New Car!

I had an appointment on Saturday morning two weeks ago to pick up new hearing aids in Eugene. Mine were 10 years old, and I had decided to upgrade. The new ones have much better sound quality.

While I was listening to a podcast and eating breakfast, my phone suddenly stopped. Zero percent battery, when just a few minutes earlier it had been at a normal level. Not good. Fortunately, there was a mobile phone kiosk close to where I’d be picking up the hearing aids. The phone is older than the hearing aids, so I figured what that meant.

On Thursday and Friday, I had thought about checking out electric cars while I was in Eugene. The price of gas had gone up a dollar a gallon, and there was no reason to believe that the situation at the Strait would be resolved any time soon, or that prices would go down in any rapid way, despite what the markets seem to think. More likely, they would continue going up.

When I first got to Oregon, I had to buy a car. The car I had had for 15 years developed a serious drive train problem two weeks before I left Santa Fe. I sold it and rented a Kia Soul for the last two weeks. Ugh, another expense.

I wanted a hybrid, but I wasn’t ready to go full electric for the usual reasons – concern about range and finding charging stations, mainly. I wound up with a Subaru Crosstrek, which I liked except for its being fully gasoline. They have a hybrid now, although there was like one in stock in all of Eugene according to the dealer websites.

I thought that the Hyundai Ioniq 5 was good-looking, and the Asian manufacturers are going full bore on electric. Since we don’t have those nice $10,000 Chinese electrics, I decided to check out the Hyundai dealer.

Yes indeed my phone’s battery was probably dying, so I ordered a new one. The hearing aid fitting took about an hour, and then off to the Hyundai dealer. They had one new Ioniq 5 and two used, 12,000 mile, from leases in California. I tried one of the used ones. Very nice. And I bought it. I signed a lot of paper, and I drove it home.

What a day!

I really like the Ioniq. It’s the size I want, and a hatchback. Two-wheel drive because snow isn’t the issue here that it is in Santa Fe. I was amazed at all the bells and whistles on the Subaru, and the Ioniq has a few more.

It feels very solid on the road, and it handles nicely. The adjustability of the seat is amazing. I don’t have it quite right yet, but I’m getting close. The screens are usable without being intrusive, and the temperature adjustments and a few other things are separate from the screens. Many of the screen functions are disabled unless the car is in Park, anyway. The navigation system is the best I’ve encountered via phone or car. Easy to set.  And there’s an additional help.

The car has a heads-up display. It required getting accustomed to, but I like it very much. Car speed, speed limit, lane monitoring, and, ta-daa! navigation instructions! I like the speed limit signs, because about half the time I miss them on the road. I didn’t know exactly where the speed limit on I-5 went down to 60 going into Eugene until I had this car.

I am still learning all the conveniences and safety features. I’ve been wondering how all the big he-men who don’t want nannying deal with modern cars. Maybe the steering wheel of their behemoth pickup truck doesn’t pull in the opposite direction when they drift to the side of their lane? Or they find a way to disable it? That’s far from the only feature that they might not like.

I’ve charged it a few times. Most of the time I’ve been getting between 4 and 5 miles per kilowatt-hour. I haven’t worked out how that compares to the price of gasoline. The charging plug is a bit heavy for me to maneuver into place, but I can get it. Nice that those areas are much cleaner than a gas station. Charging takes a different mindset. Instead of running it all the way down and then filling up, you find 20 minutes when you’re not doing anything and charge the car. And gassing a car must take ten minutes or so.

It’s very quiet inside. It makes an artificial noise like a gasoline car so that I don’t sneak up on pedestrians. And there is tire noise on the freeway, of course. Eventually I hope we can do away with the artificial noise, but I suppose it will be a few years.

No more oil changes! Even if the Strait is fully opened tomorrow, the effects will be felt for another year or two. And electric cars are the future anyway.

Photo credit: By M 93, CC BY-SA 3.0 de