Atm in my household we have 3 cars 2 X 2ltr diesels and 1 2ltr petrol. One vehicle is due for a change.. should we consider an electric or hybrid? Has anyone got experience of them? Most of my journey's are to drop off and pick up g'kids from a nearby school, golf club and SoL (if it ever re-opens) Hybrids seem to get a bad press, there is not a problem installing an electric charger in the garage. Kia Niro E, Polstar and Tesla are the electric but not that cheap. BMW are mostly hybrids and are expensive, Toyota's also have hybrids at a more reasonable price.
Get my new company car tomorrow Kia E Niro so too early for me to tell. My boss got one last month and he thinks it is fantastic. It’s also worth £100 per month tax incentive for me, so it’s win all round. He reckons it took him 3 quid to fully charge it, ( I don’t know how much it came with), but fully charged it does 280 miles. So let’s say it cost 10 quid to fully charge it and roughly the equivalent to a gallon and a half. Average miles per gallon, I dunno 35, so 50 mile for every £10 or 282 miles. please note my mathematics may not be what it used to be and my opinion of average miles and price per gallon could be ****ing miles off You will also get a grant to fit a charger
Great would really like to here how you find it, rather than just use Car Mag reviews. Do you have a charger at home?
Had one for years mate, but when the company decided I would be getting another they checked my address to see if I was entitled for a grant. I wasn’t as I had one electric car and one charger. If I have two electric cars, I believe I may get a grant for the other. I’m sure the grant is around £350
I’ve weighed this up and decided not yet, they are all trying for the first 1000 mile charge and for that reason I chose to wait, they are great btw, my neighbour has a tycan and loves it, personally I think it’s too early yet but tax wise could swing it
They are the future and I’m not against them, but for me they aren’t ready yet. The self charging ones make more sense of course, I think I’ll be a few years before I consider one yet.
We have a Leaf as the car to run around in. 120 mile range give or take. We got £500 grant to put a charger on house but paid £250 personally to put a faster charger on (7.2 kw charger on car). Gets a charge probably once a week. Cheap as chips to run. The car itself is a good little motor. Nice enough to drive and comfortable. Decent spec inside. For us as a family we have the diesel for longer journeys but the electric is perfect for the numerous run around journeys we make.
Hybrids are the beat option at present, if just the one car as the more robust electric too expensive But as per Felltop, the 2 car combo can work- small electric; big diesel/petrol for longer journeys which I know a few folk have done. That said, I'm waiting a couple of years as there isn't enough quality/cat choices yet..
Tbh I always thought it would be hydrogen fuel cell that would win over electric battery, cos you can fill up at 'garages' like with petrol now in a few minutes, rather that hours for a battery. But for 90% of my mileage a 250-300 mile range us good enough.
Never get why they didn’t press on with hydrogen. They have them in California, and Honda made one that got great reviews, sustainable and actually spit out clean air. Seemed like the future to me.
See for me there lays the problem, for the money I would want it to be our main car, we like long trips away (I don’t mind a 5 hour drive) and I would start to panic if we were deep into a journey and hit slow moving traffic
I think for this house at present the ideal would be fully electric for the wife's car around the doors and a hybrid with 200+ bhp for me. I am thinking of getting the charger installed ready but not sure if you must already have an electric car to get the grant?
Yeah I know what you want. Say a Kia Niro E would be a new car but I usually buy a few months old. Although, as a retired accountant I have my doubts about financing a new car with a deposit, pay a sum each month and then a 'buy lump sum' after a couple of years. Yes every year is so you get a new car 'smell/kudos' but it may be better just to hire one from Hertz. You end up after say 4 years, having paid enough to buy a car and have some residual value but actually you have nothing. Manufacturers, Dealers and Financial services love the 'financing option i doubt the customer should be as satisfied.
I worked in Finance/compliance in the motor trade for a few years and for the most part it is rotten, if you get the right deal on a pcp you should be able to step into a new car every 3 years or so without ever increasing your payments and always in warranty, if you want to own the car that’s a different matter, more people are leasing now than ever before
I have had both. First one was all electric Nissan Leaf. Second one Toyota CHR. Both great cars to drive but would say The Toyota Hybrid has the edge due to constant thinking about where to charge and planning journeys more. Its been a few years since I had the electric so perhaps the infrastructure has improved. However as you have more than one car so have other means to do longer journeys, if I were you I would probably go for an all electric
I do lease, it’s an absolute no brainer for me. Yeah I don’t own it, but I also don’t take the 18-20k loss over 2 years.
They have regenerative braking now also , Paddles in the steering wheel instead of using the foot brakes and that is how they get the better range . Plus you can rapid charge in most service stations. Top gear gave the Kia a brilliant review https://www.topgear.com/car-reviews/kia/e-niro
Not ready for a change just yet I bought an x3 and I’m happy at the moment I don’t do many miles so maybe my next could be a hybred or electric In a couple more years
