#vanlife
Getting around Amsterdam with the Mercedes-Benz eVito
In my newsletter I asked for recommendations for a moving truck, as I recently helped my dad clear out the holiday house in the South of the country. I was hoping to find an electric van. A friend contacted me with some info regarding the eVito, so I decided to call Mercedes in Amsterdam and Robin was very helpful. I realised just in time that travelling from Zeeland to Amsterdam by eVito in the cold weather probably wouldn’t work. Though I didn’t get the eVito for the big move, luckily, I also had a sofa to move around town, so I was able to put it to use!
eVito life I would describe the eVito as quite barebones, especially the version you can test drive in Amsterdam. For example it has no parking sensors (but there is a camera to guide you when backing up). Since I got on the highway after leaving the dealership, I immediately noticed the lack of cruise control . While parking sensors could be added on order, that isn’t an option for cruise control. I was told this has to do with the wiring loom.
Hello sofa! Time to find out what we can fit in the eVito!
This sofa has a nice backstory, because it arrived at my friend’s place years ago with a regular Vito! Though that one had more seats, so the sofa didn’t fit with the doors closed. Since this brand new eVito was built to carry around quite a lot of luggage, the sofa fit perfectly. Amsterdam traffic can be quite hectic and it was super comfortable to have the instant torque the electric engine provides. I ran into a couple of situations when I was super happy to not be manually shifting some old Diesel van.
Some people believe city safety comes from machines making a lot of noise, for example when starting to drive at a traffic light. Personally, since I move around by bike so much in town, I don’t share this viewpoint. To me, safety and noise are not related. The fact that we got used to noisy cities, doesn’t say that we have to create a future where cities stay as loud as we know them. We are free to change to a less heavy duty traffic packed city in the days ahead.
Everything electric
I cannot overstate the joy I feel driving around the city in this van, whether I’m moving around slowly on the canals, carefully steering away from all the cyclists and people on foot, or cruising the bigger streets. It’s just lovely that it doesn’t add any local emissions into the already dense city mix. A sizeable van like this was designed for the city, it had ample storage space yet is still compact enough to squeeze around the less practical spots of town.
This year, I managed a lot of work-related travel using the Peugeot Partner Full Electric. I loved that van because it was my first ever electric van to drive, it charges quickly (using CHAdeMO till around 80% SoC), and it feels very similar in handling (yet ten times smaller) than the eVito. While it doesn’t have the capacity of the eVito, the Peugeot does have the advantage of being able to charge at Fastned. Overall, for city usage the eVito is the one to go for. And next year, of course you need to look out for the eSprinter and the EQV(!)
Dashboard.
Time travel
If you look at this picture it feels like you’re back in 2010, right? One of the reasons I love driving vans in general is that it’s like time travel. Even new vehicles can still look like this! Since my dad still drives cars from the 2000s I feel very much at home with layouts like this one. Luckily, despite the old facade there is bluetooth, so you won’t be without your friend Spotify.
The inexperienced EV driver could be scared by some of the stats I’m going to share. When I left the dealership with a range prediction of 154km. Drove a little bit of highway and city, 8.5km only and the new stats displayed 96% SoC (State of Charge) and a range left of 136km. I tried the E+ mode, the most economic option the van is able to handle.
Amsterdam: Magere Brug (Skinny Bridge) in the background.
I feel very lucky to have friends with elevators that are just big enough for the couch.
Elevator life.
When driving
One thing I did notice when reaching my neighbourhood is that when driving uphill and getting to a stop, the car doesn’t hold. So when you take your foot off the brake pedal you need to drive away immediately, otherwise you will start sliding downhill. The same thing happens in a Jaguar I-Pace. it would be comfortable to have this changed especially when driving around a hilly area with some cargo load!
When I finished the move I had driven 2786km -> 2810km, totalling just 24 kilometers. 83% SoC left in the battery and depending on the mode the van showed anywhere from 119km to 129km left to drive on the GOM (Guess-O-Meter). Plugging the eVito in for a regular Type 2 charge, on a typical Amsterdam 11 kW charger the predicted time to fully charge was 3h.
Day 2
Starting at 142 GOM (using E+ mode), with 2810 on the tacho. Five degrees Celsius outside. I dropped some things off downtown and picked up my sister for a trip to Haarlem. I found us a charger after a trip of 32km. 78% SoC left and we did quite a bit of highway cruising at 100km/h. The Haarlem charger I found by PitPoint was much quicker than NUON (Vattenfall) in Amsterdam. It only took 80 minutes to charge up fully again. So after some coffee and cake, we left for the beach with 94% SoC.
Perfect backup camera!
The Beach
People will tell you this is a perfect van for city usage. Now, I don’t disagree, but you can still take it to the beach or elsewhere without a problem! The Netherlands is so dense with Type 2 chargers you will have zero issues charging up while you’re out for a walk/unloading/etc. Sometimes it can be a bit hard to predict GOM indication (see photos). Ran some tests of performance . Going from 60 to 80km/h took a bit more than two seconds. Going from 80 to a hundred in the ‘speedy C mode’ will take you around 3 seconds (without heavy cargo that is). And all that without a roaring Diesel engine!
118 or 136km on the GOM, you tell me?
The old and the new (and the beach of Bloemendaal).
Heading back to the city
With 88% SoC and 136km on the GOM we head back to Amsterdam (2849km on the tacho). It’s 29km to get to my sister’s house and we arrive with 67% SoC left. With a split between 80km/h roads and 100km/h highway driving I’m not surprised by the consumption.
Driving 16km highway to Mercedes-Benz Stern Arena, I ended up at a 57% and the GOM showed 78-84km depending on the mode chosen.
The Verdict
I’m very glad that Nander replied to my newsletter with the recommendation to try to find an eVito to help my dad move some stuff from Zeeland to Amsterdam. I realised that with the cold weather Zeeland (around 140km one way) would be a less than ideal destination, but I had some stuff to move around Amsterdam as well. I called Mercedes-Benz for a new date, and drove around town and to the beach. It’s very easy for me to recommend the eVito for any move within the city limits but it is also very convenient to drive to and from the suburbs. Even though a lot of EV fans will tell Mercedes-Benz to include fast charging on the next van (and I don’t disagree), I really don’t think many users will actually need that functionality. With the luxury of all driving modes (Eco, Eco+ and C for Custom being the fastest), heated seats, no less than four regen-modes, Mercedes got a lot right with the eVito. Enjoy the ride!
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