Chevrolet did a great job on this EV besides the winter efficiency I have no complaints. I’m thinking you need to drive one before you have the right to complain about it.

@@EvMan6466 I actually did test drive an Equinox EV and the Blazer EV. I have 2 EVs already, a Tesla Y and a BMW i4. I have also have test driven various other EVs, including the Bolt, Rivian etc and therefore I do have a right to make observations. Chevy's heart is not into making these EVs competitive and happy happy joy joy reviews, that overlook the deficiencies will just mislead the consumers.

Did you precondition the battery or preheat the cabin before leaving to head up? Doing so should in theory significantly help out efficiency. A warm battery to start will do far better than a cold one. Also, in regards to the mobile charger being 32 amps, you might NOT want to bring a more powerful charger. With NEMA 14-50 outlets, most are probably going to be connected to a 50 amp breaker, and assuming the breaker is 50 amp, that means you shouldn’t draw more than 80% of that on a consistent basis (40 amp). If someone wired that outlet to a 40 amp breaker, if you were to charge for a while above 32 amp then you very well may trip the breaker.

Preheating your car still uses energy. Just from the wall not your battery. So from a cost standpoint it does not save you anything. Unless you want to drive without your heater on which is not me. Preconditioning before a DC charge helps you charge faster.

You could definitely be right about the sensors, though if that's the case it's disappointing that there is no warning about sensors being covered and the experience just breaks. I think they could do much better with explaining that. For the efficiency, I have had the roof racks on since getting it, so I don't think they're playing a hug part in reduction, I have the all-season tires still on, so I think it's likely more the cold and elevation. It's not by any means a deal breaker and I love the Equinox overall, but the winter efficiency is definitely rough. As long as I can get L2 charging at the mountain, it's still a great ski trip car though.

@@Eventurefamily yah the roof rack likely isn’t a huge hit. Me being in eastern Canada, we definitely needed to get winter tires, which of course wouldn’t be as efficient as the stock tires.

I agree, I was shocked at how much range we lost during our trip, even with barely freezing temperatures. That's nearly what we're seeing too, and I've been intentionally driving slower to try to minimize loss due to speed.

@@EventurefamilyMy 2024 Niro EV gets 3 m/kwh in the same weather. Also since I’ve installed my ChargePoint charger and can see the actual energy usage I’ve found I lose another 10% there in efficiency by charging conversion loses. I don’t think it’s much cheaper to drive than a gas car in the winter time for the equinox EV. And that’s charging at home at $.20 a kWh . Glad I installed solar that will help but still disappointed in the efficiency. I do like the car very much though.

wow

They definitely could be covered in salt as there's a ton spread here now. I'm surprised though that there were no warnings or errors displayed about the sensors though if that's the case.

I like it overall still too. I just wish SC weren't so flaky and the efficiency wasn't so impacted in the cold.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure they have the absolute lowest trim for sure. I didn't mind the lack of punch that much as I had no expectation of it being a performance vehicle, but the nicer interior options would have made a meaningful difference. I did try to find some non-Tesla charing options, but it's very difficult coming from the US as we can't download most of the charging apps and unfortunately they didn't give me the RFID fob they were supposed to to enable me to charge elsewhere. I'll definitely have to give it another shot some time.

He's a tough critic!

The design is so captivating and just makes me happy. I've seen quite a few now in the US at dealerships, but still haven't seen a single one on the road. I hope they start going out to owners soon.

Love it! Congrats on both, I don't think there's a better vehicle for the value you can get right now. I'm going to be sad in another year and a half when the lease ends.

Yeah, I'm really surprised they didn't give us one in Switzerland and I thought it was a requirement or at least very common in Europe.

Thanks for that info on the drive trains, I was very confused about it based on the online materials from the rental company and no one could tell me for sure in person what we actually had. It must have been RWD then because it definitely was not AWD. I think the infotainment system on the Buzz (and other ID vehicles) is decent; I'd rank it above Hyundai / Kia, about on par with or slightly below GM (I like the Google integration there but I could see the argument that supporting CarPlay / Android Auto in the IDs puts it above the GM ones), and definitely below Rivian / Tesla. The routing was good and I was impressed with it adding charging stops, though it wasn't perfect as it struggled with some of the POIs we tried searching for and the charging didn't seem optimal as it picked some slower, lower powered chargers on our route, though some of this might be the learning curve and we'd figure it out better with more time with it. Norway was amazing with EVs, we spent time there two years ago and loved how easy the infrastructure made it. France / Switzerland still seem to have some room to grow, so far in our experience they have been only slightly better than the US but nowhere near as good as Norway or Germany have been. I'm excited as well to see how Rivian does with the R2 in Europe. I think it has a chance to do really well there. For R2, it might be a little too late to do much different with charging (and keep the low cost targets in place), but I could see future generations getting larger charging improvements out of the joint venture with VW and Rivian's own development. I know they seriously listen to feedback and charging performance is rapidly becoming the biggest area of feedback to them now. Thanks for watching and the great insights!

@@Eventurefamily Rivian infotanement for sure is levels above the ID Buzz and most legacy manufacturers. I think that s the reason VW asked for the joint venture, to acquire better tech for their next gen ID cars. Do you think the join venture will help Rivian ? What do you think about the new start up Scout ? Would you swap the Rivian for that ?

It was such a head turner! I'm surprised we didn't see a single other one on our entire trip and now that we're back, I've seen 4 sitting in fron of various VW dealerships (none on the road yet though). Everyone seemed to want to look at it despite it being out in Europe for a while now. I think in the US it will get a ton of attention.

Glad you liked it!

The ID Buzz is a great EV if you have a big family, or like vanlife. The software is fine. The only issue is the range. While it s not an issue if you live in Europe it can be a challenge if you live in the US. I actually think you can live with it in daily use over there, but for long trip it can be a challenge especially with the state of charging infrastructure you have in the US.

I agree overall for sure. I was hoping it would be more of a do it all type of family vehicle for the price tag, but with the charging performance and range, it is a hard sell for a longer road trip. That said, I think it makes a ton of sense as a family hauler, doing school drop off, and sports runs, with an occasional longer road trip with one or two charging stops. I certainly wouldn't want to do a cross country trip or even something like New York / Boston to FL, but otherwise it would work well. I saw that VW says they will get Tesla Supercharging in Q1 this year, so that may change the equation slightly as well. I want to check out a US version now and have started seeing them at dealerships to see if we missed anything with the 3 row version. It was still awesome to get to try it out over the course of 10 days though in such amazing scenery!

That's awesome! It's one of my favorite EVs.