Thinking about getting a Phev - is it for me? some questions

[Eggtastico]

Thinking about getting a PHEV as business vehicle, and was wondering if it was for me.

I am an IT contractor, that cover several sites around South Wales

Just to give you an idea of my useage, it would be approx 300 miles a week, at the moment, I will only have the facility to charge at home, unless I stop of at a 'free' charge area on my lunch break or something.....
Weekly break down would approx be the following :-
3x times a week 18 miles - approx 14 miles motorway or 25 miles all motorway.
2x a week 70 miles nearly all motorway/dual carriageway. (sometimes a combination of the 2 - ie I visit both sites)
1x every 2-3 weeks, I may do a trip to West Wales, approx 140 mile trip. 90 miles on Motorway/Dual Carriageway, the rest on A Roads.

Also have my personal usage, which is mostly running around locally.

I guess if I can get 20 miles a day on electric, that is about 1/3rd of my travel covered. More than 1/2 if I can get a 2nd charge on the longer trips.

Current setup - I get about 45 MPG in a 1.6 diesel on a £75 fill - approx 17p per mile on fuel?

Anyone know what kind of saving I could expect?
How much it costs to charge the car at home?
that kind of thing....

 

[Hypermiler]

Hi and welcome
I can't answer all your questions, but here are a few things:

25 miles+ all on motorway will inevitably use some petrol. I think you need to look at the local running around mileage and see if it will be enough to offset the out of ev range work driving you'll be doing.

Cost to charge at home -from empty to full I reckon is generally just under 10kwh, so cost obviously depends on your tariff - for me between £1 to £1.15.

MPG will depend on your driving style, cruising speed, whether you are generally light-footed and anticipate well etc, but if driving fairly carefully, should get high 30s to 40mpg with no electric range left, including a good percentage of motorway.

Just a thought - do you need a car this size? - it is pretty roomy, a good family car (and therefore heavy). If not, maybe you could consider one of the other plug ins due out soon - I don't know when they are due out, but perhaps a golf or similar size?

If you are going to be doing certain regular journeys outside ev range, you could research the plugging in opportunities on your normal routes. But bear in mind that the rapid chargers are not recommended too often and usually only charge to 80% of full capacity. The fast chargers take around 3 hours from empty to full. A 13amp normal socket will take about 5.5 to 6 hours.

Zero car tax
Get the 3 year servicing option for £500 (or haggle?) to give 3 years of low cost motoring (we hope!)

Have you had a decent test-drive (like a whole weekend if you can get it)?

Cheers

H

 

[Eggtastico]

Hi Thanks for that.
Yes I need a larger vehicle, as sometimes I may need to run kit from one site to another.
I used to have an L200, but fuel was costing me £100 a week.
Now have a Picasso, which has halved my fuel bill.

I do plan on trying to lobby my places of work to get charge points. Lots of comings & goings from various contractors, as well as employees, so they should get into the modern times.

From what I have read there are 2x charge stations on the 80 mile route. So I can easily use these and plan it around my lunch or break time.
Driving style depends in how much of a rush I need to be!

I have a friend who can charge at both home & work, he managed near 1500 miles on a full tank.
With the low BIK & £0 road tax, thats some cheap motoring.
As I wont be able to do the return journey on free, I figure at most its going me is 200 miles a week in petrol.
compared to the 300 miles its costing me in diesel.
Quick calc. returns Diesel for £300 miles = £40
100 miles electric & 200 miles petrol = £30 for petrol & less than £10 for electric
The difference is negligible, but if I can charging on the return journey, that brings my petrol usage down to £15 a week & still the same cost for electric.

 

[maby]

The sums are not that difficult really. At current prices for electricity and petrol (in the UK), each charge gives you up to 30 miles at a fuel consumption of about 180 mpge and the rest of your usage till the next charge is at around 45 mpg (both assuming a fairly light right foot). In mixed mode use with a fair number of shorter journeys, people seem to be getting 70 to 80 mpge. Before we paid the deposit, I did some careful calculations based on a couple of weeks of real life usage and came to the conclusion that I should be expecting around 60 mpge - pulled down a bit by the fact that my weekday motoring, while being entirely electric powered, will be probably no more than 30 miles in total with weekend usage of around 160 miles and no possibility of charging.

 

[maby]

Hi Thanks for that.
...
100 miles electric & 200 miles petrol = £30 for petrol & less than £10 for electric
The difference is negligible, but if I can charging on the return journey, that brings my petrol usage down to £15 a week & still the same cost for electric.

That does assume that the charge on the return journey is free - I don't think we should be assuming that will be the case into the indefinite future. At the moment, there are stupid government grants to support the development of the charging network, but that is to boost their green image and with so few takers, the cost of the electricity to the treasury is minimal. If they succeed in building a market, I would assume that the supply of electricity at public charging points will move onto a more commercial basis.

 

[chindley]

I think I read somewhere that 120 miles in a single journey with no charge option is the cut off where the Diesel becomes more economical than the PHEV. so if you regularly do over 120 miles in one trip with no option to charge then, no, it isn't for you, but if its only a couple times a month then yes.

 

[baldboater]

I drive 120 miles per day and i can tell you that I seem to spend alot of time at the petrol station. I have had the PHEV for 2 weeks, done 1400 miles and filled up with petrol 4 times. The MMCS(?) states I get about 39 MPG when I get home. I can only charge at home as there is nowhere close to work where I can top up.

If you are around town and sticking to EV only then it is excellent.

 

[Eggtastico]

I test drove today. Enjoyed it. The weight was something I was used to having owned an L200

I was a bit puzzled by what the sales patter told me.

I was told that the petrol engine acts only as a generator up to 75mph - then the petrol engine kicks in.
Now I thought using the petrol engine as a generator was optional.

I was going to see if I could find any comparison to using the petrol engine for combustion, compared to using the petrol as a generator.

Maybe im confused about something. I know looking at my mileage, I may do a 100+ mile trip maybe once a month.
Also, knowing my trips & the routes quite well, I think elec wise I will do well regenerating on the paddle.
For example, one trip, part of the final leg is all down hill in traffic. Regenteriffic.

My driving attitude changed quickly during the test drive. Like easing off the accelerator long before the jct, etc.

I think this car is for me )
Going to run some figures by my accountant next week (or tell me how less I am allowed to pay myself) before ordering.

Was told a boat is due in 2nd week of Sept. there was 3 metallic white's still unsold (my choice of colour)

 

[user 258]

I was a bit puzzled by what the sales patter told me.
I was told that the petrol engine acts only as a generator up to 75mph - then the petrol engine kicks in.

When the engine is running, between 40mph and 74mph, the car can decide to use serial hybrid mode (engine just powering the generator and electric motors driving the wheels) OR parallel hybrid mode (the engine directly driving the front wheels but can have help from the electric motors if required). Parrallel hybrid mode is the preferred choice as it is the most economical but the engine speed is fixed according to the roadspeed (2,100rpm @ 50mph) so isn't able to put out a great deal of power. When more power is needed it will switch to series hybrid mode so it can rev the engine freely to provide the needed power. When accelerating (fairly gently) and the speed gets to about 42mph the engine revs drop and parallel hybrid mode is selected. If accelerating quickly it will hold onto series hybrid mode until you ease off the power or hit 74mph.

When tootling along the motorway (with depleted battery or in save mode) it will almost always be in parallel hybrid mode except when 1) The engine first starts as it will remain in series hybrid mode, at a low rpm, until the engine and catalytic converter have warmed up or 2) It has aquired more charge than it deems it needs so switches to pure EV to use up this charge

My driving attitude changed quickly during the test drive. Like easing off the accelerator long before the jct, etc.

Perfect

Kind regards,
Mark

 

[Gabe]

Please note that winter driving will cost a bit more, as the petrol engine starts, regardless of state of charge, to provide additional boost to the electric heating, especially if the temps are below 10C. And electric heating can reduce expected electric range by as much as 10kms.