Test drive day 2

[Tweeds]

Mpg was the big test today.

I've decided to do my budgeting based on very rarely charging. My concern was that if I budgeted based on EV everywhere, every time I couldn't be arsed to charge up round the corner from work it would cost me money. This way, every time I do charge I earn money. Probably no financial difference whatsoever, but emotionally a lot more positive!

Back to the test. When the car arrived yesterday it was showing an mpg of 29. If this was typical, suddenly my sums don't work. So this morning I reset the counter and set off to work with 3 miles of EV range. 1 milento the motorway then pressed save. 16 miles doing 60 mph to work, and it returned 40.2mph on a cold morning.

That is slightly better than my Skoda Octavia, so another thumbs up for the phev.

I'm guessing that the reason it was low yesterday was cos the delivery driver was driving hard, with it on charge to give me some battery to play with.

Going to charge at Chichester Waitrose tonight using the polar iPhone app (any hints?) to see if the faff is bearable before making the big decision tomorrow.

 

[maby]

The displayed MPG is a very blunt tool for considering fuel economy on individual trips. Unless the conditions are right for you to run 100% EV, the displayed MPG will generally look terrible on short trips - the engine is warming up and not running at optimum efficiency. I take my wife to the station most mornings - a round trip of perhaps 2 miles - the MPG when I get back to the house typically reads around 7 at this time of year. At first sight, that is terrible - a Range Rover would be more economical - but the car has probably actually run on petrol for a few hundred yards - the 7mpg figure is meaningless.

You can only really take notice of the instrumented fuel consumption at the end of relatively long trips - or look at the "manual" mpg which is the cumulative figure since it was last reset - probably since the car was first driven. Running as a pure petrol car, it should average around 40mpg taken over a long period including some warm weather.

 

[Tweeds]

So does that mean my 40 mpg on a cold morning 16 mile trip was good, conservative, or random and meaningless?

 

[maby]

On a cold morning, that would be quite good. A lot depends on your driving style - I am quite a gentle driver, but the best I've seen on pure petrol in the middle of summer is around 45mpg. This time of year, on the same route, I reckon I'm doing quite well to get 37mpg. If you are a bit of a boy racer, it's not too difficult to get it down to 28mpg.

 

[pkulak]

Wow, 40 mpg? That's amazing for an SUV. The gas version get's 25 or so, I think. Hell, that's Volt territory, and that car is 10-inches shorter and probably 1000 pounds lighter!

 

[Tweeds]

39 mpg on the way home (still not charged it up yet).

I love this car

 

[Regulo]

I've never seen less than 43 mpg, and a best of 60 mpg overall between petrol fills. But I can and do charge it up every night. On the odd long run (200 miles), I've seen between 38-42 mpg. I wouldn't say that consumption at this time of year should be taken as a benchmark. There's a bit of disappointment in some quarters at the winter figures, but I'm happy to burn a bit of petrol to be warm!