[mohanphadnis]

Battery wali hai???
Kitna chalti hai??





These are the two questions I have been asked almost 50 times from complete strangers in the last three months. Since I bought the car.
Now having lived almost 3 months with her, I can safely say that living with a kona is a breeze.

[mohanphadnis]

Buying Decision and experience:-

I have been running in the mornings for almost 5 years now, I am not the fastest person, but if you have met a person who pays money and goes to run marathons, you would know we lot are deadly serious when it comes to running and increasing speed.
In pursuit of getting some speed, I started cycling to office as a form of cross training, while cycling was great for me in terms of increasing my fitness.
But it hit me with a ugly truth, all the diesels spew unburnt hydrocarbon, which was coming out of my body once I reached office/home.
I felt guilty every time I drove my XUV.

So decided, let me not add to this madness and about two years back, decided to actually buy the only EV in market, mahindra E2O plus for my wife.

The car was just fine, it is super small, even with that puny 28kW motor I could see that the initial torque was there and she could go quite fast from get go.
Plus there were no vibrations, hardly any noise, super smooth.
That took care of my guilt part . But now I was hooked to EV and wanted one for meself.
Aah I wished there would be a proper electric car in the market and I could chuck my XUV500 and move to the EV.

But a EV for me had to be long range(at least 350kms), decently powerful and decently big.
All I could do was look at reviews of Zoe, Leaf, Bolt or the mother of all EVs Teslas and wish they were present in India. (I don't get paid enough to import one on my own )

Then last year Hyundai launches the Kona EV, and I was hoping they launch in India. Then we get the specs, 64kWh battery pack, and 200hp motor which would rocket the vehicle to 100kmph in 7seconds flat.
Whoa... finally a EV which seemed reasonably priced and had performance to boot.

Then Hyundai announces they are bringing the kona to India and I was literally hoping it is the 64kWh one.
Alas no!!!! It turns out to be 39kWh 100kW model. But ARAI range was advertised as 451 kms.

I could live with that range, I was okay to live with ~300km real world range, so 451 was fine, but how can a kona go 12 km/kwH when My E2O does hardly 10?

Still decided to try and get a test drive the day after it was launched. So strutted down to the SS road showroom of Kothari Hyundai for the same.
Was told by the sales person that the TD car is out but if I come on next saturday, they will have the car ready to test.

Good enough, went back 10 kms to the dealership on Saturday and surprise, the car is not there, it seems they have sent it as display car to Phoenix mall.
The salesman promised he will get the car home, but nothing. Zilch...

At this time I decided that kona and me is not gonna happen.

Next I see the reviews on Team BHP that people are getting 350kms on single charge with kona, and the call of the electric came back.

About two months after the above frustrating experience, I was on the SS road and decided to drop in and see if I can get a TD, and voila, this time the car was available. Went for the test drive (only as a driver) and had the following observations:-

1. She was fast, scary 0-80 in sport, but pretty quick in eco as well.
2. Suspension was hard but she seemed to handle quite well on corners (not a lot to compare, coming from XUV)
3. The adjustable regen was simply intuitive and easy to use.
4. Smooth, this was DSG smooth, may be even more than the DSG.

After E2O, kona was almost a night and day experience. I loved the car, but then the waiting time was advertised at almost 4 months. I was going to pickup the car on company car lease. So 4 months wait would not fly.

Then fate intervenes, 3 weeks later, the salesperson calls and says that they have a car coming in and in could get her inside the month...
YAY... moved the papers and got delivery of the car.

I have the knack of buying cars at the worst possible time of the year and buying one in December is not smart, but when the heart wants something, heart has to have it.

The car was gonna cost 23.71 ex showroom. I had to get insurance from the lease provider so that was a bit expensive (~Rs.70,000), handling was Rs.10,000 and RTO was Rs.2500. The end price came to Rs.24.54lakhs.

Kothari Hyundai, SS road, was pretty proficient during this time, and did not face any problems after the early hiccups.

[mohanphadnis]

Pros/Cons I could figure after test drive :-

Pros :-
1. EV - I have become a bit of a green 'nut' lately and that was an overriding factor
2. Acceleration - She is fast, I don't care for high speed, anyway the country's speed limit is 100kmph, but she can accelerate as fat as any hot hatch.
3. Well specced - very well specced, though not as well as other 24lakh cars.
4. Low cost and no trip to petrol pump - I have solar system at home and am exporting about 120 units per month so moving to the EV would use that headroom I have, and I hate standing in line on the gas station.
5. Ground clearance - Surprisingly that hard suspension + 172mm has meant that I have never scrapped on a speed breaker till date.

Cons :-
1. Range - While 350kms range will suffice for me for 99.9% of the times, but I know there will be one time when I will need to go 400kms+ and that day I am gonna have to rent a car.
2. Size - For a car that costs 24 lakhs, she is not big. While she is quite wide, but in terms of legroom not great.
3. Rear seat - The rear passengers sit with knees high. While the kids are not having problems, but if I put some adults there, they won't be comfortable
4. Hard suspension - The suspension was hard, this was the one factor that was almost a dealbreaker.






After buying the car, found a lot more about the car and following are the things I love / don't love.
Things I love :-
1. Acceleration - I know I put it above but god she can go fast. I really wish that Hyundai put better wheels so that she does not spin them every time in sport mode.
2. No body roll - Put her in a turn, where those tyres work and there is no body roll whatsoever,
3. Ventilated seats - Bye Bye sweaty back
4. Adjustable regen - Hardly use the brakes anymore. The adjustable regen is perfect and having them on paddle is just perfect. We can actually change regen on the fly.

Those paddles are perfect

5. Smooth - Cannot sit in a ICE vehicle anymore without feeling the vibrations creeping through my backside.
6. Running Cost and time saved - No waiting at gas stations, and 0 running cost
7. Range - Getting 350-380 kms of range on full charge, she is super efficient.
8. Wallbox provided - The wallbox, Delta AC Mini plus is an excellent 7.2kW wall charger.


Things I don't like so much
1. Tyres - May be these low rolling resistance tyres are the reason for that amazing range, but god they have no grip.
2. Hard suspension - while the car does not scrape the speed breakers, she is not fun on broken road.
3. Rear seat - knees up position not great.
4. Small Boot - a bigger boot, would have been nice.
5. Space saver spare - That spare is 135/80 17. They look so horrible.

[mohanphadnis]

Driving Experience - City


Driving the kona EV in City is a very different experience that driving a manual diesel, which I was used to.
1. Instant torque means overtakes are faster.
2. You do win the traffic light derby almost every time.
3. Keeping a high regen setting means once a overtake is done, lifting off instantly drops the speed to manageable levels, actually the brake is so strong that sometimes I am scared someone may rear-end the car.
4. The high per kWh mileage in city is a myth, the more you change the speed of the car, worse the efficiency gets.
5. The car eats up about 250W just on the electronics, and then about 500W on the A/C. So standing on a light is not exactly free. But yes, not idling the car, does mean it is better than an ICE.


7. The A/C is quite decent. I have seen that the highest energy usage for A/C has been around 600W. Have to see how much more it takes once summer arrives.



The Energy usage monitor is very useful to figure out how the energy is being used.

The energy usage that I have had on my daily office runs have been as below


That worst energy consumption I ever got??? Had @anandpadhye test drive my car, got 6km/kWh. I am guessing that is the floor for this car

[mohanphadnis]

Kryptonite::: Highway driving

Now we get to the kryptonite for EVs getting them out of the city.
The first thing that people told me when I told them I am getting kona EV, but you won't be able to leave house. What are you thinking, what happens when you have to go to Goa?

Honestly this "going to Goa" is one question which I have never really understood, I don't have any relatives in Goa, My relatives do not have relatives in Goa. Why is going to goa the litmus test for every car?
Yes, I have a plan to get the Kona EV to goa, but that will be tested only later .

But for now, let us talk about my general travel. Most of my outstation journey is to either Mumbai or to Nashik.
So from Pune that is only 150kms and 210 kms respectively.

So what are the salient points when taking your kona EV on the highway?
1. Regen mode, should be set to 0. Do not regen, once you get to speed, try and keep that. Do not lose that energy in regenerating.
2. When going down a ghat, driving with regen 0, is like coasting in neutral. And with the rolling of this car, you will gain speed in blink of the eye.
3. On these sections use the regen mode to slow down the car, again be careful before using regen mode 3, because that provides as much as 42-45kW of braking energy, you will slow down dangerously even on khandala or chandana puri downhill.
4. Use cruise, and try to be as smooth as possible. The average one gets on express highway is unmatched because of lack of speed breakers, sudden road impediments (cows/buffaloes/cycles).
5. Cruise will use regen to slow you down if you go above the speed you are cruising at. So one advice would be to turn off cruise in such case, let the car come back to cruising speed at it's own volition and then start cruising again.
6. She is a pig going over speed breakers, take them nice and slow. Do not hit those breakers at anything faster than crawl speed.
7. The worst mileage I have ever had on road was from Pune - Ale phata on nasik road. Which meant continuously going upto the speed limit and then dropping back to crawling speeds all the time.
8. She is a dream when overtaking on two lane roads, to overtake a line of slow moving trucks, put the regen in highest mode, and then use that fantastic roll on acceleration to breeze past the trucks, tuck back in before the oncoming traffic reaches you, while regen slows you down quickly to the cruising velocity of trucks. The roll on acceleration really makes her a overtaking machine.

Charging
Aah now we get to the horrible bit with travelling out of station. Charging
I have made it to mumbai and back twice now and both the times, I went and came back on single charge. So never had to figure out charging in that city. (Though the tata power station at Vikhroli did give me heartburn once)






I documented that trip in following thread :-
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/offic...ml#post4731820

But going to Nasik was a different beast. My in laws have a bungalow there, and decided that I could charge using the portable at their house.
I took a 15 Amp extension to pull the wire and made it to their house.
The journey itself was quite uneventful, though had to use that roll on acceleration a lot on this extremely busy road.

Anyway, we reach home and after I started charging, my father in law tells me that the extension seems to be getting awfully warm. So we figure out that the extension is just not designed to pull as much as 2.7kW.
Now Kona EV gives a beautiful charge management utility using which one can reduce the amount of current you pull, so I changed it to pull reduced current and that dropped the wattage to 2kW. boom, the heat problem solved.


Though, I need to get a dedicated EVSE Type 2 cable extension to avoid this in the future.

Plus you can also tell the car when is your next departure and how much you would like to charge it and if you keep it attached to the charging station, the car will be ready for you to leave at your departure time.

On the charging station, (wallbox), the minimum, reduced and normal charging gives you 4.5kW, 6kW and 7.2kW. So basically if you are charging the car at home and then want to use may be a electric geyser as well, charging at minimum is the perfect idea.

Plus I have setup the car to charge to only 80% as it seems that is the best way to charge a Li ion battery for it's range.

[mohanphadnis]

Living with her

Living with the Kona EV has been very nice and hassle free.
She has been to one service, but that was just a checkup and nothing was changed or charged.

There are lots of cubbyholes in the front seats to store the knickknacks


One nice feature of the car is the reminder that it pops if one turns off the car, with sunroof open or the phone in wireless charge, generally I close the flap after keeping the phone in charger and forgetting it is common, so having this warning has helped a lot


Below that floating centre console there is a full tray to keep stuff, which is generally out of the way.
The wireless charger itself is super easy to use.
Entertainment system is decent with decent speakers, supports car play and android Auto.
The armrest cubbyhole is nice and deep


One oddity that you will see with KONA is the VESS(Virtual Engine Sound system). When this thing is turned on it emits a strange robotic hi frequency sound.
It seems this is compulsory in EU below 20kmph.
Personally I find it extremely irritating and it is so low that it does not really tell anyone on the road that there is a car coming.
It is not like the thump of a bullet of something, so I have not really found it to be very useful.


But everytime, one changes the driving mode, the dashboard actually changes colours and contours

Comfort

Sport

But once we get these dashboards, there is no real way to customize the info being printed.
So while change in colour is nice, it would be nice to get some sort of control on what is actually being displayed. I actually end up driving in eco rather than comfort because I prefer the dash design in eco over comort.
Sport just scares me for everyday driving, so not going into that mode.

The front seats are 10 way electrically adjustable with enough travel and lumbar support, but why doesn't a car that costs as much as 24.5 lakhs does not come with memory function.
This is frustrating, especially when we swap drivers and then finding the perfect position is a pain.
But there are two saving graces in the front seat
1. ventilated seats
2. lateral adjustment on the headrest. I have always felt the hearests are too far back for me, and this is the first car since 2006 Octy TSI, which actually allows lateral adjustment of headrests.

Rear seats themselves, as I said are a bit knee high, and preferably for kids.
There are cupholders and bottle holders and such standard bits, but honestly, I have never sat on those sits and never want to sit there either.

The boot itself is slightly bigger than i20, generally good for four person luggage, though nothing to write home about

[GTO]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to the Initial Ownership Section. Thanks for sharing!

Heartiest congratulations on buying this very special car - she is shortly going to our homepage .

[bharat4ever]

How much does charging at home cost? If you charge all night overnight, can you compare the electricity consumption to maybe a geyser, or an iron box running the whole night? Sorry if i am being absurd.

[2000rpm]

I think 500 km range will be the threshold which will drive the electric car penetration in India. (very close to the Goa litmus test).

Once we have vehicles in that range, the adoption will propel and self-sustain.

I wish Tesla would launch in India soon, and at a reasonable price!

[tarik.arora]

Many congrats on riding the EV wave. I am sure you must be getting some undesired attention as well. Since you charge you Kona to 80% only, the range you are getting is excellent. Or, does the range correspond to 100% charge? How many units are required for a full charge?

[DarthVeda]

Originally Posted by bharat4ever

How much does charging at home cost? If you charge all night overnight, can you compare the electricity consumption to maybe a geyser, or an iron box running the whole night? Sorry if i am being absurd.

the amount of electricity consumed is equal to the battery capacity or the amount charged. Kona has 39.2kwh battery pack, so it takes around 39 units to charge. However, there is always a minor loss in conversion of one type of energy to another. So you can assume 40 to 42 units. Depending on the electricity rates it might be anywhere between 200 to 400 rupees per full charge.

On the article, excellent write up, I test drove the Kona a while back, unfortunately, when I took the car out from advaith Hyundai in Bellanduru, Bengaluru, it was just the start of traffic in evening and I couldn't go beyond 40kph, but what made me not consider that car was the rear seat, it's not possible for any elders to sit in the back and enjoy even a 100km trip. Otherwise, the car is just brilliant and the efficiency is just unmatched.

[sramanat]

Originally Posted by mohanphadnis

Pros/Cons I could figure after test drive :-

Pros :-
6. Running Cost and time saved - No waiting at gas stations, and 0 running cost

Well, nothing is free. Can you provide some rough number for charging it to 100% at the highest per unit cost of electricity?

[superbad]

Originally Posted by bharat4ever

How much does charging at home cost? If you charge all night overnight, can you compare the electricity consumption to maybe a geyser, or an iron box running the whole night? Sorry if i am being absurd.

From 0-100% charge, it will use around 40 Kwh (battery capacity of 39 + heat/electrical resistance losses), that is 40 units. Multiply that by Rs 6 per unit (average rate) : 40 x 6 = Rs 240 for one full charge. That is equivalent to running a 1500 W geyser for an entire day.

[Old_Salt]

Many congratulations on your purchase.

Just wondering, as you'll be charging 2 electric cars ( E2O and Now Kona) for many years to come, have you explored and tried to make an economic case for installing a solar system just to serve your EV.

Solar starts to make more sense if you get a system capable of providing electricity for the household as well as the EV.

[sri_tesla]

Originally Posted by Old_Salt

Just wondering, as you'll be charging 2 electric cars ( E2O and Now Kona) for many years to come, have you explored and tried to make an economic case for installing a solar system just to serve your EV.

Solar starts to make more sense if you get a system capable of providing electricity for the household as well as the EV.

He already has a solar system with excess energy being exported to the grid as he mentioned in this thread itself.

4. Low cost and no trip to petrol pump - I have solar system at home and am exporting about 120 units per month so moving to the EV would use that headroom I have, and I hate standing in line on the gas station.