16 years in BMW 520d's .... need to jump (or being pushed!) to 530e

Buddy Bubs

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121672462#Comment_121672462

60 mpg is a piss take for starters. Maybe for short periods of time but long term average, not a hope.

maidhc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121672659#Comment_121672659

I had an avensis with a n47 318d engine. It did about 42mpg over its life. I swapped it for Camry (es300h with a low rent interior) and that does about 45.

Only car we had that got close to 60mpg was a 2017 Astra.

Old diesel

1200 kms is actually 750 miles.......

In real terms it's the equivalent of TEN hours non stop at 75 mph.

I suspect that far from running back to 520ds what many drivers will actually find is they don't actually need 750 miles of range.....

If we take an old school Japanese 2 litre diesel non turbo direct injection like an old E10 or E11 Corolla.....

You were looking at a real life 400 to 450 miles between fills.....

Because you'd frequently find yourself filling up with 1/4 of a tank showing on the gauge.....

Because if you go lower then that you never quite knew how much you really had.

How accurate is a gauge for example...

So leaving the EV argument aside - a hybrid - whether "self charging" or a plug in should be plenty.....

Would be interested to know what use case actually requires 750 miles can't stop at all ability......

MojoMaker

None, which is why it must be a piss take, especially given the forum orientation.

dodzy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121671322#Comment_121671322

2018 Beemer 5 series D that does 60mpg ? I've put 70k miles on a 5 series. Not a chicken's chance in Thailand you are averaging that mileage. I too, call BS on that statement.

creedp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121674782#Comment_121674782

Personally, at that price point, I would buy an EV all day long but I don't get the necessity of describing somebody's decision to buy an ICE as a pisstake. IMO all it serves is to drag the thread down a rabbit hole which benefits no one.

A friend of mine is in a similar situation ATM. Has driven 520ds for around 15 years and, despite a number of conversations with him, he's adamant he won't buy an EV. Equally he considers the 530e to be too expensive so is buying a 330e instead. Personal choice is fine by me. Its not a black and white decision

Old diesel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121674987#Comment_121674987

The issues (with his argument) are......

1) he reckons people will be back looking for the 520ds 1200 km range...... Few people need 1200 km range in the first place.

BUT

The bigger issue is.....

2) he doesn't fully understand how PHEVs work..... He thinks you need to charge when the PHEV runs out of battery.

The ability to keep going on fossil is literally the entire point of a PHEV.

If the point was he can't use an EV* then fine but he's dismissing hybrids and PHEVs out of hand......

People talk of an EVer bubble but there's a hard core diesel driver bubble....

They are the ones that will overlook all manner of diesel engine failures.

When they could get superior reliability on say a Toyota hybrid.....

Oh I see - wrong badge.

Never mind 😀😀.

Edit to explain the astrik

*a modern EV at 520d money will probably run for 2 to 3 days between charges at 110 kms a day......

creedp

It could be argued there are 2 or even 3 bubbles though! How many threads go to shoite with EV supporters arguing with PHEV supporters that PHEVs are a waste of space and go full EV and vice versa?

Discussion is good as all sides learn from each other but in the end some people are not for turning, just not yet anyway.

DaveyDave

What sort of range would you get in hybrid mode from these? Assuming the petrol does the majority or all of the motorway work.

I regularly see PHEVs charging at my local Tesco, I personally don't see the point of driving them in EV mode if it means having to top up for an hour when doing your weekly shop or whenever you left the house. Fair enough if you can communute and do a few errands in a day on battery but if I couldn't get a day out of the EV mode I'd probably run hybrid mode, or at least run hybrid once the battery ran low. Wouldn't be arsed paying 60c/kWh+ on public chargers for 7-11kW charging rates.

At least if you charged at work it would be alright but charging while out and about, feck that.

I seem to be one of the few EV owners that thinks hybrid is ok. I live and work in Dublin, I'd much rather walk past a few 530e than 520d on their 5 minute school run.

Buddy Bubs

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121676176#Comment_121676176

Somewhere between 20 and 40kms from mine which was smaller battery. Rarely got above 30 on full battery usage.

We are full EV x 2 now, but up to a few months ago I had a 530e PHEV. I did try to maximise range on battery but it meant plugging in every day and was still using some petrol, about 50% of petrol of a 520i perhaps.

Became a bit of a pain, I always plugged in but herself didnt if it was cold or wet or windy or she had loads of petrol in the tank! Stopping to charge the odd time on a long run is, for me, easier and less hassle than plugging in every single day.

PaulRyan97

The new 530e has a significantly larger battery. Claimed WLTP range of 100km so I imagine 70-80km should be very doable.

anthonymacd

All - I was the original poster who started this thread. Having had a continuous string of 520ds since 2007 (one X5 3.0d in 2015) , I picked up my new 530e last weekend. I thought I'd take the time to write a simple review as a non-car experts / non journalist to help the average punter make a decision. I struggled to leave the diesel, so thought it would be useful to others write a "layman" review.

My last car was a 2022 520d M-Sport which covered 40k per year on a mix of North Cork -> Dublin, London as well as local trips. I drove the last car carefully and got ~70K from a set of original tyres so this suggests I drive the car "easy". I still drive on the motor way limits etc but tends not to do wheel spins etc! I do the same ~800-900 miles of trips weekly which is a Cork->Dublin run along with a route around Cork towards Bantry. In the winter I achieve 56MPG blended and in the summer I was seeing 61MPG approx. Tank capacity was always 1200 - 1400 kms.

New car has just completed its first week and after 1059km on the clock since new and 905km since the last fuel fill its averaged 52.8 MPG. This included a trip from Cork to Dublin where I did the first 90km on battery and the remaining 516km on petrol. This was the worst part of the fuel economy and the car averaged 48.5MPG for this part of the trip. Motorway speeds seem to be at 39mpg on petrol alone (was a very wet windy night). However, on Saturday I did a run from Nort Cork -> Bantry -> Cork City -> North Cork and this brought the overall average up to 52.8MPG. 100km local road driving seems to yield 43MPG on fuel alone. I'll report more after 5,000km once the car settles in, but if it stays on 52MPG I will be fairly pleased. Range of 1040km which is about 840km on Petrol and the other 200 on battery + coasting.

Aside from missing diesel, I am delighted with the car and its probably a bigger step up in terms of comfort/tech than I had seen going from the F10 to the G30 model. The ride quality on the car is truly exceptional, even with the extra weight. My only niggle here is sharp bends, you do notice the sway of the car ... it feels like an X5 sometimes. Doubt I'll see ~70k from the tyres.

Build quality, interior, stereo all seem to be good. Lots of press reports complain about the indicator stalk, which I think is fine. I miss the buttons on the dash for basic functions, but the touch screen is easy to use. The fix controls for heating, home, nav along with programmable shortcuts all make the car easy to use on the move. Yes, I would prefer buttons - but the BMW is far easier to use than the Audi A6 / VW Tiguan we also used to run.

In short, I am very pleased with the new car and not suffering any buyers remorse. I'll give the group another update when I hit 5k.

Hope this helps!

DaveyDave

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121685038#Comment_121685038

Do you have the option of setting what speed the electric motor cuts off? A colleague had a 530e while their car was in service and they didn't make it into work on battery alone at motorway speeds (although I think this was a slightly older one with the smaller battery) so they ended up with fairly low fuel economy due to the stop and go being done on petrol.

Do you think it will be more economical to run EV then petrol to finish the journey or hybrid?

PaulRyan97

I would think driving in hybrid mode from the start during long motorway journeys would be the most efficient rather than running the battery flat in EV mode.

User1998

Agreed. You should try use hybrid mode for the full duration of motorway driving. It might yield slightly better results, and should give a better driving experience.

joe1303l

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121685038#Comment_121685038

Well wear, very honest real world review and I’d say it’ll serve you well. In terms of price, would I be right in thinking a new 530E now is at least €20K more expensive than your last 520d ? When you go to trade it next time, could a high mileage petrol hybrid be hard to shift compared to a high mileage 520d ?

anthonymacd

Thanks for the comments folks.

@joe1303l - The 2024 car came in at €76K. The list on my 2022 520d was €63K. The list on the 2019 car was €54K. A lot of inflation in 5 years!! ... Agree with the concern with trading in a 2 year old car with 80k KMs in 2 years time. I am hoping the use car market will have accepted that diesels are no longer available. I did numerous spreadsheets on all this before I ordered the car and it was a toss between numerous situations on what would work out cheapest ... so I eventually took the emotional approach and ordered a new car ;-)

@DaveyDave @User1998 @PaulRyan97 - The car hybrid setup seems to be fairly sophisticated. When I input my journey, incl stops into the SAT-NAV the car does a mix of electric/petrol for the whole journey ...right down to saving 1km of fuel for the last leg of the journey. When I use WAZE for navigation, the car seems to burn all the electricity first and move to 100% Petrol. .... I'll be learning ...

User1998

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121686692#Comment_121686692

When you use a cars satnav it usually incorporates the driving modes into the journey to be as fuel efficient as possible.

While using Waze you can just override the system by putting the car into hybrid mode.

anthonymacd

Thanks @User1998 - something for me to play about with this week!

Deco911

Also similar situation in that have to move from 520d.

Dont do huge mileage about 25k km per year and it’s a mix of motorway town and countryside.

New 530e Msport Pro test drove and its class but looking for €78k, too much for the amount of driving I do.

Thinking of sticking to 520d and drive into ground. Or perhaps looking at 330e (wonder is the 330e big enough for car seats and kids stuff in boot?

Question, have they discontinued the 530e msport and it’s now only 530e msport pro?

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121737796#Comment_121737796

The 530e is noticeably smaller in the boot than the 20d variant. A lot shallower due to the battery, I’d go as far as saying half the space in the real world.

We had an E60, F10, G30 (all 20d) and a G30 30e parked side by side.

GusGus

530e m sport was available to order on line until very recently- it’s changed to only the 550e for a period of time . There are posters here who have just got delivery for m sport models - I think around 75k.

there is a general issue with the 5 and delivery at present so this might be the reason why not on line at present .

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121739329#Comment_121739329

There’s a shortage of some part for them I heard.

MarkN

Driving a 520i this week. Not as much torque as a 520d but nothing much wrong with it either.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121741737#Comment_121741737

Other than price?

At least there be no queing at charger videos 😂😂

MarkN

Specced to 83k this one!

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121743455#Comment_121743455

Point proved.

€45k used to get you into a brand new 520d in E60 format.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121743478#Comment_121743478

€45 used to get you a weeks shop in Aldi when the E60 was new.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121743551#Comment_121743551

😂

Inflation is ripe but double!

In 2009 we bought brand new from Duffys for €44 odd. Le Mans Blue Msport.

RainInSummer

Yeah but it's all relative, I mean our wages have all tripled.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121743559#Comment_121743559

I think there was a big jump with inflation in the past 3 years as well as increased VRT. But I agree with the point you're making. i went for a test drive in the new I5 M60 and it was 136k for the one I wanted. Insane. That would probably (and I have no idea as I wasnt in that market then) have gotten me an e61 M5 back in the day.. or the best BMW ever made IMHO.

MarkN

The suspension and damper setup in the M60 is a lot better than the standard car, I will say that. I couldn’t get over how little a 1kg lens was moving on film when I was editing my video as a marker.

anthonymacd

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121737796#Comment_121737796

@Deco911 - I've just turned 3,000km in my new 530e M-Sport (not an M-Sport Pro). Delighted with the car and the MPG is only 4-5MPG below the comparable numbers for my 900km weekly commute. Suspect they have stopped the Non-Pro car for now as @GusGus suggested the shortage of some parts. The boot size in the new car is almost the exact same as the previous G30 520d ... but its about 7cm less-tall, but a lot deeper.

Reckon a 330e will cost almost as much as a 530e when you spec up the car ....

joe1303l

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121752010#Comment_121752010

Presuming your mpg comparison is with a 520d, that 4-5mpg increase isn’t bad. If you have free charging, your fuel bill may only be up €700 -€800 over a year at current fuel prices.

Deco911

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121752010#Comment_121752010

The msport 530e Pro costing €79k €770 a month PCP

The Msport normal 530e costing €720.

looking at 330e Msport with a lot of extras during the week. My main worry is would 330e fit a baby seat and the room for boot. Hard to know, plus I think I’d miss my 520d. Which makes me think I should just refinance or pay off my balloon payment - only thing stopping me here is never get a new one then and I’m wary getting second half 330e/550e (old school with my thinking someone won’t look after it right).

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121744901#Comment_121744901

It is a great handling car, leaps and bounds ahead of the 40. (I had an extended test drive of both). BMW deserve a lot of credit for making a great handling and good looking EV, except they've priced it way too expensive. There's no way I would buy anything other than the 520d at this point. It's 75k for the 520d touring, vs ~100k for the 40 touring and 136k for the M60 touring (the one I'd want)

MarkN

https://youtu.be/li17rac_ySI?si=NA2ZJl0TNI4Xs3Up

Here’s the 520i vid I made

Jizique

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121752645#Comment_121752645

Fascinating that all this tech and inclusion of battery is leading to a 10% increase in emissions - Ince upon a time, this was all about lowering emissions

djan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121760652#Comment_121760652

It's why for high mileage motorway usage diesel is still the way to go, especially for business use, regardless of EV or PHEV. Where the 530e shines is in the vast majority of cases where people will hardly ever use the motor as they do their daily motoring on battery with the motor occasionally kicking in at higher speeds or hard acceleration.

Spipov

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121743635#Comment_121743635

Not everyone

GPoint

Should not mix one’s progression through career over the years with average market salary for the same position. People in their 40s are not making 3x more money now than people in their 50s were making 10 years ago.

Glad for people whose salaries tripled though!

_H80_GHT

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121769484#Comment_121769484

They were joking.

RainInSummer

That was a joke along the lines of the immortal Hudson's 'it's a dry heat' line.

A large part of society has seen feck all increase, and what they have seen has been eroded by inflation. And yes I know that same inflation is also responsible for some of the price increases on luxury goods too. And some of it is blatant profiteering.

anthonymacd

Hi All,

As promised in previous posts, a quick update on my experiences of the 2024 530e vs my 2022 520d. I just turned 8,100Km today after returning from a week long trip from Cork → London. I usually do the trip 3 times per year and the old 520d used to 58MPG for such a trip. Usually a mix of motorway driving, a good bit of driving around London. The new car did 2,207 km in 7 days and achieved 44.1MPG. Interestingly 397km of this was on battery (and I assume coasting also). Considering I did not charge the battery since leaving home, the car managed to generate 297km of power somehow.

I was very impressed with how the sat-nav and the car work in harmony. On approach to London (say 50 miles out) the car had zero charge. However, by the time we entered the City traffic, the car had generated 12 miles (not Km) of power which was sufficient to get us to our destination in Canary Wharf.

I continue to be very pleased with the G60 530e in terms of driving, tech and comfort. Its definitely a step up on the old car. For journeys up to 300km, the 530e is more fuel efficient than the 520d. My 530e is averaging 51.4MPG since the factory, as opposed to 60.4 in the former 520d.

In terms of items to dislike, my list in order are:

1. Steering wheel buttons are now a touch sensitive panel. Very very unpredictable to use. Not happy with this, particularly the toggle between Cruise Control and the Speed Limiter.
2. Battery makes the car heavy. Not an issue for motorways, but the car feels overweight when driving on rough country roads. The 520d felt a lot lighter.

Overall I am pleased with the 530e and happy to have bought it. That said, if the 520d became available in Ireland again I'd probably jump back.

As I said in previous posts, I found it hard to get real world info on the 520d vs 530e for high mileage drivers. Hope my layman reviews helps any people considering the switch.

CivilEx

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121982076#Comment_121982076

Thanks for the update, it's good to see real world figures and how cars like the 530e are driven in practice.

I have to admit that I'm scratching my head trying to understand the rationale of the traction battery in this car. The way the longer trip is described, the car wasn't plugged in at all for over 2,000km, which means that it was only charged through regenerative braking. The sole purpose of the traction battery in this use case seems to be to try and improve the overall efficiency of the petrol engine?

Surely it doesn't make sense to be carrying around a heavy battery like this and a car with a traditional petrol engine would get better fuel efficiency. In essence, if the battery is never plugged in to charge it, then what's the point of "lugging it around". I expect that a modern BMW with only a petrol engine would do better than 44mpg?

I don't want to sound like I'm having a go here, I'm not. I'm genuinely trying to understand why a traditional petrol engine car isn't a better option than a plug in hybrid in a real world scenario if the hybrid is never plugged in.

prawnsambo

Pretty much demonstrates that there is only a narrow use case for PHEVs. Somebody who does the odd long trip but otherwise just tootles around the city or suburbs on short trips would be the perfect use case. Somebody who does a lot of high mileage trips would seem to better suited to a petrol or diesel car.

anthonymacd

Hi @CivilEx @prawnsambo - I 100% agree with your assessment! Putting it bluntly, I literally "carried" a half tonne battery from Limerick → London and then back to Cork! Diesel is the only option for someone like me at the moment, but brand loyalty (or stupidity!) kept me in a 5-Series. I did look at the 520i, but felt it was best to hedge my risk by buying the 530e given the inevitable switch to cars with a battery.

In terms of MPG on Petrol alone … I achieved 46.5 MPG on the journey between Oxford and Holyhead. Nice motorway driving on a dry day. Dublin → Cork was in terrible weather (wind / rain) and the MPG came in at 41.5 MPG.

prawnsambo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121982833#Comment_121982833

Yeah. At the moment the longest range available on a BEV is ~650-700km. That includes cars like the Tesla Model 3 and S, Fisker Ocean, Polestar 2 and Merc EQS. Probably another year or two before we get ~1000km range.

CivilEx

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121982833#Comment_121982833

I've mentioned it on this thread before, but like yourself, I moved from being a serial 520D buyer to crossing bands into an Ioniq 6 in January this year. Also like yourself, I have done over 9,000km in the first 3 months of ownership, including a trip to Manchester recently.

I don't agree that diesel is the only option for high milage users, but there is a lot of planning ahead with a BEV on longer trips and that definitely isn't for everyone. I enjoy it though!

joe1303l

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121982962#Comment_121982962

The other great benefit with the old 520d was the residuals, a great car to hold their value even with high mileage. An Ioniq 6 may not do so well even allowing for fuel savings. At least you’re not worrying about timing chains, turbos, clutches/flywheels etc.