I took my son gliding today. That's something I used to do a lot of. It's about 200k return. I remember back in the days, the cars I had used to average about 10l/100. They would probably have done better with todays me driving. :o. Anyway probably one of the reasons I drifted away was it was expensive to go out there.
If I did that trip in the defender today it would cost about $43 dollars. In the EV the cost for the trip was $2.4. Aerotows are more expensive now but it all helps. I don't even want to try and factor in a maintenance cost for the defender per km. [bighmmm] If the Tesla ever actually costs me anythingto maintain it I'll post in here.
IMHO people are conditioned to the costs of driving. It's a lot. It's to some extent optional though now.
EDIT: At the rate of expenditure on maintenance in the last couple of years for the defender I'd say I'm running north of $2 per km in maintenance/upgrades. There have been some big expenses in there that are once off upgrades, but also lots of regular maintenance, and 20 year old car things. :( I mean it's not a linear relationship and you wouldn't worry about it for occasional trips. But I do think if I was just driving it around town where I didn't need the capability I'd consider it a factor when you can drive an EV which has no mainetenance really other than tyres. I'm quite confident that if I did 100k in an EV, and then compared that to the defender I could easily buy two replacement batteries per 100k in saved fuel and maintenance costs. Of course - all the evidence at this point suggests that an LFP battery will last the life of the car despite what people on here might think.
EDIT2: As opined in here - people buy cars because of the image it they think it portrays about them. Because I rarely drive it - when I drive the defender it's fun. People look at you at lights, defender waves, getting accosted in car parks ETC. I get it. But - that's not important enough of consideration to me that I'd happily drive around the city in a car that's frankly completely inappropriate for city use AND costs a motza. There are a number of defenders that I see around here that are purely city cars. IMHO that's cray cray but there you go. (before you get into me I've talked to the owners.. "I'd like to go off road one day" is their reason for buying a defender). :D
EDIT3: (I really need to stop this and go pull the engine out of the Lotus).. And for the vast majority of our driving an EV is a far far better device than the defender. For the trip to gliding. It's fast, quiet, comfortable, the AC works. Plugged in before bed the night before, jump in and drive in the morning. Get home without even considering range (50% when I got home after 200k in 35 degrees). Charge and repeat if required.
