EVs... no one wants them! (Vol. 2)
EVs... no one wants them! (Vol. 2)
Author
Discussion

Buzz84

1,409 posts

170 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
cerb4.5lee said:
That was where I got to with the X5 45e and X5 50e as well. I was worried that once the battery ran out, you were then left with a very heavy car leaning on a potentially thirsty petrol engine. So I gave it a swerve and stuck with the diesel X5 instead.

I'm not saying that all hybrids are like that don't get me wrong, but it is definitely something to consider with them as you say. I remember having a 530e Touring as a loan car once as well, and the battery was empty in that, so you were then left again with a heavy car using a puny petrol engine on it's own for example. It is difficult to know what is the best way to go about it really I think(keeping the battery fully charged would help a bit though I guess).
I know this is a BEV page but thought I might just comment on this

Google implies that the engines alone produce 289bhp in the 45e and 313bhp in the 50e. So the 50e engine is probably similar to to the 40i @ 335bhp which google seems to suggest mid 20mpg

The hybrids list a 50mile range on electric alone, which wont be the range in hybrid mode as its used in conjunction with the engine too so will be much higher.


I have a Volvo V60 T6 Hybrid estate, it has a battery range of 25miles (newer ones have 50) which is fine for me as day to day that range gets me to work and back with some to spare. I can charge it overnight on the cheap rate means that the majority of my driving can be on electric which only costs me £8 a month.

When in hybrid mode it does somewhere in the region of 150mpg and as the battery is used to compliment the engine so the battery drains slower (and recharged some via regen) so it lasts for a far longer distance. (the sat nav is very clever and optimises the drive train to the type/speed of the road)

When I do need to go further afield and runs the battery out it has a 250bhp engine that is still pretty rapid on its own. That returns around 40mpg without the electric assist.

Even if you are not convinced about full electric, I would highly recommend a hybrid, I used to have an Audi A6 2.0 TDI and wouldn't go back.

While I know its very subjective and that it all varies and changes between people and their requirements, but a flat hybrid battery would be a rarity, and if it were a rarity it shouldn't be an issue to deal with a period of lower power/mpg, as it should be so much better for the other 97% of the time.

I went away and made a few stops around the UK with the family recently. There were no opportunities to recharge from the mains, but I did some recharging from the engine when on the motorway (this reduces the efficiency by 2-3mpg but its not really "lost" as it allowed electric only/hybrid running later).
We drove 700miles and used about £100 in petrol, which is probably around the same as it did in my previous diesel when we did the same journey last year.


RizzoTheRat

27,701 posts

213 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
Another PHEV fan here. My NX does about 50mpg on the motorway with a flat battery. It always maintains about 20% battery so it can still use it to accelerate, meaning the 180ish bhp engine never feels sluggish despite it weighing nearly 2 tonnes.

Most of our mileage tends to be short around town, or long motorway trips to visit friends and family abroad, so don't have chargers. The 35ish mile electric range is plenty for our day to day use, and on longer trips i don't need to charge it unless i happen to be somewhere with a convenient and sensibly priced charger.

What i don't like is the way they publish mpg figures for PHEVs, claiming 200mpg is pointless as it depends how far you drive. It would be a lot more useful to know miles per kWh on battery, and miles

Edited by RizzoTheRat on Saturday 8th November 06:30

Alex Z

1,936 posts

97 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
otolith said:
I took a large Christmas tree home in an MX-5 once, in the passenger side with the roof off.
I’ve done that in my Mini convertible several times, and a reclining lounge chair and footrest (not at the same time).

raspy

2,202 posts

115 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
RizzoTheRat said:
Another PHEV fan here. My NX does about 50mpg on the motorway with a flat battery. It always maintains about 20% battery so it can still use it to accelerate, meaning the 180ish bhp engine never feels sluggish despite it weighing nearly 2 tonnes.

Most of our mileage tends to be short around town, or long motorway trips to visit friends and family abroad, so don't have chargers. The 35ish mile electric range is plenty for our day to day use, and on longer trips i don't need to charge it unless i happen to be somewhere with a convenient and sensibly priced charger.

What i don't like is the way they publish mpg figures for PHEVs, claiming 200mpg is pointless as it depends how far you drive. It would be a lot more useful to know miles per kWh on battery, and miles

Edited by RizzoTheRat on Saturday 8th November 06:30
How can your battery ever be flat when you are saying that it always maintains 20% of battery minimum?

Composite Guru

2,414 posts

224 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
raspy said:
RizzoTheRat said:
Another PHEV fan here. My NX does about 50mpg on the motorway with a flat battery. It always maintains about 20% battery so it can still use it to accelerate, meaning the 180ish bhp engine never feels sluggish despite it weighing nearly 2 tonnes.

Most of our mileage tends to be short around town, or long motorway trips to visit friends and family abroad, so don't have chargers. The 35ish mile electric range is plenty for our day to day use, and on longer trips i don't need to charge it unless i happen to be somewhere with a convenient and sensibly priced charger.

What i don't like is the way they publish mpg figures for PHEVs, claiming 200mpg is pointless as it depends how far you drive. It would be a lot more useful to know miles per kWh on battery, and miles

Edited by RizzoTheRat on Saturday 8th November 06:30
How can your battery ever be flat when you are saying that it always maintains 20% of battery minimum?
I’m assuming that the car just acts like a normal Toyota hybrid and will harvest energy from the regen etc. The battery in the PHEV will be bigger so 20% probably equates to the full charge on a standard Toyota hybrid battery.

cerb4.5lee

40,575 posts

201 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
Buzz84 said:
cerb4.5lee said:
That was where I got to with the X5 45e and X5 50e as well. I was worried that once the battery ran out, you were then left with a very heavy car leaning on a potentially thirsty petrol engine. So I gave it a swerve and stuck with the diesel X5 instead.

I'm not saying that all hybrids are like that don't get me wrong, but it is definitely something to consider with them as you say. I remember having a 530e Touring as a loan car once as well, and the battery was empty in that, so you were then left again with a heavy car using a puny petrol engine on it's own for example. It is difficult to know what is the best way to go about it really I think(keeping the battery fully charged would help a bit though I guess).
I know this is a BEV page but thought I might just comment on this

Google implies that the engines alone produce 289bhp in the 45e and 313bhp in the 50e. So the 50e engine is probably similar to to the 40i @ 335bhp which google seems to suggest mid 20mpg

The hybrids list a 50mile range on electric alone, which wont be the range in hybrid mode as its used in conjunction with the engine too so will be much higher.


I have a Volvo V60 T6 Hybrid estate, it has a battery range of 25miles (newer ones have 50) which is fine for me as day to day that range gets me to work and back with some to spare. I can charge it overnight on the cheap rate means that the majority of my driving can be on electric which only costs me £8 a month.

When in hybrid mode it does somewhere in the region of 150mpg and as the battery is used to compliment the engine so the battery drains slower (and recharged some via regen) so it lasts for a far longer distance. (the sat nav is very clever and optimises the drive train to the type/speed of the road)

When I do need to go further afield and runs the battery out it has a 250bhp engine that is still pretty rapid on its own. That returns around 40mpg without the electric assist.

Even if you are not convinced about full electric, I would highly recommend a hybrid, I used to have an Audi A6 2.0 TDI and wouldn't go back.

While I know its very subjective and that it all varies and changes between people and their requirements, but a flat hybrid battery would be a rarity, and if it were a rarity it shouldn't be an issue to deal with a period of lower power/mpg, as it should be so much better for the other 97% of the time.

I went away and made a few stops around the UK with the family recently. There were no opportunities to recharge from the mains, but I did some recharging from the engine when on the motorway (this reduces the efficiency by 2-3mpg but its not really "lost" as it allowed electric only/hybrid running later).
We drove 700miles and used about £100 in petrol, which is probably around the same as it did in my previous diesel when we did the same journey last year.
Yes, and it is mainly frustration from me to be honest, because every single time I've had a hybrid loan car, the battery has been flat for example. So I've never got to experience the potential benefits to be fair.

MightyBadger

3,691 posts

71 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
otolith said:
Most ostentatious TT interior since they stopped doing the baseball glove leather laugh
hehe



cerb4.5lee

40,575 posts

201 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
MightyBadger said:
otolith said:
Most ostentatious TT interior since they stopped doing the baseball glove leather laugh
hehe
One of my mates years back had a Mk1 225 TT Roadster with that interior! I thought that it was alright at the time! getmecoat

otolith

64,543 posts

225 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
cerb4.5lee said:
One of my mates years back had a Mk1 225 TT Roadster with that interior! I thought that it was alright at the time! getmecoat
One of the young IT blokes had one back in the day. There was mumbling about him being a flash git and it being obviously on PCP, both of which were true, but they definitely belied a bit of the green eyed monster from the mumblers. It was a nice looking thing.

cerb4.5lee

40,575 posts

201 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
otolith said:
cerb4.5lee said:
One of my mates years back had a Mk1 225 TT Roadster with that interior! I thought that it was alright at the time! getmecoat
One of the young IT blokes had one back in the day. There was mumbling about him being a flash git and it being obviously on PCP, both of which were true, but they definitely belied a bit of the green eyed monster from the mumblers. It was a nice looking thing.
Definitely. My mate earned really good money at the time, and he had a string of lovely motors as well. I really enjoyed getting the chance to drive all of them at the time too, because I was only rolling around in much cheaper stuff back then in comparison.

lornemalvo

3,750 posts

89 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
cerb4.5lee said:
otolith said:
cerb4.5lee said:
One of my mates years back had a Mk1 225 TT Roadster with that interior! I thought that it was alright at the time! getmecoat
One of the young IT blokes had one back in the day. There was mumbling about him being a flash git and it being obviously on PCP, both of which were true, but they definitely belied a bit of the green eyed monster from the mumblers. It was a nice looking thing.
Definitely. My mate earned really good money at the time, and he had a string of lovely motors as well. I really enjoyed getting the chance to drive all of them at the time too, because I was only rolling around in much cheaper stuff back then in comparison.
I remember seeing a Mk 1 TT in Spain, before it had been launched in the UK. It absolutely blew me away. My daughter later bought one and I found it a bit dull to drive TBH.

eldar

24,794 posts

217 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
Mark-C said:
MightyBadger said:
otolith said:
I took a large Christmas tree home in an MX-5 once, in the passenger side with the roof off.
Outrageous! I once transported a large Edwardian bathing chair in the back of a MK1 TT coupe.
Impulse bought a deckchair once when out in the XJS ... had to drive home with both windows down and a bit of (deckchair) leg poking out each side.

A Christmas Tree or Edwardian bathing chair would need a roof rack.
I had a puncture in a rear tyre of my merc slk. The punctured wheel would fit it neither boot nor interior if you had a passenger. You needed a special too to completely deflate the tyre. I'd obviously parked next to an EV to cause this issue.

cerb4.5lee

40,575 posts

201 months

Saturday 8th November 2025
quotequote all
lornemalvo said:
I remember seeing a Mk 1 TT in Spain, before it had been launched in the UK. It absolutely blew me away. My daughter later bought one and I found it a bit dull to drive TBH.
I liked the Mk1 to drive to be honest at the time, but I didn't rate the Mk2 TTS that we had to drive though in comparison. However my car experience was much more vast by the time I'd experienced the TTS though. So I think the Mk1 was just a generally better car than I was used to back then really, so it naturally impressed me. Whereas the TTS was dynamically crap for me versus the performance cars I'd had by then in comparison.

MightyBadger

3,691 posts

71 months

Sunday 9th November 2025
quotequote all
Any BYD owners in here?

Buzz84

1,409 posts

170 months

Sunday 9th November 2025
quotequote all
cerb4.5lee said:
Buzz84 said:
cerb4.5lee said:
That was where I got to with the X5 45e and X5 50e as well. I was worried that once the battery ran out, you were then left with a very heavy car leaning on a potentially thirsty petrol engine. So I gave it a swerve and stuck with the diesel X5 instead.

I'm not saying that all hybrids are like that don't get me wrong, but it is definitely something to consider with them as you say. I remember having a 530e Touring as a loan car once as well, and the battery was empty in that, so you were then left again with a heavy car using a puny petrol engine on it's own for example. It is difficult to know what is the best way to go about it really I think(keeping the battery fully charged would help a bit though I guess).
I know this is a BEV page but thought I might just comment on this

Google implies that the engines alone produce 289bhp in the 45e and 313bhp in the 50e. So the 50e engine is probably similar to to the 40i @ 335bhp which google seems to suggest mid 20mpg

The hybrids list a 50mile range on electric alone, which wont be the range in hybrid mode as its used in conjunction with the engine too so will be much higher.


I have a Volvo V60 T6 Hybrid estate, it has a battery range of 25miles (newer ones have 50) which is fine for me as day to day that range gets me to work and back with some to spare. I can charge it overnight on the cheap rate means that the majority of my driving can be on electric which only costs me £8 a month.

When in hybrid mode it does somewhere in the region of 150mpg and as the battery is used to compliment the engine so the battery drains slower (and recharged some via regen) so it lasts for a far longer distance. (the sat nav is very clever and optimises the drive train to the type/speed of the road)

When I do need to go further afield and runs the battery out it has a 250bhp engine that is still pretty rapid on its own. That returns around 40mpg without the electric assist.

Even if you are not convinced about full electric, I would highly recommend a hybrid, I used to have an Audi A6 2.0 TDI and wouldn't go back.

While I know its very subjective and that it all varies and changes between people and their requirements, but a flat hybrid battery would be a rarity, and if it were a rarity it shouldn't be an issue to deal with a period of lower power/mpg, as it should be so much better for the other 97% of the time.

I went away and made a few stops around the UK with the family recently. There were no opportunities to recharge from the mains, but I did some recharging from the engine when on the motorway (this reduces the efficiency by 2-3mpg but its not really "lost" as it allowed electric only/hybrid running later).
We drove 700miles and used about £100 in petrol, which is probably around the same as it did in my previous diesel when we did the same journey last year.
Yes, and it is mainly frustration from me to be honest, because every single time I've had a hybrid loan car, the battery has been flat for example. So I've never got to experience the potential benefits to be fair.
I think there is a common mistake conception about hybrids partially fueled by the way their spec is reported. They will normally quote the battery size and range, but this will be the PURE EV range with no engine.

So for my Volvo I can set it to battery only and drive around 25 miles, without the engine. (Which covers 95% of my local driving and too and from work)

BUT this is not the Hybrid range. In hybrid mode the battery will handle the lower power range, the stop start, the slower town driving, the inefficient bit basically. Once you go a bit faster or accelerate harder the engine comes in and handles that bit. Where it achieves it's best "extra urban" mpg figures.


You can see above the lower part of the "power meter" has a blue outline with the electricity bolt, once you go out of that range into the oil drop the engine takes over.

As I mentioned above if the sat nav is set, the car uses the road information to hold back using battery when the engine is better.

I drove 150 miles on a mix of slower rural/town and motorway roads and arrived with some battery capacity left.



RizzoTheRat

27,701 posts

213 months

Monday 10th November 2025
quotequote all
raspy said:
How can your battery ever be flat when you are saying that it always maintains 20% of battery minimum?
"Flat" as in its no longer using any power from mains charging and it's purely using petrol to generate power, although it converts some of that to electricity, both through regenerative breaking and direct generation from the engine, operating like a non plug in hybrid.

MightyBadger

3,691 posts

71 months

Tuesday 11th November 2025
quotequote all
Jeep have sold a whopping 375000 of it's 4xe in America!

loudlashadjuster

5,988 posts

205 months

Tuesday 11th November 2025
quotequote all
MightyBadger said:
Jeep have sold a whopping 375000 of it's 4xe in America!
That’s a lot of cars. Congratulations to them!

MightyBadger

3,691 posts

71 months

Tuesday 11th November 2025
quotequote all
loudlashadjuster said:
That s a lot of cars. Congratulations to them!
Every single one has recalls for risk of fire.

Buzz84

1,409 posts

170 months

Tuesday 11th November 2025
quotequote all
MightyBadger said:
Jeep have sold a whopping 375000 of it's 4xe in America!
There was me thinking you were posting something constructive and useful. But no, it was just a lead in to the regular agenda based biased posts:

MightyBadger said:
loudlashadjuster said:
That s a lot of cars. Congratulations to them!
Every single one has recalls for risk of fire.
So?

It's not like there has never been any recalls for ICE engine fires.

72k Stellantis vehicles recalled for engine fire risk (fuel hoses):
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/367535/fire-ris...

200k BMW recalled for fire risk (starter motors)
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/09/26/us/bmw-fire-rec...

700k Fords recalled due to fire risk (fuel injectors):
https://www.independent.co.uk/bulletin/news/ford-v...

720k Honda's recall for fire risk (fuel pumps):
https://www.motortrend.com/news/honda-fuel-pump-re...

All withing the last year, all for items unique to ICE engines.

Post something that's unique to EVs and maybe we will care...