pjvik said:
I do not understand this thread. The PHEV starts up in EV mode. If needed it starts the ICE. If it is cold it needs to warm up the ICE, but it start as soon as possible if it is not needed.
Assuming Norwegian models are the same as UK / Dutch models, the ICE is not started to warm up the ICE, but the ICE is started to warm up the cabin.
What do you mean by: "but it start as soon as possible if it is not needed."? Did you perhaps mean: "but it
stops as soon as possible if it is not needed."? That's fine. But the real question is: why does it start when it is not needed at all or not efficient at all?
Yesterday, I washed my car on the driveway. When I was done, I had to back it up for half a meter to get it off the sidewalk. As soon as I turned on the car, the engine started running. Why? Because I forget to turn down the Aircon after my last trip and it was
only :shock: 7 deg C. A total unnecessary cold start. Bad for the engine, bad for the environment. Not worse than with any other car perse, but easily prevented. If this had happened with my wife's Suzuki Swift, I would be okay with it. But not when it happens with a car that is supposed to / equipped to excel at short trips.
The day before yesterday, we had to make a trip with four short stops. We could have easily made it in comfort on battery power alone. But after every stop, the engine fired up, because the car had decided that the heater had cooled off too much during the stop. Every time the engine stopped before reaching 60 deg C when the heater was again hot enough. Got back home with approx. 10 EV km left in my battery. Total waste of fuel.
pjvik said:
Because the PHEV starts up in EV mode it is not necessary to have any EV button. There are Charge button for charging the battery and Save button for maintaining the battery level.
The PHEV does not start in EV mode, as there is no such thing as an EV mode. There is Save mode and Charge mode, which indeed allows you to maintain or enhance SOC. Then there is the default mode (which is really No Save / No Charge, instead of EV), which allows the car to decide why and when to start the engine or not. This default mode allows the car to start the engine for the sole purpose of warming up the cabine. Mine does that, even though it has an electric heater installed for this purpose. It does that not only at 0 deg C or below, but sometimes even at temperatures of 8 or even 10 deg C above 0. The morning it started the engine with the purpose of warming up the cabine, 2 km before reaching my destination, eventhough the battery was not empty. A total waste of good fuel as there is no way that the engine coolant would reach 60 deg C in 2 km. As the car does not know how far / how long I will be driving it should allow me to decide whether or not I want to involve the ICE in the heating process.
pjvik said:
Please get some experience with the car before you complain.
For me, this is my second full winter season with the PHEV. How about you?
pjvik said:
The system in the car is quite good at selecting the needed mode. It is not often we have use any off the buttons here in Norway. When it is cold the latest version of the pre-heating give a very good temperature on the ICE so it do not start at 0 degrees celsius.
Again, assuming Norwegian models are the same as UK / Dutch models, preheating does NOT warm the engine. It warms the cabin. And indeed, if you have to opportunity to preheat, that is a way of preventing the engine from being used for wearing up. But you do not always have that opportunity. When my wife decides she wants to go shopping, she wants to go now, not in 30 minutes.
