Was Buying This 2023 VW ID.4 Pro S A Mistake? 6 Month Ownership Update | US Spec Pure Gray RWD

[Music] how's it going guys welcome back to Blake check if you're new to the channel my name is Blake it's nice to meet you and I'm so excited to be back in front of the camera with you guys like this making another video if you've been following for a while you'll know that my wife and I recently had a major life event we had our first baby boy and his name is Evan he's adorable here's some pictures for you guys to check out but as you can imagine especially for those of you who are also parents that has taken up a ton of our time and energy so I did decide to take a little bit of a step back from YouTube In the meantime but since then you guys have continued to subscribe to the channel like my videos comment and continue to watch my videos so I really appreciate all of that you guys you have no idea how much that helps but I figured what better way to get back into the swing of things than with an update video on our Volkswagen id4 now a quick recap this is my wife's car a few months ago she traded in her Tesla Model 3 long range rear-wheel drive for this Volkswagen id4 I made a bunch of videos about why we did that I documented the entire delivery day process all of that stuff if you want to check that out they'll be linked in the top right hand corner of your screen screen and in the description below but the SparkNotes version of that story is that this was just a better fit for our family at the time and we already have my dream car my 2018 Tesla Model 3 Performance stealth Edition so we thought we'd go ahead and diversify the garage by adding this electric SUV so if you're interested in learning more about the 2023 Volkswagen id4 go ahead and browse the rest of the channel and see the other videos that I've made on it again today we're just going to be focusing on our ownership experience but before we do that I want to show you guys some of the stuff that I've done to the car in the few months that we've owned it so let's go take a look [Music] thank you the first thing we should probably discuss is the elephant in the room or should I say elephant on the roof if you'll pardon my dad joke and that's this rooftop storage box that I've added to our ID for most of you guys probably know that the id4 doesn't have a frunk or like a front trunk storage area which is really a shame most EV manufacturers have figured out a way to turn the space that would have been used on an engine into usable storage on their cars but Volkswagen hasn't figured out how to do that or something and instead underneath the hood is a bunch of BS honestly it's like AC components and like windshield washer fluid I'll let you guys take a look at it but just a quick peek because there's really nothing exciting under there like I was saying and it's really a shame because Volkswagen markets this car as a family vehicle and you would think that families would want this extra storage space so because VW couldn't figure out the front I had to get creative with the storage solution hence the roof box now I posted pictures of the roof box as soon as I got it on Twitter and it got some mixed reviews a lot of people were saying that they thought it looked ugly and and they might be right I think looks are subjective I happen to think it looks okay especially after I got it paint matched I think it kind of ties into the rest of the car pretty well and the good news is that because it's so small I chose this size on purpose it actually is really easy to remove from the car so it spends most of its life mounted on our wall in the garage and I only put it back on whenever we need it and those are in instances whenever we need to take the whole family on a trip my wife and I our newborn son and the dogs the dogs will go in the back so we can't use the back for stuff like strollers baby bags clothes for my wife and I so that goes in the roof box so I think that's enough about the roof box if you're interested in getting a roof box like this for some reason maybe you have an id4 and you're trying to figure out a decent looking storage solution I'll have this Linked In the description below they are not a sponsor I don't even remember the name of the company that I bought this from um and you would have to figure out how to get it paint matched if you want it on your own I happen to know somebody that does automotive paint here in the Arizona area I'll have them Linked In the description below too if you live in Arizona and you want to get paint done like this or really even any like minor body damage he knows how to fix for a pretty reasonable price he actually fixed my Tesla Model 3 Performance bumper whenever I got into that hit and run at the end of last year so again I'll have that Linked In the description below for you guys to check out so the next thing I want to talk about is the front reflectors this is pretty simple these are orange but I just went ahead and wrapped them in this like satin black to kind of simplify the look of the id4 it's really just a lot of Grays and blacks on the car so I thought that orange just like stuck out so wrapping it was a really simple and easy solution for that the next thing I did was add these mud guards to the id4 for all the rain that we get in Arizona I'm being facetious it doesn't rain here that often actually monsoon season is coming up so I think maybe these might get their first use here in a little bit but I really added those because I think that it adds kind of just like a slight styling element to the id4 otherwise it kind of looks a little too egg-shaped it still looks kind of egg shaped I get it but I think that just adds a little extra Flair and it's practical because whenever it does rain or when we're driving in the snow that helps prevent rocks snow ice all of that stuff from splashing alongside the car so that was really cheap and easy to do as well I'll have that Linked In the description below if you guys want to check those out too for your id4 moving around to the back the next thing I did well first I added this baby on board sticker which I think is really cute but the next thing I did was add this trunk mat to the back which is really cool I like that it's gray that's a little different and it has this hexagonal shape that traps dust dirt moisture all that stuff makes it really easy to clean so if you're interested in something like this I think the company that I bought this from makes these for all shapes and sizes of trunk areas but they're not a sponsor and I actually I have to be honest with you I didn't like that it didn't have like a gap in the mat to access this handle able to get to the underfloor storage which is a bummer but otherwise it's really cool and really affordable so if you're interested in that they will be linked in the description below as well moving around to the side actually before we get to the interior I added a little piece of ppf here because this is the place that you'll press in in order to access the charge port I don't like fingerprints and all that stuff so that makes that a little easy and it shows you where you should press so that you're not like poking your fingers around to try to find that space the next thing that I did was add ppf to the B pillar here this is kind of the place where you'll put your hands naturally in order to open and close the door again that's a solution to try to prevent fingerprints from getting all over the place I tried to put protective stuff over the areas that are often touched so that was really easy to do too as you guys know I put ppf on the front of my wife's old Tesla Model 3 long range before we sold it and so this was a lot easier it's a really flat surface this and even if you have no experience installing ppf I would recommend something like this but before we look inside I just want to point out that I added this Edge guard to the id4 that was really easy to do I'll have this Linked In the description below this wasn't id4 specific this was just a really simple and cheap install to prevent damage from our car moving to the interior as you can see we have the car seat base here at our car seat that I added to the car it's not permanent the base can be removed it's pretty easy I also added this mat that goes under the car seat base that prevents this the leather seats from getting damaged and also acts as a extra barrier for like spit up and pee all the baby things I added this mirror to the back seat so that I can see baby Evan from up front there speaking of the front let's move around to the front so we can take a look at what I've done up here I did add these car mats to the id4 they're made by lays fit as you guys know I am partnered with lacefit they actually are a sponsor so I can get you guys a little bit of a deal if you want these floor mats for your car they will be linked in the description below along with a discount code that you can use last and certainly not least let's hop in the driver's seat so I can show you two final things that I've added to the id4 the first is this screen protector so I always recommend adding a screen protector to your car if it has a center touch screen like this one this is an area that you'll be using almost all the time every single time that you get into the car so you definitely want to protect it I'll have this specific screen protector for the Volkswagen id4 Linked In the description below if you guys are interested but I wanted to save the best for last and that is the most recent addition to our id4 this vixied magsafe air vent car mount at the time of filming this video you can get this mount on Amazon for 29.99 plus an additional 15 off but vixied is regularly hosting sales so you might be able to get it for even cheaper here's everything that comes in the Box looks like you get a setup guide some sort of VIP warranty card thing an instruction manual some extra parts and of course the mount itself which is really all you need putting it together is as simple as snapping the vent mount end to the magsafe end and then it's got two tighteners one for the air vent n and one for the magsafe and to keep it sturdy once you've positioned it to your liking twist clockwise for the vent mount end until you feel it's tight enough and then twist counterclockwise for the mag safe end and that's all there is to it so like I was saying I can't stress enough how impressed I am with this vix seed magsafe air vent car mount like listen to how sturdy it sounds whenever you just slap it on there and then I just wiggle it around and like it won't move until I really want to pull my phone back off of there and the best thing about this is that it will work with any car you have no matter what as long as it has air vents hopefully it does if you live in some place as hot as this so I'll have this vix seed macsafe air vent car mount Linked In the description below thank you to vixseed for sponsoring this video let's go ahead and wrap it up now the last thing I want to go over with you guys in this video just briefly is our ownership experience in the id4 over the past few months now if you guys recall earlier this year my wife traded in her 2018 Tesla Model 3 long range rear-world Drive we're looking for something a little more family oriented so we're looking for an electric SUV we looked at all of the popular electric SUVs on the market like the Ford Mach e we looked at the Hyundai ioniq 5 the Kia ev6 and the Tesla Model y of course but we landed on the id4 because it was the best value proposition for us meeting most of our needs for the least amount of money if you want to know more about why we made the decision to go with the id4 go ahead and browse the rest of the channel I've made a ton of videos about that topic but as far as our actual ownership experience like owning and driving the car on a day-to-day basis it's actually been a really pleasant experience I heard some pretty negative things about the id4 before we made the decision to go with the car stuff about the software and the driving experience and all that stuff I have to tell you that I'm actually pretty impressed with the software in this car it's good enough like I said this is a backup car so we don't need to do all of the really cool things that Teslas are capable of doing and my wife really doesn't care about all of that stuff and whenever we do want to experience those things we still have the Tesla that we could try I'd also heard horror stories about the charging experience on the CCS Network specifically with Electrify America and our experience again in that department has been really Pleasant we've never encountered a down charging stall and the one time that I encountered a charging stall that was not operational it was a new charging stall I found found out when I reached out to Electrify America that just hadn't come online yet so those were our main concerns and fortunately they were all dispelled pretty quickly after just a few months of ownership the main issues with the id4 came down to reliability and the service experience so after just about a month of ownership we found that the AC the air conditioning in this id4 wasn't blowing air super cold which when you live in a desert like I do you guys can see the beautiful scenery but it's also a really harsh climate the temperature today is 113 degrees so you need that cold AC or else you're going to suffer so whenever we found out earlier this year that the AC wasn't blowing really cold I was like we need to get this address right away so I scheduled a service appointment and I took the car in and I had to haggle with the service department but ultimately they did provide us with a loaner and they took the car and they had it back to us in just three days and the AC has been blowing cold air all summer long again it did take some haggling But ultimately they did take care of us so I figured that was the end of our slightly negative service experience but I was wrong just a few months later we got a letter from Volkswagen they told us that there was a safety recall on our model of the id4 where apparently when the car has been drenched in water or something the doors can just fly right open if you are cornering at low speeds for some reason so I wanted to get that address right away again this is a family car I need it to be as safe as possible so I reached out to Volkswagen again in order to schedule this safety recall service but this time I called ahead to make sure that there would be a loaner made available for us because at that point our son was just a few weeks old and for those of you guys who are parents of young ones you guys know that in those first few weeks there are a ton of appointments that you have to go to so it was important for us to have a backup car available for those appointments so this time when I called Volkswagen they told me that they were doing away with loaners altogether and I thought that was really strange but that's kind of like a first world problem so I just let that go and instead I scheduled service with the dealership that had the earliest availability but when I did that I found that that dealership only had one service technician that was capable of doing this recall service and that there were a ton of id4s just basically waiting in line in order to have this recall service applied to their car so I was just like kind of seeing these problems sort of like stack up one after the other in terms of service fortunately we did find a dealership that was able to get us in within about a week or so so the recall has been done on our car it's safe and sound again so I'm not concerned about that anymore what I am concerned about though is the service experience I'm really hoping that it was just a two-time fluke but what's more likely is that the service experience with the id4 probably with any Volkswagen is just going to be a headache well that's kind of a bummer but I guess as long as nothing else really goes wrong with our car for the rest of our ownership we won't have anything to worry about but that's really all that there is to it this car has performed great for us overall it's super comfortable we're really pleased with it in fact I'll be making a future video where I go over my top five favorite things about the Volkswagen id4 so be on the lookout for that video as far as this video it's time to wrap it up all right you guys I think that's gonna do it for today I got to get out of this heat it is so hot but before I go I want to thank you guys for watching this far into the video if you liked what you saw leave me a like below and subscribe to the channel if you want to see more videos on our id4 as well as on my dream car my Tesla Model 3 Performance stealth Edition and other various EVS I'm super excited to bring you guys more videos on the Family Focus and affordability and practicality of electric vehicles especially if you guys are a young family like us considering your first EV now before I go I want to thank you guys one more time so much for sticking around while I took a little bit of a break from YouTube it means the world to me all of your guys's well wishes and comments you guys have no idea how much that means to me and before I get too emotional on this video I just want to tell you that's the reason I'm out here in this 111 degree Arizona summer heat talking to my phone camera about electric vehicles it's because I love engaging with you guys and sharing ideas Concepts insights about electric vehicles sharing our passion for these EVS that's all for today I'm going to go ahead and turn off the camera before I start crying thanks again for watching this has been Blake check that's a wrap foreign

Channel: Blake Check

Views: 34,046

Keywords: ID.4, Volkswagen, Electric, SUV, Inflation Reduction Act, Federal Tax Credit, EV, Tax Credit, 7500, Tesla, Model 3, Performance, Stealth, Pro S, RWD, Pure Gray, Pure Grey, Long Range, Chapman, Electric SUV, IRA, Trade In, Pro, Standard, AWD, Plus, Electrify America, DC, DC Fast Charge, Scottsdale, Arizona, Chattanooga, Tennessee, VW, Accessories, MagSafe, iPhone, Smartphone, VICSEED, Family Car, Family SUV, Roof Box, Cargo Box, PPF, Graco, Moonstone Gray

Id: kQ05UCUaX-o

Length: 15min 39sec (939 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 26 2023