Is the Twizy a bit of a con?

[300bhp/ton]

I reckon so. Just had a look at Renault's website and what seems to be a huge cost to running these cars is the battery hire.

The miniumum is £45/month, but this limits you to a poxy 4500 miles a year. Do more than this and you are heavily penalised at 2.5p/mile.

You can up the mileage restriction to 9000 miles a year, but at a cost of £67/month battery hire.

Remember this doesn't include the electricity cost of charging the battery. Sadly I have no data on what cost it would take to charge the battery to do 9000 miles. But the key thing here is, even if you did ZERO miles, it'd still cost you a whooping £804/year without turning a single wheel.

I'm assuming that it must cost at least £20/month of so of electricity to fuel it (happy to be corrected on this).


But what strikes me is, if you need a compact 2 seat car, then something like the CDi smart ForTwo would appear to be a better bet. Faster and more every day friendly and seemingly more weatherproof too.

Parkers list the smart as being capable of 85mpg. But even if it only manages 70mpg that still means it'll only cost £69/month to fuel.

With battery hire + the cost of charging there is no way the Twizy will be as cheap to run as a compact IC powered car.


I was interested in the Twizy.... right up until I did the numbers. Seriously you'd have to be friggin mental to consider one on "cost saving" grounds. Such a shame

[mollytherocker]

Witness the biggest automotive red herring in history. The electric car.

MTR

[Chrisw666]

I really want to like the Twizy and have booked a test drive for next week to satisfy my curiousity about them. Like you I'm cynical about the battery cost, but suspect depreciation could be low (or they'll flop like the C5 and be desireable eventually) and repairs should be minimal.

It's an interesting concept and a brave move to produce it, certainly on paper looks to be an alternative to using cars/motorbikes in towns and cities but probably better if everyone is using them rather than a handful of people willing to be different.

[Riknos]

mollytherocker said:

Witness the biggest automotive red herring in history. The electric car.

MTR

This. Electric cars are miles away from being more financially viable, at the moment they're too expensive to be any more than a gimmick / hippy car.

[Waugh-terfall]

Chrisw666 said:

I really want to like the Twizy and have booked a test drive for next week to satisfy my curiousity about them.

What a good idea..!

[tbc]

Electric cars are a false economy for anyone doing an average of 10k miles a year

couldn't justify one with a poor range of 100 miles, i meant having to go somewhere and then thinking 'oh no, not enough charge to go out'

it's just a nonsense

if you want to spend £25-30k on a car that is practical and economical then get a good diesel engine with 60+ mpg and a 400-500 mile range on a tank

enough of this electric car

[Chrisw666]

Waugh-terfall said:

What a good idea..!

You don't even need to bother a dealer.

http://www.ze-tour.co.uk/venues-and-how-to-find-us

[EDLT]

Its costs about £2.50 to fill up a Leaf and that was good for 200miles, iirc. The costs of fueling a Twizy won't be much different.

[Waugh-terfall]

Chrisw666 said:

Waugh-terfall said:

What a good idea..!

You don't even need to bother a dealer.

http://www.ze-tour.co.uk/venues-and-how-to-find-us

Thanks for that, just booked myself a Twizy Test Drive at RHS Wisley in September.

[thinfourth2]

Riknos said:

mollytherocker said:

Witness the biggest automotive red herring in history. The electric car.

MTR

This. Electric cars are miles away from being more financially viable, at the moment they're too expensive to be any more than a gimmick / hippy car.

Or they are the perfect daily driver for a family that rarely does more then 20 miles in a trip and have an M5 tucked away in the garage.

Advantages of a leaf over a golf diesel are exceedingly quiet, no need to visit petrol stations, always have a full car on your drive every morning and it can be bought in colours other then resale grey

[BigTom85]

EDLT said:

Its costs about £2.50 to fill up a Leaf and that was good for 200miles, iirc. The costs of fueling a Twizy won't be much different.

So £112.50 in electric for 9000 miles. Still cheaper in a ForTwo.

[300bhp/ton]

BigTom85 said:

EDLT said:

Its costs about £2.50 to fill up a Leaf and that was good for 200miles, iirc. The costs of fueling a Twizy won't be much different.

So £112.50 in electric for 9000 miles. Still cheaper in a ForTwo.

Actually £67 a month battery hire is almost the same cost as the ForTwo a month for fuel. Even if it's as cheap as £2.50 to do 200 miles, which it will only be from flat. Re-charging and cold weather are likely to influence this.

I still don't see how the figures are cheaper for electric. If battery hire was £10/month it'd be a totally different thing.

[maffski]

thinfourth2 said:

Riknos said:

mollytherocker said:

Witness the biggest automotive red herring in history. The electric car.

MTR

This. Electric cars are miles away from being more financially viable, at the moment they're too expensive to be any more than a gimmick / hippy car.

Or they are the perfect daily driver for a family that rarely does more then 20 miles in a trip and have an M5 tucked away in the garage.

Advantages of a leaf over a golf diesel are exceedingly quiet, no need to visit petrol stations, always have a full car on your drive every morning and it can be bought in colours other then resale grey

I'm with 300 on this, I thought it looked great. But you can buy a C1 for £6,995, and the £45 a month battery gets you enough petrol for around 4,500 miles per year (same as the milage limit on the battery lease). Plus you've got better performance and 4 seats.

Shame, it looked like the first proper effort at an electric commuter, but unless your going into London it needs to be a couple of grand cheaper to buy or the battery needs to be half the price.

[anonymous-user]

If you want a cheap economical small new car buy a Nissan Pixo! If you want the same but with only two seats and no windows buy a Pixo and wind the windows down and fold the rear seats!