Kilowatt: A Podcast about Electric Vehicles · 918Digital

Vans with Range and Cars with Brains?

·30 min·3 clips

Kia's electric van carried 1,466 pounds and traveled 430 miles, shattering its rated range.

The opening is loose and familiar. Bodie welcomes listeners to Kilowatt and lays out the show's mix of electric vehicles, renewable energy, autonomous driving, and related news, but he quickly wanders into a shout-out for Neil Dandy's YouTube channel. It feels like someone talking across the desk, in a good way. The Dandy Funhouse bit gets more than a passing mention. Bodie corrects the spirit store name and explains why a Wham-O video caught him off guard. Then the episode gets down to the practical stuff. The main excerpt is about Kia's PV5 and a range result that sounds excellent, as long as nobody mistakes it for a guarantee. Bodie likes the number. He notes that the vehicle was carrying 220 pounds and lost only about one and a half percent of range for every 220 miles. Then he taps the brakes. Should a buyer expect more than 400 miles? His answer is no, even if he thinks the van may beat its advertised range. That is the useful part of the discussion. He brings in his own shopping experience with his wife and the Ioniq 9 to show how reviews can make an EV look better than its stated range. But range is fussy. Driving style, the person behind the wheel, and the usual variables can change the result, so the lesson is not that every owner gets the best case. After that, the show shifts before Tesla news. Bodie asks for support through Supercast or Patreon and ties it straight to CES travel costs. Hotels, Ubers, food, and airfare are real line items here, not vague show expenses. The close stays casual. Friday may bring an earnings call episode, if he has recovered enough from the previous week's workload. The thoughts and prayers joke lands because the whole episode already feels a little messy in the normal podcast way. The best part is the balance: real EV enthusiasm, plus arithmetic and caveats.

As heard by us

A roomy EV discussion that cares more about real range than glossy specs.

The episode centers on a practical range question: what EV numbers mean when a van is loaded, tested in real use, and set against the advertised figure.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Want EV range talk that checks the math against actual driving?

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Kilowatt: A Podcast about Electric Vehicles