LFFarm
Active member
I don't test drive vehicles for a living, but I've owned 36 cars in 15 years, and I drive about 125000km a year so I'll give my feedback on my soul so far. I know a lot of people considering buying it google some of these topics and read these forums so I'll try and hit some key points for people who don't already own one.
Range and every day use...
I got a 2015 soul ev base in black/red. In Canada, the base doesn't have the heat pump or DCFC. I drive a 140km round trip each day. 1/3 country road, 1/3 city streets, the remainder highway. generally flat terrain. I average 14.8kw/100km city, 15.2 country roads (at 80km/hr), and about 18+kw Highway. Top speed makes a difference in consumption, but so does initial acceleration. I tried a couple days of really creeping up to speed, and a couple days of 'normal' acceleration. I actually found better energy consumption in regular acceleration (not gunning it or creeping). So far, since I've got the car, there's only been a hand full of days above freezing. So I use the cabin pre heater, and I manually cycle the cabin heater. With all of this I'm getting about 150km using B mode. The last couple days of plus 15C has actually dropped the energy consumption by about .4 kw/100km disregarding the heater.
B mode and Eco...
The B mode and eco are nice features. My wife refuses to use B, and Im obsessed with using B. In our commute, using B saves about 10% (we've tried the same route in both). Eco makes the B mode slightly more aggressive, but otherwise it really seems to be there for people who are to jumpy on the throttle. Just cruising at any speed, if you switch from eco to regular, there's no change to the motors consumption. When using B mode, I've tried a few scenarios to see what yielded the best results. We tried long coasts to stops gaining about 4-5 kw for longer stretches,and we tried last minute stops for -40+ kw for short distances. All of this without using the brake pedal until completely stopping. In my opinion, the best gains were from a short coast, with an aggressive pedal release near the end. If you let off fast, the car brakes hard, but if you taper off to the same pedal position, it stops less aggressively. That type of stopping can drop the kw/100km the same as it increases when leaving the stop sign.
Winter driving...
Tires it comes with are horrible on frozen ground. with traction a control on, the car literally will not move if it's on ice or snow. B mode has to be controlled a little more too (similar to a Jake brake). The climate control does takeep a good bite of range, but I use the preheated in the morning which buys time before I start the cabin heater. The seat heaters are very strong too. When plugged in to a 120v plug, the preheater at any temp seems to drop the charge by about 5% over the 30 minutes. The wall yields about 1200watts while the heater is pulling almost 4000. when plugged in to the 240v 30amp charger, the preheater can run and the car trickle charges at the same time. As predicted by some, the front charge door freezes shut almost every time I use the car. I give it a couple love taps and it usually opens. I might add a tab to it so I can pull it out if it's jarred shut.
Charging...
As advertised, 120v wall plug taked about 22-23 hours, but the bosch 240/30amp takes about 4. It doesn't charge proportionally. It starts slower, ramps up mid charge, the slows down after 80%. The charge timers are great. At 7 pm the car goes to 80%, and at 5 am the car charges to 100% finishing minutes before we leave to work. Keep in mind that if you switch the charge schedule while the car is plugged in, it won't take effect. You have to unplug snd plug the car back in. Public charge stations are near non existant here, but there are some. Most in inconvenient places. But that's part of the deal getting a technology newer to the area. It'll pick up.
Features...
Stereo sounds great, but my sxm has frozen several times and I have to hit the reset button on the front. No issues with anything else. On country roads at night, the low beams work well, but the high beams don't add much. I'm going to re aim the projectors to see if it helps. The cloth seats in the base are great, like sitting on a giant pair of pyjama pants.
Overall...
I've never owned an EV before this....never even drove one. I never owned, or cared to own a kia either. I've always had lifted trucks, Suvs, built up turbo cars...pretty well everything polar opposite to this car. And after putting about 3000km on it, I love it. Every one says smooth all the time, but it's hard to explain how smooth if you've never driven one. I let everyone drive my car so they can feel it. The car takes more attention then gas counterparts because you want the most range. But I think most buyers are car guys or tech'ies so they wouldn't mind the perusing of the gages constantly. People seem to like it and I'm answering questions all the time (some being dumb sexy hamster jokes). People are usually unimpressed with charge time vs putting gas in. I just explain it as a different mind set. with gas you stop every couple days to fill, with electric you just add a bit everywhere you go, then top up at night. It becomes second nature. We have a small farm and are surrounded by other larger farms, my second vehicle is a lifted truck, which are common place in the rural area..believe it or not. So I figured I was in for some serious commentary when I got it. But overall people are really impressed with it and had no idea there were affordable EVs with that kind of range.
Next....
I bought new rims for the car that are 12lbs each....very light. I hated the oem ones, so they will be the winter wheels. I'll weight them when I pull the tires. I also got a rear spoiler for it....but I doubt the aerodynamic loss will hurt range much. I'll post any difference in energy consumption with the lighter wheels when I mount them....if it'll ever warm up in Ottawa!
**Sorry for the grammar, I wrote this on a cell phone that feels the need to autocorrect everything
Range and every day use...
I got a 2015 soul ev base in black/red. In Canada, the base doesn't have the heat pump or DCFC. I drive a 140km round trip each day. 1/3 country road, 1/3 city streets, the remainder highway. generally flat terrain. I average 14.8kw/100km city, 15.2 country roads (at 80km/hr), and about 18+kw Highway. Top speed makes a difference in consumption, but so does initial acceleration. I tried a couple days of really creeping up to speed, and a couple days of 'normal' acceleration. I actually found better energy consumption in regular acceleration (not gunning it or creeping). So far, since I've got the car, there's only been a hand full of days above freezing. So I use the cabin pre heater, and I manually cycle the cabin heater. With all of this I'm getting about 150km using B mode. The last couple days of plus 15C has actually dropped the energy consumption by about .4 kw/100km disregarding the heater.
B mode and Eco...
The B mode and eco are nice features. My wife refuses to use B, and Im obsessed with using B. In our commute, using B saves about 10% (we've tried the same route in both). Eco makes the B mode slightly more aggressive, but otherwise it really seems to be there for people who are to jumpy on the throttle. Just cruising at any speed, if you switch from eco to regular, there's no change to the motors consumption. When using B mode, I've tried a few scenarios to see what yielded the best results. We tried long coasts to stops gaining about 4-5 kw for longer stretches,and we tried last minute stops for -40+ kw for short distances. All of this without using the brake pedal until completely stopping. In my opinion, the best gains were from a short coast, with an aggressive pedal release near the end. If you let off fast, the car brakes hard, but if you taper off to the same pedal position, it stops less aggressively. That type of stopping can drop the kw/100km the same as it increases when leaving the stop sign.
Winter driving...
Tires it comes with are horrible on frozen ground. with traction a control on, the car literally will not move if it's on ice or snow. B mode has to be controlled a little more too (similar to a Jake brake). The climate control does takeep a good bite of range, but I use the preheated in the morning which buys time before I start the cabin heater. The seat heaters are very strong too. When plugged in to a 120v plug, the preheater at any temp seems to drop the charge by about 5% over the 30 minutes. The wall yields about 1200watts while the heater is pulling almost 4000. when plugged in to the 240v 30amp charger, the preheater can run and the car trickle charges at the same time. As predicted by some, the front charge door freezes shut almost every time I use the car. I give it a couple love taps and it usually opens. I might add a tab to it so I can pull it out if it's jarred shut.
Charging...
As advertised, 120v wall plug taked about 22-23 hours, but the bosch 240/30amp takes about 4. It doesn't charge proportionally. It starts slower, ramps up mid charge, the slows down after 80%. The charge timers are great. At 7 pm the car goes to 80%, and at 5 am the car charges to 100% finishing minutes before we leave to work. Keep in mind that if you switch the charge schedule while the car is plugged in, it won't take effect. You have to unplug snd plug the car back in. Public charge stations are near non existant here, but there are some. Most in inconvenient places. But that's part of the deal getting a technology newer to the area. It'll pick up.
Features...
Stereo sounds great, but my sxm has frozen several times and I have to hit the reset button on the front. No issues with anything else. On country roads at night, the low beams work well, but the high beams don't add much. I'm going to re aim the projectors to see if it helps. The cloth seats in the base are great, like sitting on a giant pair of pyjama pants.
Overall...
I've never owned an EV before this....never even drove one. I never owned, or cared to own a kia either. I've always had lifted trucks, Suvs, built up turbo cars...pretty well everything polar opposite to this car. And after putting about 3000km on it, I love it. Every one says smooth all the time, but it's hard to explain how smooth if you've never driven one. I let everyone drive my car so they can feel it. The car takes more attention then gas counterparts because you want the most range. But I think most buyers are car guys or tech'ies so they wouldn't mind the perusing of the gages constantly. People seem to like it and I'm answering questions all the time (some being dumb sexy hamster jokes). People are usually unimpressed with charge time vs putting gas in. I just explain it as a different mind set. with gas you stop every couple days to fill, with electric you just add a bit everywhere you go, then top up at night. It becomes second nature. We have a small farm and are surrounded by other larger farms, my second vehicle is a lifted truck, which are common place in the rural area..believe it or not. So I figured I was in for some serious commentary when I got it. But overall people are really impressed with it and had no idea there were affordable EVs with that kind of range.
Next....
I bought new rims for the car that are 12lbs each....very light. I hated the oem ones, so they will be the winter wheels. I'll weight them when I pull the tires. I also got a rear spoiler for it....but I doubt the aerodynamic loss will hurt range much. I'll post any difference in energy consumption with the lighter wheels when I mount them....if it'll ever warm up in Ottawa!
**Sorry for the grammar, I wrote this on a cell phone that feels the need to autocorrect everything
