Are all Tesla drivers narcissists?

[fourtet]

I'm sure by now everyone must have seen the electric equivalent of the mondeo driving around; whilst the technology interests me and of course its the way all cars will probably end up going, it always amazed me why people would spend such a lot of money on an ugly unknown car and manufacturer. However, it appears that in addition to this particular taste they have, the people who buy these particular cars think they are above us all and whilst they'd never have spent such an amount on a car before, now they have, it is all they seem to be living for.

And so this brings me to my current situation which i was looking for some advice on....

I drive a hybrid car and park it most days at the station, plugged in to a charger that i pay a membership for. A few months ago I started getting a note on the car advising me that only Tesla cars should plug into the charger i use (to be clears its a not a Tesla point), this happened a few times and i simply ignored it, the notes stopped but soon after someone started hitting the emergency cutoff on the charger point. This has been happening for a few weeks now and nearly every time i park there.

I decided to go beyond ignoring it by leaving the car with the emergency stopped pressed - ie deliberately not charging my car in the hope the offender assumed someone else was doing it and gave up.

Last week the offender decided to up the game and poured a hot chocolate (hope you are getting a picture of this person now) over the side of the car and into its charging port, luckily its obliviously designed to be exposed to the elements. so other than my car being the local wasp attraction there was no real issue.

I didn't have time to clean the car so the next day the car was back in the same spot and plugged in. Upon returning to the car that night the offender has now tried to break the charging port cover flap - like a normal tank flap on the car itself.

Its clearly escalating and whilst I worry partially for my car, i also worry about the state of mind this person is in and where it might end up.

Thoughts?

Edited by fourtet on Sunday 30th September 20:46

[C.A.R.]

Can you set up a dashcam pointing in the right direction?

If the car has an auxiliary socket which is permanently powered most dashcams have a built in function to record any movement...

[raspy]

Report to station, find out if they can share CCTV footage.

[Evanivitch]

fourtet said:

I'm sure by now everyone must have seen the electric equivalent of the mondeo driving around; .... spend such a lot of money on an ugly ..., the people who buy these particular cars think they are above us all and whilst they'd never have spent such an amount on a car before, now they have it, it is all they seem to be living for.

Thoughts?

Edited by fourtet on Sunday 30th September 20:31

I would say you are made for eachother.

[DailyHack]

Interesting, can see this being more of a problem with the whole electric car thing - with these acts of vandalism i.e pulling out chargers etc...maybe for a laugh, but can is pretty serious, bit like the law of syphoning fuel...

Haven't really got anything to say regarding your situation though, other than what a jerk!

Edited by DailyHack on Sunday 30th September 20:42

[EddieSteadyGo]

fourtet said:

<clip>...
I drive a hybrid car and park it most days at the station, plugged in to a charger that i pay a membership for.

When you say you pay a membership, are you referring to one of the standard charging networks like ecotricity?

If so, are you continuing to use the charging space after your car has charged?

[Ron99]

C.A.R. said:

Can you set up a dashcam pointing in the right direction?

If the car has an auxiliary socket which is permanently powered most dashcams have a built in function to record any movement...

Or power the cam with a sizeable power bank, along with using a large memory card.
Some cams can be set to keep recording until the memory card is full, then stop.
Buy a cam that can work with exFAT file systems and cope with 64GB cards which should be able to hold about eight hours of FHD video.
Alternatively, choose a cam which can use less memory by recording in lower resolution (e.g. 720pHD instead of 1080pFHD) to allow a regular 32GB FAT32 card to hold several hours of video.

[Toyoda]

Take the day off work, hide in the car and catch the Walt in the act. Their passive aggressive demeanour is likely to turn to a cowering wreck if you give them a good old bit of confrontation, not forgetting to record them in the act. Reminiscent of the thread about that fat tt who was recorded keying a lovely 140.

[Evanivitch]

EddieSteadyGo said:

fourtet said:

<clip>...
I drive a hybrid car and park it most days at the station, plugged in to a charger that i pay a membership for.

When you say you pay a membership, are you referring to one of the standard charging networks like ecotricity?

If so, are you continuing to use the charging space after your car has charged?

I suspect this is the crux of the issue.

PHEV with (at most) 10kWh battery sat at a 3/7kW post all day is poor form. It's not an excuse for vandalism or damage though.

[dvs_dave]

Park your car up with a movement sensing dashcam, see if you catch the tt. Go online, buy a cheap wheel clamp. When you know who it is/what time they’re there, make sure you’re not in “his” charging spot so he can park there. Attach the wheel clamp walk away laughing. For good measure and after he’s outstayed the parking ticket, phone up station parking enforcement firm, explain about a car blocking/hogging a charging spot with an expired ticket, get him towed. Even more satisfying.

[PK0001]

You have got a problem brewing there.

Check the car park for a Tesla's, sounds like someone has had their nose put out by your 'lesser' hybrid. Maybe they don't even realise hybrid cars exist.

Dash cam is a great idea.

Just as well plugs cannot be pulled out while cars are locked.

Wife has a GTE and I do wonder about the etiquette of charging bays. I mean the cars charge in less than 2 hours but you have left it in the bay all day whilst at work meaning nobody else can use it. Not your fault and I don't have a solution.

[EddieSteadyGo]

PK0001 said:

. I mean the cars charge in less than 2 hours but you have left it in the bay all day whilst at work meaning nobody else can use it. Not your fault and I don't have a solution.

If he is blocking a charger all day way after his car is charged, then I can understand why people are getting annoyed with his selfish behaviour. That doesn't condone vandalism of course.

One of the problems with current chargers is that there are very few bays and an increasing number of cars who would like to charge.

So the general etiquette with public chargers is you park in the bay until you are charged, and then you move to let someone else charge.

[PK0001]

EddieSteadyGo said:

PK0001 said:

. I mean the cars charge in less than 2 hours but you have left it in the bay all day whilst at work meaning nobody else can use it. Not your fault and I don't have a solution.

If he is blocking a charger all day way after his car is charged, then I can understand why people are getting annoyed with his selfish behaviour. That doesn't condone vandalism of course.

One of the problems with current chargers is that there are very few bays and an increasing number of cars who would like to charge.

So the general etiquette with public chargers is you park in the bay until you are charged, and then you move to let someone else charge.

I agree that you should move the car once charged but OPs car is at the train station where cars are left all day.

[EddieSteadyGo]

PK0001 said:

I agree that you should move the car once charged but OPs car is at the train station where cars are left all day.

I'm afraid to say, if he can't move his car when it is charged, he shouldn't charge there.

[ashleyman]

Is it a parking space or a charging pot? I wouldn't know the difference.

I guess it comes to if you view the space like a normal parking spot as in - the car is parked there all day regardless of if it's charging or not or are you to view the space like you would in a petrol station where it's to be used to fill up only?

[EddieSteadyGo]

ashleyman said:

Is it a parking space or a charging pot? I wouldn't know the difference.

I guess it comes to if you view the space like a normal parking spot as in - the car is parked there all day regardless of if it's charging or not or are you to view the space like you would in a petrol station where it's to be used to fill up only?

The accepted etiquette is the latter. But I understand it isn't obvious if the OP is perhaps a new owner.

Sounds like someone has written a note on his windscreen but the OP hasn't quite got the message. If this is what he was doing, hopefully this thread will have clarified matters. At least that way, if he carries on he knows why other people will continue to be annoyed with him

[Evanivitch]

I wonder if it's a 3 phase 22kW Type 2 charger?

That might be the reason for the Tesla comment (Zoe can use the full capability too).

Plugging a PHEV that has a 10kWh battery and a 3kW charge limit into one of those posts would be pretty selfish. However, many people would also be ignorant of what they're doing.

[ashleyman]

EddieSteadyGo said:

ashleyman said:

Is it a parking space or a charging pot? I wouldn't know the difference.

I guess it comes to if you view the space like a normal parking spot as in - the car is parked there all day regardless of if it's charging or not or are you to view the space like you would in a petrol station where it's to be used to fill up only?

The accepted etiquete is the latter. But I understand it isn't obvious if the OP is perhaps a new owner.

Sounds like someone has written a note on his windscreen but the OP hasn't quite got the message. If this is what he was doing, hopefully this thread will have clarified matters At least that way if he carries on he knows why other people will continue to be annoyed with him

OK, so if that's the case then how does the other owner know if the car is charging or not?

Sounds to me like other owner just wants to use the spot and doesn't care if the op is charging or not, they just want 'their' spot.

[EddieSteadyGo]

Evanivitch said:

I wonder if it's a 3 phase 22kW Type 2 charger?

That might be the reason for the Tesla comment (Zoe can use the full capability too).

Plugging a PHEV that has a 10kWh battery and a 3kW charge limit into one of those posts would be pretty selfish. However, many people would also be ignorant of what they're doing.

Good point. To be honest, there are quite a few minor but
potentially irritating parking/charging matters to be ironed out.

For example, I visited a shopping centre the other day. The bays with charging points were designated 'free parking', on the assumption people would use them for charging.

I noticed a couple of people park their car there, "plug" it in, but not active the charging app. So taking one of a small number of charging bays someone else would like to use to actually charge their car.

[EddieSteadyGo]

ashleyman said:

OK, so if that's the case then how does the other owner know if the car is charging or not?

It's obvious by looking at the charging unit.

It's a clear as being able to tell if you are putting petrol in your car at a fuel pump.