The Electric Vehicle Experience Podcast – Episode List
Hello and welcome to the Electric Vehicle Experience
Today I’m thrilled to kick off this podcast.
As the name says, it will be about electric vehicles, or EVs, to make it easier.
But first, let me tell you a bit more about me.
My name is Gustavo and I love cars and technology. I started using computers during the 80s, the first computer I had at home was an Amstrad. Later I had a Schneider, then a 386 which I can’t remember the brand and I still have a Commodore Amiga 500 stored away.
I loved cars and after having one I started participating in some car communities here in Portugal, sometimes being part of the management staff of web forums and I participated in various meetings. Sometimes I was helping or the one organizing them. That’s also where I met some of my closest friends.
For years I enjoyed getting great fuel economy and taught a few friends of mine. I wrote an ebook about fuel economy over a decade ago.
For years I thought of EVs as interesting but “not there yet” for something more than an urban car.
Throughout the years I had cars that ran on gasoline, diesel and I even converted one to LPG.
Meanwhile, the evolution of EVs has been mind-blowing.
I was thinking of buying a Honda Civic diesel when the pandemic hit. For some reason I wasn’t really considering an EV back then but I had been consuming a lot of information on EVs, and I was fascinated.
During the pandemic, I had two activities to which I devoted a lot of time: one was walking outside (when possible) and the other was watching a lot of videos about cars, namely EVs.
For a while, I decided to just postpone buying because there I was weeks on end without even seeing my car at the time, and back then we weren’t sure how things would progress and how much I would be using the car in the near future.
In Summer 2020 I tested the Tesla Model 3 for the first time. Testing it confirmed: I was really hooked on that car.
I ordered it in June 2021 and received it later in November of that year.
Since then I drove it for almost 32k kms.
I had it going over snow in freezing temperatures (and that reminds me, it’s sooooo good to have a heated steering wheel) and also under the hot sun at almost 40ºC.
I’ve driven it on highways and other main itineraries; also by the coast and on the hillside.
And, yes, although it’s a car that sits close to the ground, it has gone through a few dirt roads where I had to be very careful to prevent any bump on the car’s bottom. I did get its wheels on the dirt a few times but above all, always being very cautious; in 2-3 of those situations it felt safer to go the way back.
For a while I kept another diesel car; I even thought of using that car if I decided to go on a long trip, like going to Spain. I could maybe go spend a few days and come back on a single tank.
On an EV? Surely not.
That idea didn’t last long and that diesel car is no longer with me. In fact, since I got an EV, the diesel car barely left the garage at all, even though it was an awesome car for 10 years, a car I really enjoyed a lot.
When you get really comfortable with an EV doing a long trip is generally pretty easy.
Please hit the subscribe button and check out the links in the description for my social media links where you can also follow me.
Thank you for listening and I’ll talk to you soon