This week's EV bargain that I'm not buying

Lovely motor

From a post by @Alkers in another thread

Would be a great buy at that price. Solid cars and range.

Yes I'm waiting impatiently here for sanity to return to 2nd hand ev prices :-)

Pity. What was it at in the auction?

It'd be an interesting project vehicle for sure. Keep the ESB look on the outside, I think it adds to the aesthetic.

I was the leading bidder at 1500, I suspect we werent near the reserve or they had a good offer to take it off the site.

I'd have loved it for posterity, with 100km range and CEE charging you are very limited in using it as a real van!

I'm genuinely intrigued by that electric Transit. My other half has a 30km round trip of a commute. We've actually been looking into a potential leasing contract for a new MG4 that would become the main vehicle for our household if we get it, but tbh this could be almost equally suitable and cost less in the medium term. Right now, I'm fantasising about the potential for expanding the battery pack in the cargo area (and just putting in a false floor or whatever to cover & protect the modules) meaning it wouldn't necessarily have to be remain a 100km range vehicle long term. But it could be a good starting point that's still usable for our needs from the get-go.

One thing I'm not clear on is the mention of CEE charging. Is that the same as the sockets you use for the likes of a campervan's leisure battery - if so, presumably that means charging would be a slower process than normal? Wouldn't necessarily be a problem as it would only be used the way an older Leaf would, i.e. charged only at home/work for commuting and shorter trips. We'd still have an ICE for anything longer distance.

Tbh my biggest fear would probably be the tendency of Transits to rust! Plus potentially the red tape involved in importing from the south to NI, i.e. registering and testing it etc.

Yes, these are conversions. As far as I am aware they are not lithium ion and the only charging method is a 16a commando/cee plug - indeed the exact same as a caravan hookup. I have 3 32a blue plugs at home so wouldnt have had an issue charging. I think, given it's so early in the EV timeline, everything would be very crude and you may even be able to make your own battery for this - similar to a golf cart.

Very hard to find info online on them, there were only a few made and all were for the likes of government or semi states. A very rare beast which of course adds to the appeal.

The insurance will be an issue alright. I tried to insure a van without a business need and no company quoted a van for private use back in 2018 when I bought a Sprinter as a camper project. I managed to insure it via motor caravan club in the end but it was a hassle and obviously needed to be converted asap which I did. But I think even that might not be an option anymore.

It's a good point about the insurance - that said, I'm based in NI so tend to have access to much cheaper premiums than anyone living in the south with whom I've ever discussed that particular topic! My last renewal was about stg£180 fully comp including legal cover, for something like 7000 miles p.a. There's a UK-based company called Adrian Flux which specialises in the sort of policies other companies generally refuse outright or else load with high premiums, such as young/newly-qualified drivers, unusual or even one-off vehicles etc. I've used them before and they weren't too bad at all - willing to take into account at least some of the NCB earned and in use on another vehicle (e.g. if you had full NCB that was already in use on another vehicle's policy, they would start you off with the equivalent of 3 or 4 years' no-claims discount on the additional vehicle). So if I get a reply from the seller and decide I want to take it further then I'll give them a call. I could always describe it as a campervan (and actually do something to make it into one) to see if that helps.

Re the type of battery and the range - so long as there's an electric motor in it that's powerful enough to get it to normal cruising speed, and it'll do that 30km commute without having to coast gently to a stop by the time you arrive (!), it would do what we need it to in the short term and be more useful than a 24kWh Leaf. Presumably it would be possible in the future to upgrade the battery by sourcing modules from a crashed EV. For example, the EV breaker in Newry currently has a Kia Niro 64kWh battery pack available for £5500. You would hope that in 2-3 years, something like this would be even cheaper. I know that wouldn't be the only cost of a battery upgrade, but it should be most significant one - shouldn't it?!

Hi, curious to know how to identify the better version.. MIC car versus the MIA earlier version.. assume MIC sold here from a particular date, but identify by VIN too?

I messaged a pal of mine who works for ESB to see if he could find out anything about that van. His response:

"Spoke to one of the lads this morning and he said it would be a big no. It was in the line school, used just for going up and down the field and they were constantly charging it. He reckons the best part of it would be the body. They left all the diff and four wheel drive in it and the electric motor was driving all that".

So really it'd be a case of buying a 12 year old Transit body ready for an EV upgrade, but it wouldn't be usable until all that upgrading work was done. Even if that Niro battery I mentioned was the cost benchmark, that's still the guts of ten grand before adding a new motor and on-board charger together with the labour involved. Obviously a factory-built EV with that sort of cargo space/flexibility is a rare and much more expensive beast, so this van might still represent a viable project for someone who could carry out the work themselves or afford to have it in the workshop until it's all done. But as it's not something that we'd be able to make immediate use of over a period of say a year or two before getting stuck into it, I'll not be pursuing the idea any further.

Down another 1k according to add today:

-Price now reduced by €8,100 for 1 week only, then it’s off the market