Thinking of Electric Car

OddballJamie

Wh05apk wrote: »

Can it?

What other petrol auto can match it?

Pretty certain Ultrasonic was referring to non-hybrids as conventional rather than petrol autos.

Anyways here's a petrol semi auto that can get 60mpg+
http://www.nextgreencar.com/view-car/42960/FIAT-500-0.9-TwinAir-Colour-Therapy-85HP-Dualogic-Petrol-Semi-automatic

OddballJamie

OP this is a useful site to help to decide on your next car
http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/

If you want a quality used economical car and don't mind it being older, you can't go far wrong with one of these.
http://www.autotrader.co.uk/used-cars/audi/a2/used-audi-a2-1-4-tdi-se-5dr-birmingham-fpa-201305096678139?logcode=p

Wh05apk

OddballJamie wrote: »

Pretty certain Ultrasonic was referring to non-hybrids as conventional rather than petrol autos.

Anyways here's a petrol semi auto that can get 60mpg+
http://www.nextgreencar.com/view-car/42960/FIAT-500-0.9-TwinAir-Colour-Therapy-85HP-Dualogic-Petrol-Semi-automatic

Not really in the same class (size wise ) as a Jazz? Also the Fiat twin airs seem to deliver very poor economy in real world use.

OddballJamie

Wh05apk wrote: »

Not really in the same class (size wise ) as a Jazz? Also the Fiat twin airs seem to deliver very poor economy in real world use.

Doesn't look like the Jazz gets what is claimed either. Diesel is the best option for high milers until hybrid/electric cars iron out the kinks.
http://www.which.co.uk/news/2011/06/honda-jazz-hybrid-tested-by-which-255599/

Wh05apk

OddballJamie wrote: »

Doesn't look like the Jazz gets what is claimed either. Diesel is the best option for high milers until hybrid/electric cars iron out the kinks.
http://www.which.co.uk/news/2011/06/honda-jazz-hybrid-tested-by-which-255599/

Agree, cars rarely meet their "official" figures, personally I am a fan of diesels, but moderns diesels now seem to have too many issues (DMF/DPF/Turbo issues) and so reluctantly I will probably be looking at something like a Prius, possibly plug-in, in a few years time once prices fall, as I now have solar panels, so effectively can re-charge for free during the day.

OddballJamie

I've had my fair share of diesel issues when my mileage went from average/high to low, any savings I made on fuel and tax were wiped out by repairs. That's why I drive a petrol now, 20,000 miles since Sept 2010 and not a single problem. If I had the spare cash I would get an Ampera as the running on pure electricity for 90% of my trips would be fantastic.

Unfortunately I live further north than you and the sun we get just about covers a few rockery lights.

redux

By coincidence I watched an old episode of Top Gear last night in which they drove two electric cars, the Nissan Leaf and the Peugeot iOn, which is a rebadged Mitsubishi [they didn't mention this].

In their characteristic fashion, they pretended to be less organised than they really are, and drove across Lincolnshire, and had to find somewhere to charge the cars in Lincoln, which was something of a problem.

At the time of the programme these cars cost about £30,000 each new, less a £5000 grant from some government scheme.

The programme must have been a couple of years old, and now you can find main dealers selling year or two old Citroens and Peugeots with about 800 or 1500 miles for about £12,000, while the Leaf is about £15,000 with a few thousand miles.

A slow charge would take 12 or 13 hours overnight. They mentioned that the manufacturers recommend that if the car is always charged on a fast charge scheme in about half an hour, this will shorten the battery life significantly.

So that says to me someone intending to use it to commute to work would be better off at a range which means charge at home overnight, rather than travel further and have to rely on fast charging during the day.

I'm unconvinced by electric cars, and I think that they are only being made marginally worthwhile in financial terms by using huge tax and other subsidies.

In my opinion all the zero emission marketing should be banned on advertising standards grounds, as it simply isn't true. All they are doing is shifting emissions to the power station, and what's more the CO2 emissions due to use of an electric car aren't really any better and may actually be worse than a well driven modest diesel. This isn't too surprising, as a typical power station efficiency is about 28%, whereas the best diesels are around 45%, though you have to add distribution of the fuel in somewhere.

If a battery set costs £7000 to replace, then it would need to achieve 80,000 miles life to compete on per mile costs with diesels that do 70 mpg. How likely is that? Some might achieve it, but perhaps not all cars will, especially with a lot of fast charging

The car manufacturers which reduce the upfront cost of the whole car by using battery lease schemes don't seem to have priced them as cheap as that per mile.

I'd agree with the consensus of quite a few people here: go for a diesel a few years old, maybe in the range £3000 to £6000

Lum

15 grand on an electric car vs another old banger diesel at, lets say 2 grand, that you say you are capable of working on yourself.

That had better be some really cheap electricity to offset the extra 13 grand purchase price.

Get one if you want one, but don't pretend you're saving money.

Ultrasonic

Wh05apk wrote: »

Can it?

What other petrol auto can match it?

No idea where the requirement to be a petrol auto came from? As OddballJamie pointed out I was just meaning that you could buy non-hybrid cars with better advertised combined fuel economy. And it doesn't have to be tiny city cars to better it either, e.g. a new 1.6 TDI Skoda Octavia has an official combined mpg of 74.3 mpg (compared to 62.8 mpg for the Jazz hybrid).

As others have mentioned what matters is what mpg is actually achievable, which is where the Honest John Real mpg site comes in handy. For the Jazz hybrid this shows a real world average of 55.4 mpg. I average 55 mpg (year round) in my 8 year old 1.9TDi Octavia (something that could be bought be £4k ish). My point being that whether buying new, nearly new or old, the fuel economy of the Hybrid Jazz can be bettered by cheaper alternatives.

redux

Lum wrote: »

That had better be some really cheap electricity to offset the extra 13 grand purchase price.

Agreed.

Apparently there are even schemes that give away the electricity for free, which is taking subsidy to ludicrous places, though one or two of them do cost a few quid (£20) a year to join.

Imagine how much a decent diesel car would cost to run if it had a £5000 purchase grant, no road tax, no congestion charges in the cities that have them, and tax and duty exempt or even completely free fuel ...

I wonder when this delusion is going to stop