Need advice on buying a used 2016 e-Golf

[Jhumroo]

I am in the Dallas area and considering buying a used 2016 e-Golf. All the cars I am seeing listed are lease returns from California. A majority of them are listed on Carvana and include a shipping fee, so I’m assuming they are being shipped from CA as opposed to local stock. The listings are from $13K to $18K for cars with between 12K to 20+K miles.

Should I go for the lowest miles, or is it okay to buy one with more miles at a lower price? This car will be mainly driven locally to drop kids to school and activities, run errands, and shopping etc. So, not more than 15-20 miles on most days, with maybe 40-50 mile round trips on weekends.

What should I be considering before making a purchase and what should I check/test after purchase? Carvana offers a 7-day return policy in case something is not right or if don’t like the vehicle.

I had a leased Nissan LEAF for 3-years until a couple years ago and really miss driving an EV. From everything I have read, the e-Golf seems to be a better car than the LEAF. I know the expected range is 80+ miles, which is the same as the LEAF. But the LEAF had a battery percentage meter on the dash and I don’t think the e-Golf has that. Short of taking it to a VW dealer, how can I check the battery capacity of the car to see if its degraded or holding a 100% charge?

Not may VW dealers in Dallas are certified to work on the e-Golf, which is another challenge.

 

[Jhumroo]

Would appreciate any information or recommendations. Thanks

 

[Szyszka]

Was about to ask why looking at used when you can get a brand new one for about the price you have mentioned and then it hit me... you're in TX so your options are somehow limited, at least when it comes to buying new.

Cannot offer much advice as to what to look for when buying new. Just to be on the safe side, do check your local VW dealer whether they offer any kind of support on the eGolf.

 

[srue]

There's no known user-facing way to check the car's battery health. It may be possible with an OBD adapter. No one knows for sure how these batteries will degrade generally. Anecdotal evidence suggests some slight degradation over time, though I personally haven't noticed any range drop over 12k miles. VW put a sizable buffer in the usable battery capacity, which is gentle on the battery. Some have speculated that the car's software could also reclaim this buffer as capacity drops.

I personally tend to spend a little more money to get the lower mileage car. I just tend to believe a car with fewer miles will have fewer problems, but of course it wholly depends on the individual car.

Best of luck to you.

 

[Jhumroo]

Was about to ask why looking at used when you can get a brand new one for about the price you have mentioned and then it hit me... you're in TX so your options are somehow limited, at least when it comes to buying new.

Cannot offer much advice as to what to look for when buying new. Just to be on the safe side, do check your local VW dealer whether they offer any kind of support on the eGolf.

I’ve called half a dozen VW dealers around Dallas and found one who said they have two technicians in house who are certified to work on the e-Golf, another said they would check with their head tech and call me back, but never did.

 

[Jhumroo]

There's no known user-facing way to check the car's battery health. It may be possible with an OBD adapter. No one knows for sure how these batteries will degrade generally. Anecdotal evidence suggests some slight degradation over time, though I personally haven't noticed any range drop over 12k miles. VW put a sizable buffer in the usable battery capacity, which is gentle on the battery. Some have speculated that the car's software could also reclaim this buffer as capacity drops.

I personally tend to spend a little more money to get the lower mileage car. I just tend to believe a car with fewer miles will have fewer problems, but of course it wholly depends on the individual car.

Best of luck to you.

Thanks for the additional information. I wish there was an easy way to see the battery capacity on the dash like they show on the LEAF. May have to take it to the VW dealer to get it checked.

 

[MichaelG]

Jhumroo,
I don't know if you are still looking, but I recently took the plunge on a 2016 e-golf and was wanting to have an answer to the battery health question. I spent a great deal of time at this and a number of other forums for advice. There are a number of things that can do damage to the battery. At least this is what I think I learned. Storing it for an extended period (weeks?) with either a full charge or more importantly a fully depleted battery. Frequent uses of the DC fast charge. especially back to back (to back) charges with the fast charge. The owners manual even recommends that you do not do a back to back DC charging. I found a way to give you a rough estimate of the battery health. This technique will not be terribly accurate, but it at least could tell you if the battery has sustained serious damage. When you test drive the vehicle take note of the fuel gauge and the range remaining. Convert the fuel gauge to a decimal value (3/4 full would be .75, 1/2 full would be .5). Divide the range remaining by the fuel gauge numeric value. If you are seeing a value that is in the 85-95 (or higher) range then I would say that the battery has not sustained serious damage (45 miles remaining with 1/2 full would be 45/.5=90mi with a "full" charge). It would be valuable to test drive the vehicle at least twice over several days so you could get at least two data points. I was looking at a car over a period of two weeks so I was able to get two different opportunities to do this calculation. Both times I came up with a number of approx 65. This led me to believe that something bad had happen to the battery. The vehicle I ultimately ended up with is regularly calculating to a value of 85-90mi. I also steered clear of vehicles that had the DC quick charge. This was a way to insure that the vehicle had not been exposed to frequent DC charging. I understand the desire to be able to quickly charge the vehicle, but it was not that important to me. I have had the vehicle for about 10 days and I am loving it.
Mike

 

[Jhumroo]

Jhumroo,
I don't know if you are still looking, but I recently took the plunge on a 2016 e-golf and was wanting to have an answer to the battery health question. I spent a great deal of time at this and a number of other forums for advice. There are a number of things that can do damage to the battery. At least this is what I think I learned. Storing it for an extended period (weeks?) with either a full charge or more importantly a fully depleted battery. Frequent uses of the DC fast charge. especially back to back (to back) charges with the fast charge. The owners manual even recommends that you do not do a back to back DC charging. I found a way to give you a rough estimate of the battery health. This technique will not be terribly accurate, but it at least could tell you if the battery has sustained serious damage. When you test drive the vehicle take note of the fuel gauge and the range remaining. Convert the fuel gauge to a decimal value (3/4 full would be .75, 1/2 full would be .5). Divide the range remaining by the fuel gauge numeric value. If you are seeing a value that is in the 85-95 (or higher) range then I would say that the battery has not sustained serious damage (45 miles remaining with 1/2 full would be 45/.5=90mi with a "full" charge). It would be valuable to test drive the vehicle at least twice over several days so you could get at least two data points. I was looking at a car over a period of two weeks so I was able to get two different opportunities to do this calculation. Both times I came up with a number of approx 65. This led me to believe that something bad had happen to the battery. The vehicle I ultimately ended up with is regularly calculating to a value of 85-90mi. I also steered clear of vehicles that had the DC quick charge. This was a way to insure that the vehicle had not been exposed to frequent DC charging. I understand the desire to be able to quickly charge the vehicle, but it was not that important to me. I have had the vehicle for about 10 days and I am loving it.
Mike

Hi Mike. Yes, I took the plunge and ordered a 2016 e-Golf SE with DC fast-charge from Carvana, which should be here this week.

I too have pored over the articles on several of these forums. Thanks for the tip on calculating the battery capacity. I'll use that to do some calculations while driving the car. The good thing is Carvana has a 7-day return policy, so I can drive it for a few days and make some estimates.

Thanks again. Enjoy your e-Golf.