Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Electric Cars

I am quite amazed how people have bought the term "Self Charging" it uses petrol or momentum assistance to charge, if you leave it overnight it won't self charge. Just use the term hybrid, I am certain that a lot of the public have swallowed the idea of self charging due to mainly Toyota's use of it in advertising don't be fooled by it. Toyota's engines are noisey when pushing on, should you buy some earlier hybrids second hand, check that they have the added sound proofing, my Toyota Auris estate hybrid suffered from this, otherwise a nice car, Toyota offered to buy it off me when zero tax rules changed for hybrids and people were asking for them for that reason as I disliked the noise I went to a car that was supposed to make noise, the GT86 😛 so do your homework.

I am not convinced that any form of hybrid is the answer.
The self charge seems a waste of time from my experience of driving one. The PHEV has limited E-range but as it has an ICE engine it will need servicing and fail on the emissions zone tests ( I think). The added oomph from the electric system feels nice but for everyday driving?
That narrows things to full EV or ICE.
Full EV is dependant on the charging infrastructure that is not at it’s best so far.
LEZ/ULEZ zoning provides a nice cash cow while the ICE cars predominate. I wonder when the tip over point to cash generation for ICE will be dealt with to replace the current money generation being eroded.

It seems like horses for courses.

I never understood why Toyota and Lexus insisted on the HEV (not plugin, small battery and in most cases with the CVT box) so you end up hefting it around and still needed to servicing it like a full ICE car as well. All of the first generation Ubers in SanFran seemed to have Prius and most of the time I was in them they had the engine running more than battery. Only now are they adding PHEV it would seem.

If you do need to do long haul the idea of a decent PHEV (40 miles range on Battery as a minimum?) is worthwhile. If you don't then a suitable BEV with consideration of your personal charging seems the best moving forwards. Or just a high grade modern diesel PHEV.

Also the assumption of how you will work with a BEV is part of it. When I first went in a Tesla in SanFran years ago I was underwhelmed by the experience, even when he hit the loud (big whine) pedal and it did go fast. I think the issue is what you compare them to. I figure the next generation will not care. If your goal is to replace a daily tootle then it does make sense. If you still expect it to be enjoyable then you need to reset around the lack of driveline feedback and dealing with the weight through bends. I do think the Honda-e and electric Mini with there limited range and so weight alongside the handling they have is a smart choice.

Personally, I don't like the hybrid concept. When I must rent a car and they offer me one, I refuse (if I have the choice), unless they guarantee its battery was plugged and is fully charged.

If it’s not, they showed higher consumption than the equivalent ICE model without the hybrid jazz. They seem nice when you arrive to a heavy traffic area and they move silently with the ICE off, but before that, you had the ICE precisely consuming more to charge the battery! You feel you’re not consuming in the traffic jam, but you consumed more earlier to have the battery charged! And as the efficiency is never 100%, the global balance is not good compared to the same car with just the ICE.

Last week I got again a hybrid (I had no choice). A BMW X2 25e plug-in hybrid. The battery was obviously not fully charged, so as soon as I left the airport and before taking the motorway, the 3-cylinders ICE was in charge of the task… From Barcelona to Tarragona, it made an average fuel consumption of 8,7 l/100km = 32,47 miles per gallon (UK). It claims to have 220 hp, but I could only feel a little bit of power when doing a proper kick down and have both the electric motor and the ICE working together. Definitely not my like.

An equivalent in power “only ICE” vehicle with similar power will consume less. And if it’s a diesel, probably half of that. Not worthy at all for my purposes.

I would have a fully electric car if the range was really way more than 500 km = 310 miles, and you have the complete certainty that you have chargers all the way. If you are travelling for pleasure and like to improvise taking this narrow road here or go for lunch to this other village there…. a full electric car is not the appropriate car neither… because you don’t have the range nor the number of chargers all over the place to improvise the routes. It may happen soon, but not yet. At least not here in Spain.

PHEV are a fascinating piece of interim technology. My i8 lives to be fully charged - so 30+ miles electric range in a 1500kgs car.
BMW dealers *never* return a car fully charged, about which I chide them every time.

Charging the battery from the ICE is quite quick - about 1 mile range added for each mile driven: 50mph average speed stretches are welcomed, because the constant speed puts low loads on the ICE, but it still generates power for the battery. I almost welcome 10-15 miles of average speed roadworks!

During lockdowns, using the i8 for local journeys only, my lifetime average consumption was over 54mpg. Now that we're back into long-range journeys, and after a long road trip with somme spirited driving, it's down to 49mpg. Some of that drop was down to using 95 petrol rather than 97 or 99, because protesters were disrupting the supply chain: 95 gives about 10% poorer fuel consumption.

On that long trip I only twice was able to charge where I stopped for a break, or overnight. And that's the *interim* bit - our infrastructure hasn't caught up with charging demand.

Will
(with a low milage Stag for sale if anyone's interested :-)

I've been mulling over the EV/ICE/Hybrid conundrum.
For now, excluding the Morgan, we have a Tesla Model 3 Dual Motor and a Mercedes C43 Coupe.

The Tesla costs about 7p/mile to run, based on charging at night from home. With a realistic range of 270 miles it covers most of our needs, but even with Tesla superchargers we wouldn't use it for longer trips away from the motorway/urban network, so the Merc or Morgan is our choice. BUT the Merc costs about 35p/mile to run, the Morgan 45p.
The Mercedes is now almost 6 years old and we need to consider the future, particularly as we want to drop from 3 cars to two, including the the Plus 8.
A full EV isn't viable because I have zero confidence that there will be sufficient public charging in the sort of places we want to go.
So a PHEV seems logical: sell the Tesla, trade in the C43 and get a new C43 PHEV, available next year: I have put a deposit down on one.

I think PHEV would suit our useage - only doing about 5000 pa and 90% of mileage is local so would hardly use the ICE.

Providing the cost is below £40k

Cost saving would be minimal but I could assuage my guilt on the other vehicles in the garage.

Plug in Hybrid suits me too. Most local journeys are completed on electric and there's no issue with "range anxiety" if I go on a longer trip.

The main advantage for me though is that the plug-in hybrid has substantially better straight line performance than the pure ICE equivalent.

Ok I start with an apology for introducing a modicum of thread drift, but thought there might be some interest in the advances of EV in racing... I have to admit I have never watched an E car race and having watched the vid in the link below, I doubt I could manage to do so unless with the sound down, and for me the sounds of engines make up a high percentage of the magic.. OK so the sound engineers could have made a better job of mixing the vehicle to voice levels but...??

https://youtu.be/GiYT3ftvsYI

I can well understand your concerns, our local council has put a few EV charging points on the promenade, however any sunny day and the promenade and surrounding area is packed with day trippers searching for somewhere to park, after 10am all the available spots are taken.

What is happening the EV's being recharged are parking at the charging stations and remaining there all day because they cant find anywhere else to park. So in effect the charging stations are under utilised as charged EV's are using them for parking all day. The council is considering introducing a time restriction on the EV charging bay, but that will require policing by traffic wardens and its a major walk from their usual patrols around the town centre. It was the most ludicrous place they put the initial EV charging bays, when they could have used the town municipal car parks that are patrolled, but that would have reduced the number of paying parking bays and hence revenue to the council.

I dread to think what impact analysis they undertook, if any. The council and its officers seem to struggle with the concept and direct correlation caused by increased parking fees, leads to increased illegal/inconsiderate parking leads to more local residents complaints about parking issues caused by day trippers. They certainly seem to live in their own little ivory towers......................so I dread to think what solution they will employ regarding the EV charging bay parking issue. So I understand your natural concerns if our local council provision of EV charging bays is anything to go by.