youtube.com/hubnut/smart_electric_drive_is_it_the_best_of_the_bunch¶
3 excerpts.
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youtube.com/hubnut/smart_electric_drive_is_it_the_best_of_the_bunch · p. 1 · Applies to: 450, 451, 452, 453, 454, #1, ebike
My name's Ian. This is Hubner. And I drive interesting cars. And today it's another Smart. And uh it's another second generation Smart, the 451, as it's known in Smart Circles. Uh I've driven a petrol one. I've driven a diesel one quite recently. And now I'm going to be driving the electric one, the rarest of them all. So all those people who go, "Oh, smarts. That gearbox. Oh, I hate it." Well, this hasn't got that. It's the only smart you can buy that but doesn't have the semi-automatic gearbox. It has one gear and enables you to go forwards or backwards. So, it's quite novel. It's also the cabriolet. So, we had a 450 cabriolet last year. This is a 451. Much improved roof system. So, I'm going to enjoy seeing how that works. In fact, I may even start there before we uh jump aboard this electric smart. It's for sale here at EV Wales. The asking price is $4995 and uh it offers around 80 mi of range. Uh no rapid charging. So I look forward to everyone telling me how that won't work. Say do a,000 miles a day, double down on Tuesdays and have to transport an elephant and 16 people. Yeah, it isn't the car for you. It's not going to be the car for a lot of people. But if you're just doing a lot of local mileage uh and pottering about, perfect vehicle. But I'm looking forward to seeing how this drives cuz it's going to drive like no Smart I have ever driven. So officially this is a smart electric drive. That was the branding. Electric drive on the back there and the little logo on the side. It's actually a deferred attempt at making an electric smart. They originally had one that had a molten salt battery that had to be heated to like over 200° to be functional. Rubbish. Terrible idea. Um so they had a few attempts before getting it right with a lithiumion battery. It's about 17 kwatt hours and uh it drives the rear wheels much like a normal Smart, but the roof very different. On the Mark1 Smarts, the uh rear window was glass and a bit of a pain. But if I press this button, then the roof folds back along the top and then it should fold down at the back as well. Okay, this bit's quite clever. you have to have the ignition on and uh press the button inside the car to trigger the next phase which is that the window folds flat into the hood and uh the hood folds down like so. Uh so that um all this is now automated. On the phase 1 smart you had to manually do this and then you had to manually lift it back up and try and get it to click in so it would then close forward. So that's an improvement. uh open the boot and uh sorry you can tell I've already been in here. Got a luggage cover. A bit of space back here. A bit more generous in the second generation smart. And then under here uh we've got the motor. So that's where it now lives under here at the back. And uh I suspect the charging goubbins is there as well. The battery is stored underneath the car. And uh yeah, this I can't wait to drive this. I'm really looking forward to it. So, it's not the most practical cuz you got all this in the way of more boot space, but obviously you can put the roof back up again. So, uh I might do that cuz it is quite cold and I'm a wuss. So, we press the button, the roof comes back up, and then press it again and it all slides shut. It's a lot easier than the first gen and that proper glass rear window. Otherwise in here it's um remarkably like any other smart uh I don't know if this is a standard stereo or not. I suspect not. That looks like a a fake um support but uh heated seats. Uh a bonus on a convertible two levels. Here's our gear selector. And it's a more usual style. There's our buttons for the roof operation as well. The key like uh SAR just down here. Hazard lights sound like that. And then um we've got a battery state of charge uh and uh the power as well. So we can see our usage as we're going down the road. Should be quite interesting. We start it by turning the key. It says we're ready and we got a little smart icon. Um we're at 60% battery at the moment. Uh it reckons in eco mode we've got 35 miles of range. So like I say, if you're going long distance, probably not the one. Oh gosh, that's a loud washer pump. Good wipers, and of course, they overlap all very good. It's 12° outside. Apparently, we've got air conditioning. We've got those heated seats, like I say, and again, very useful in an electric vehicle. Uh oh, sorry, just turn you back a bit more towards me. Very useful in an electric vehicle to have heated seats because it means you don't have to
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youtube.com/hubnut/smart_electric_drive_is_it_the_best_of_the_bunch · p. 2 · Applies to: 450, 451, 452, 453, 454, #1, ebike
heat the entire car quite so much. But we have got the conventional heater should we need it. Now, so far this is the smoothest smart I've ever driven. We've got flappy paddles, so you can adjust the level of regen going on. Um, yeah, apparently they've done a couple of different options. I like it in maximum regen, really. Oh, yeah. Get your foot down. She accelerates well. Yeah, just like my first generation Cabrio, wind noise is the problem. They never really managed to um engineer that one out. Steering feels very heavy actually. It is assisted, but uh obviously it doesn't need to assist very much. 5560 not a problem at all other than the wind noise. actually got to slow down a bit here. If I just pop the um heated seats on. Why not? I'll tell you what though, because there's no engine noise. I am noticing all the noise. You don't otherwise tend to notice the road noise. Obviously, the wind noise. Um I I'm yet to drive a Smart Cabriolet of any form, including the Roadster where wind noise is actually good. Uh the hard tops are a lot better, but this one's done 36,776 miles, so plenty of life left in it. Uh like I say, no rapid charging. So, uh if you charge it up, it's going to take about um 3 hours by a type two charger. So, that's the ones you tend to find more um at supermarkets uh where you have to take your own cable along. Uh, and home chargers tend to be of that nature as well. Uh, otherwise you could charge up on the granny cable of course that plugs into 13 amp. And like I say, I don't think you buy one of these to do a lot of miles in it. This is because you need to pop to the shops. Uh, you need to nip into town and there's one at most two of you. Obviously, it's just the rear view mirror for the tiny little view I've got out the back. Yeah, it rides a bit firm, but it's always going to be in a smart. But it's amazing how soon you kind of forget you're driving an electric car. You just put your foot down and it accelerates and you take your foot off and it slows down. There's nothing particularly dramatic about it. In terms of torque, it has got about 130 new m of torque, which is about the same as the diesel. The diesel really quite torquy. Uh so we'll go and pop down this road now. Check it in a bit. Hey. Yeah, it is not stupid rapid, but uh nonetheless, it's uh very enjoyable. The mapping seems to really sort of control uh the uh use of power cuz obviously if you unleash the full power of that motor, you'll be wheel spinning everywhere and using a lot of um energy up on acceleration. By having a fairly lazy throttle map, it does um calm it down somewhat. Can confirm the seat heaters are good. Enjoying the seat heaters. Now we're firmly in charge. We are um my foot is off the power. So the charge gauge is showing us putting juice back into the battery. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the electric car. Smart has quite good blind spots there, but we're all good. If we turn the key, smart, open your mind, and then um foot on the brake. Turn again. There we go. Little icon to say she's ready to go. And that's when the um dash gauges pop up there as well. So, uh it's doing 3.7 miles per kilowatt hour at the moment. Uh which is cuz I've been mostly hoofing it everywhere. Uh, I'm sure your average can be um an awful lot higher than that, but you think you if you're charging at home, you're probably paying a few pence per kilowatt hour if you're on the right tariff. And uh a kilowatt hour will get you 3.7 milesi. Very, very cheap to run. The question is, given how noisy it is with the roof shut, is it actually better with the roof open? Uh, just like the previous generation, I'm going to go for it. I'm going to go all the way. Uh you can remove these um side panels separately if you wish. Uh that is optional behavior. Let's see if the roof off makes a difference. Uh I can't seem to get it out of eco mode, but nonetheless, if you put your foot all the way down hard, oh yeah, you get that electric shove.
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youtube.com/hubnut/smart_electric_drive_is_it_the_best_of_the_bunch · p. 3 · Applies to: 450, 451, 452, 453, 454, #1, ebike
And while the headline figure is uh 130 Newton meters of torque, the same as the diesel, I think, the difference here is it this produces it from a standstill. Uh there is no sweet spot for an electric motor. It just gives everything it's got from the get- go. So, uh it makes it feel a lot more brisk, I think. And it needs to be because this is a horrible junction. Very poor visibility. Yeah, let's go. Oh yeah, it really is like the best Smart you've ever driven just because uh it's so smooth. Now, it still represents the fairly early days of electric vehicles, which is why it took three attempts to get one into production at all. I think the first two attempts of these they only leased out. Uh so, uh it it took them a while to get a version. and we're actually happy to put on sale. And so, you know, I accept 80 mi of range is not a lot. That's not useful range for your big trips. But, uh, yeah, it it's just intriguing, isn't it? But petrol, diesel, or electric, all available at the same time, and I think these would have been quite expensive. Well, that was a very entertaining drive. It just proves how good an automatic can be if it's actually an electric motor. So all those gearbox wos with smarts gone in an instant. And uh also working on the engines on the petrol and diesel versions horrible. Generally you got to drop the subframe to do anything on this. You would certainly hope you wouldn't have to do very much at all. But uh yeah, a very intriguing prospect and uh amazing how many journeys you could actually do in that without really realizing. Uh want to drive to the south of France? No, probably not. But for all your bimbling around locally, and you probably do a lot more local miles than you realize, that'd be absolutely ideal and super cheap to run. So $4995 is the asking price here at EV Wales. Um, if that's not to your taste, they do a whole range of other EVs and they also do EV servicing. Uh, so uh, a very useful contact. So, uh, there you go. The Smart Electric has just become my new favorite smart, I think. So, thank you very much for watching and we'll see you in a future video. Farewell [music]