ID.4 is one of the most popular family electric crossovers in our country. Affordable price, excellent characteristics and level of comfort make it quite attractive for Ukrainians. However, before buying this car, the question often arises: “What to choose — mono- or all-wheel drive ID.4?”. Let's compare these two versions of the car in Ukrainian conditions.
Ukrainian climatic conditions can become a real “stress test” for electric cars. With a sharp drop in temperature in winter, the energy consumption of electric vehicles increases significantly. Experts from the First Electric Train channel decided to test the energy consumption of two different versions of the ID.4.
For the test we chose a rear-wheel drive ID.4, shod with 20-inch tires (235/55/20` front and 255/55/20` rear) and all-wheel drive with the same tire size 225/65/18` on all wheels. Both tire sizes are recommended by the manufacturer, Volkswagen AG, specifically for these ID.4s.
During the trip, the car owners noticed that the Chinese tires that the one-wheel drive car was wearing behaved very poorly in the snow.. That is why the authors urge you not to neglect choosing good tires for your car, because any savings are not worth it.
The route started from the charging station in. Ivankov. At the time of launch, the batteries in both cars were 85% charged.. The first 100 kilometers of the journey were already quite surprising — the costs in both cars turned out to be almost similar: single-wheel drive — 25.4 kWh, battery charge 51%; all-wheel drive – 25.7 kWh, battery – 50%. Similar results persisted in the future, which amazed experts.
At the end of the route, when both cars returned to Kyiv, the experts presented a table of average expenses in their cars. They emphasized that in difficult weather conditions, costs increase significantly, but even in such conditions, electric vehicles can safely travel long distances.
To summarize, we can conclude that the average cost of electric vehicles depends not only on the type of drive and weather conditions, but also on the wheels that are installed on your car.
As experts from the “First Electric Train” channel have proven, an all-wheel drive car with narrower and smaller tires consumes as much energy as a rear-wheel drive car, which, it would seem, should consume less. That is, the choice of tires on electric vehicles is even more important than on a car with an internal combustion engine.