m leaving home at 100% and keen to make progress - that’s about 1hr 45 mins. After that it’s maybe 1.5 hours and less distance as only going from 80% to 20%. Generally, The number of stops will be dictated by family’s needs and smallest bladder size.

In Scotland there are a large number of Charge Place Scotland units for free - get the card and/or phone app - and generally work well but can be busy. There are some hubs popping up in central Scotland too. Depending on how far NW you’re going, they may become more sparse but larger towns still have several. And often plenty of AC units in car parks, etc.

 

[biffo]

@Chrisd - depending on where you're going along the NW coast of Scotland, might be worth checking with @Archev about charging as he's doing some trips around Fort William, Oban and over to Mull, etc.

 

[Archev]

@Chrisd - depending on where you're going along the NW coast of Scotland, might be worth checking with @Archev about charging as he's doing some trips around Fort William, Oban and over to Mull, etc.

Good morning yes I’m your man, you’re expert guide . Having made a complete pigs breakfast of using chargers at Oban Tesco and Charge place Scotland in the Ferry terminal last night, we’re now sitting in line for the approaching ferry over to Craignure on Mull. We eventually scrambled together 86% (252 eco miles) of charge so we’re ready to boldly go on this forty minute voyage in search of all the Teslas that went yesterday. There’s a postage stamp’s worth of fine blue sky over Coll or Tiree but it could be here by the time we’re there Who cares really.
Ahh - here comes our transport:-

 

[Archev]

Good morning yes I’m your man, you’re expert guide . Having made a complete pigs breakfast of using chargers at Oban Tesco and Charge place Scotland in the Ferry terminal last night, we’re now sitting in line for the approaching ferry over to Craignure on Mull. We eventually scrambled together 86% (252 eco miles) of charge so we’re ready to boldly go on this forty minute voyage in search of all the Teslas that went yesterday. There’s a postage stamp’s worth of fine blue sky over Coll or Tiree but it could be here by the time we’re there Who cares really.
Ahh - here comes our transport:-

Following the dino juice Moggie - hope those chappie appreciate the silent, peaceful way an MG EV boards after that music - it was a bit smelly to follow though

 

[Chrisd]

Looks like an awesome trip! We've a holiday let near Ullapool and go up regularly.
We're gong to put a charger in as it's 50 mile round trip to nearest public charger.
Good planning is clearly key, and we do stop regularly for the dog (and occasionally for the child).
Feeling more reassured.

 

[Archev]

Looks like an awesome trip! We've a holiday let near Ullapool and go up regularly.
We're gong to put a charger in as it's 50 mile round trip to nearest public charger.
Good planning is clearly key, and we do stop regularly for the dog (and occasionally for the child).
Feeling more reassured.

I think you have it sussed my friend. Good luck.

 

[Archev]

Looks like an awesome trip! We've a holiday let near Ullapool and go up regularly.
We're gong to put a charger in as it's 50 mile round trip to nearest public charger.
Good planning is clearly key, and we do stop regularly for the dog (and occasionally for the child).
Feeling more reassured.

Just devoured the third delicious haddock chowder in as many days as they’ve smelled and tasted utterly gorgeous. Drove round a marvellous bunch of the narrowest, steepest single trackiest coastal roads round northwest Mull. No other vehicle I’ve driven has behaved like this Five. These roads were made for EVs. Clutchless, fearless wonder with tons of regen opportunities and oooh the savings on brakes and weariness to bums has been awesome .
Nearly four hours until we need to board the boat for Oban and hit the glorious road home again. We’ve around 180 miles in store and it’s approximately 140 to get there so might do a free top up for some minutes at Stirling en- route.
We might do a wee detour to Pennygael to twist and turn around the fantastic Gribun rocks. Just can’t get enough

 

[EVready]

I’ve not gone as far as London to NW Scotland, but have driven to and fro between Edinburgh and SE Lincolnshire (300+ miles each way) a number of times, and never had a serious problems. I’d echo the great advice above, in particular using Zap Map to help plan your journey. I always try to make sure I try to stop with enough juice left to make it to other chargers if there are queues or the first chargers don’t work, which in my old Hyundai Kona EV meant a couple of stops (I’m waiting for my ZS). I was surprised the very first time I drove any distance on the motorway just how much more quickly my battery drained, but learned to limit my speed and allow for this. And it probably won’t affect you if you’re heading to the west, but in the past six months or so I have ALWAYS had to queue when stopping at chargers on motorway services on the A1(M) despite additional chargers having been installed, so now will try to charge before and after that stretch.

As long as you don’t have issues with faulty chargers or queues, then I absolutely agree long journeys by EV don’t take much longer than by ICE, taking into account comfort and rest breaks. And on the unfortunate occasions when you might be slightly inconvenienced by delays charging, at least you can console yourself with the thought that your journey cost a fraction of what it would have using petrol!

(I’m also planning a road trip up north next month, so will be making good use of the great tips above for charging around the Highlands and Islands, so thanks all!)

 

[bwanamdevu]

I didn't drive SR that far but recently drove from Lincoln to London and back with 2 kids and a Mrs it didn't take much longer at all. It was 170 miles is on first way we stopped twice for about 15 min each time not due to charging but due to kids needing a wee. Each time I plugged in before we went to toilets and unplugged as soon as we were done. Got to London fine charged at hotel to full over night. On the way back we stopped once for tea, by the time we have eaten Mcdonald and used toilet car went from 30% to 86% no extra time wasted.

You will need to stop for about 25 to 30 min once every 2.5 to 3 hours of driving. It may sound like a lot but if you aren't doing it already in the ice car you are just driving tired and it's dangerous.

We used gridserve services to charge no apps just contact less payment super easy.

If I were to travel 600 miles in SR I would plan a break every 100 miles or so if I were to go in LR I would add break every 150-180 miles or so which will be 3h of driving because you almost never get to do consistently 70mph on motorway. So you are looking at 3 to 4 stops for 25 min on a 8 hour journey. Plan those around toilet and meal breaks and hardly any extra time at all.

You will need to stop probably at least twice to go to toilet and once to eat anyway on such travel

Do you mind telling me where you stayed at in London that had a charger available? We usually stay near Excel and take the DLR in but now we’ve got an EV the hotel having a charger is important. The only hotel in the Excel area with charging is the Hampton by Hilton but that’s a little pricey for us and the ones we usually stay at haven’t installed chargers yet!
It would be useful if there was a separate app or website just devoted to accommodation in London with chargers. I wonder if any forum members know of one?

 

[Archev]

Looks like an awesome trip! We've a holiday let near Ullapool and go up regularly.
We're gong to put a charger in as it's 50 mile round trip to nearest public charger.
Good planning is clearly key, and we do stop regularly for the dog (and occasionally for the child).
Feeling more reassured.

Just devoured the third delicious haddock chowder in as many days as they’ve smelled and tasted utterly gorgeous. Drove round a marvellous bunch of the narrowest, steepest single trackiest coastal roads round northwest Mull. No other vehicle I’ve driven has behaved like this Five. These roads were made for EVs. Clutchless, fearless wonder with tons of regen opportunities and oooh the savings on brakes and weariness to bums has been awesome .
Nearly four hours until we need to board the boat for Oban and hit the glorious road home again. We’ve around 180 miles in store

 

[Archev]

Just devoured the third delicious haddock chowder in as many days as they’ve smelled and tasted utterly gorgeous. Drove round a marvellous bunch of the narrowest, steepest single trackiest coastal roads round northwest Mull. No other vehicle I’ve driven has behaved like this Five. These roads were made for EVs. Clutchless, fearless wonder with tons of regen opportunities and oooh the savings on brakes and weariness to bums has been awesome .
Nearly four hours until we need to board the boat for Oban and hit the glorious road home again. We’ve around 180 miles in store and it’s approximately 140 to get there so might do a free top up for some minutes at Stirling en- route.
We might do a wee detour to Pennygael to twist and turn around the fantastic Gribun rocks. Just can’t get enough

Yep what a detour - glorious day and superb road. All twists and hairpins with rocks and sheep with lambs to negotiate. A bit overcast so at least we didn’t need any dark window film to keep cool
We’ve about an hour now to wait for the ferry back to Oban so we’ve plugged in to the CPS charger opposite the ferry pier. All told, grand day to be allowed out to play with an MG5

 

[apzs]

Wouldn't say its a massive difference imo. We did a trip from South London to Glasgow in our Hyundai Kona '21 model. Had one stop at Milton Keynes coachman ionity, but that was because I needed to use the restroom. So it was a quick 10 min stop. After that we only stopped for about 30 mins at Leeds skelton lakes ionity for a lunch stop and then finally did a quick 15 mins top up at Gretna Green ionity to ensure we didn't need to run around for chargers once we reached Glasgow. This trip was done end of December around Christmas holidays so weather wasn't really great, it was pretty cold, temperatures were hovering close to freezing. But tbh these 3 stops would have been there regardless of the type of car we were driving. Even in an ICE car I'd want to stop for a restroom break, lunch break and just a break to stretch my legs.

Following that, we relied mainly on chargeplace Scotland for most of our charging within Scotland. They are mostly free plus are conveniently located at most tourist points. So while we explore the nature, the car gets juiced up. Stopped at Inverness and charged up at EV box at the ness Hotel. Staff is lovely, they let us in and use the chargers. Did a trip to John o groats and back, stopped near Blair where we did a quick 15 min top up at a CPS charger and finally did a longer 30 min top up at Ionity Perth and made our way to Edinburgh. After that charged about 15 mins at Gretna Green, big 40 mins stop at Leeds skelton lakes and then straight back down to South London with about 15% left.

The drive was super convenient. Honestly if you stick to speed limits and go easy on the throttle, these EVs are surprisingly efficient to drive.

Did a trip to Cornwall last week which was about 1000 miles round trip. Happy to share that experience as well if anyone is interested.

 

[Chrisd]

Wouldn't say its a massive difference imo. We did a trip from South London to Glasgow in our Hyundai Kona '21 model. Had one stop at Milton Keynes coachman ionity, but that was because I needed to use the restroom. So it was a quick 10 min stop. After that we only stopped for about 30 mins at Leeds skelton lakes ionity for a lunch stop and then finally did a quick 15 mins top up at Gretna Green ionity to ensure we didn't need to run around for chargers once we reached Glasgow. This trip was done end of December around Christmas holidays so weather wasn't really great, it was pretty cold, temperatures were hovering close to freezing. But tbh these 3 stops would have been there regardless of the type of car we were driving. Even in an ICE car I'd want to stop for a restroom break, lunch break and just a break to stretch my legs.

Following that, we relied mainly on chargeplace Scotland for most of our charging within Scotland. They are mostly free plus are conveniently located at most tourist points. So while we explore the nature, the car gets juiced up. Stopped at Inverness and charged up at EV box at the ness Hotel. Staff is lovely, they let us in and use the chargers. Did a trip to John o groats and back, stopped near Blair where we did a quick 15 min top up at a CPS charger and finally did a longer 30 min top up at Ionity Perth and made our way to Edinburgh. After that charged about 15 mins at Gretna Green, big 40 mins stop at Leeds skelton lakes and then straight back down to South London with about 15% left.

The drive was super convenient. Honestly if you stick to speed limits and go easy on the throttle, these EVs are surprisingly efficient to drive.

Did a trip to Cornwall last week which was about 1000 miles round trip. Happy to share that experience as well if anyone is interested.

This is all very reassuring. Ionity are rapid chargers?

 

[apzs]

This is all very reassuring. Ionity are rapid chargers?

Yeah ionity are rapid 350Kw chargers. I'm with ONTO so they cover the cost of charging in the subscription hence why I stopped at these rapid chargers. If I was paying I might stop at the gridserve chargers or any other ones on those services. For example, MK had BP pulse which are cheaper than ionity.

Regardless shouldn't make any difference to stopping time. Might make a difference if your car can actually take super fast charges like the Tycan, teslas or the Hyundai ioniq 5 and Kia EV6. Then probably sticking to the super fast chargers would be ideal to minimise those few extra mins of charging stop

 

[Archev]

This is all very reassuring. Ionity are

Good morning yes I’m your man, you’re expert guide . Having made a complete pigs breakfast of using chargers at Oban Tesco and Charge place Scotland in the Ferry terminal last night, we’re now sitting in line for the approaching ferry over to Craignure on Mull. We eventually scrambled together 86% (252 eco miles) of charge so we’re ready to boldly go on this forty minute voyage in search of all the Teslas that went yesterday. There’s a postage stamp’s worth of fine blue sky over Coll or Tiree but it could be here by the time we’re there Who cares really.
Ahh - here comes our transport:-

After an all day drive around Mull and finding we had nearly an hour to wait for the ferry, we plugged up to the CCS unit opposite the pier behind the convenient conveniences. I was going to have a top up to about 60% but before I knew it we had almost 90% and nobody else waiting.
The ferry “Isle of Mull” swept serenely up to the ramp, we rolled onboard in majestic silent convoy with a few other green stripe vehicles and set off for Oban. The cafeteria supplied a freshly made mac’n cheese for my CPWMBO and an absolutely delicious chicken curry with fresh rice for me.
So we had nothing to do at eight fifteen pm when we rolled off the ramp but thread together all the wonderful, deserted, twisting hundred miles home. There were two guys walking a dog in Taynuilt and a couple of tankers from Grangemouth trailing Dino juice for those remaining poor chuggers that persist in using it to get around . Other than that the road was ours

 

[Archev]

Good morning yes I’m your man, you’re expert guide . Having made a complete pigs breakfast of using chargers at Oban Tesco and Charge place Scotland in the Ferry terminal last night, we’re now sitting in line for the approaching ferry over to Craignure on Mull. We eventually scrambled together 86% (252 eco miles) of charge so we’re ready to boldly go on this forty minute voyage in search of all the Teslas that went yesterday. There’s a postage stamp’s worth of fine blue sky over Coll or Tiree but it could be here by the time we’re there Who cares really.
Ahh - here comes our transport:-

When I couldn’t get the Oban Tesco Podpoint unit to work after many many tries, I tried to contact them via the account reporting procedure.
this morning, almost two days and a hundred odd miles after the event, I’ve just had an email from them telling me that someone else has also reported the fault and it’s been ”escalated” to their Network Assurance team to resolve the issue as quickly as possible but they need site approval before they can attend to perform any maintenance.
It’s terrific to know that if I ever go back I might find the fault escalated, approved and attended to.
At least my nagging self doubts have been dispelled and good old Charge Place Scotland were around to see us on our way.
And at least if they do charge for some power in some places they trust you to pay later and you don’t have to cough up in advance.

 

[Edoc16]

When I couldn’t get the Oban Tesco Podpoint unit to work after many many tries, I tried to contact them via the account reporting procedure.
this morning, almost two days and a hundred odd miles after the event, I’ve just had an email from them telling me that someone else has also reported the fault and it’s been ”escalated” to their Network Assurance team to resolve the issue as quickly as possible but they need site approval before they can attend to perform any maintenance.
It’s terrific to know that if I ever go back I might find the fault escalated, approved and attended to.
At least my nagging self doubts have been dispelled and good old Charge Place Scotland were around to see us on our way.
And at least if they do charge for some power in some places they trust you to pay later and you don’t have to cough up in advance.

You've had an exciting time Arch, you can regale on Saturday and pass on info as I'm going near that area end of month...

 

[Maciej]

Do you mind telling me where you stayed at in London that had a charger available? We usually stay near Excel and take the DLR in but now we’ve got an EV the hotel having a charger is important. The only hotel in the Excel area with charging is the Hampton by Hilton but that’s a little pricey for us and the ones we usually stay at haven’t installed chargers yet!
It would be useful if there was a separate app or website just devoted to accommodation in London with chargers. I wonder if any forum members know of one?

We stayed just outside London in Premier Inn Slough West - Trading Estate. We stayed there over night to go to Lego land next day morning and back to Lincoln.

Parking was free as was a charger just outside hotel main entrance. Bit slow averaged 4kwh but charged us from 30% at 10pm to 100%at 8am