Is owning a hybrid a bad idea?

For what it's worth, a good friend of mine has recently bought a hybrid and swears it's the best thing since sliced bread. I can see the advantages, and very little downside, if any.

Here's an article that will tell you a whole lot more....

Look at cost of car with and without hybrid. It might save you 10% on fuel costs. It will save nothing on longer trips. The Kona has a tiny boot, and small back seats so check out that too.

I don't regret for a single minute having owned a "Self Charging" hybrid. I had one for 8 years before moving to a PHEV and it was one of the most reliable cars I ever had. Around town it was very economical and used the electric motor a decent portion of the time (although it was not the 50% of the time quoted by some car manufacturers). On any long journeys, I was getting up to 60mpg and the long time average (over the 8 years) was just under 58mpg. Newer models would most likely be more efficient than this over time.

You will get a lot of conversation in this Forum on how BEV is superior to all other tech and HEV and PHEV are only there for compliance reasons but at the end of the day, HEVs are more readily available, cheaper to purchase (new or second hand) and all come without the need to wait for a charger or have to plan a journey to take into account a charge stop/broken charger situation. If you are living in an apartment block without access to charging facilities then I would not be recommending a BEV or PHEV to you in any case.

Theres no such thing as self charging. Hybrids need either petrol or a plug to "charge"

One of the key components of a self-charging hybrid is the ability of the vehicle's ICE engine to power off and be eliminated from the highly inefficient tasks of idling and initial acceleration from a stop. Start-Stop technology 15 years ago initiated part of this but was annoying to use as it was required to be trigger-happy to keep the wait time for the engine restart low, and the engine was often left running anyway as it needed to power the cooling/heating systems. Hence why hybrid has any size foot in the door.

So in my opinion, self-charging hybrid should be a stop-gap for city vehicles and should not be considered for medium to long distance vehicles due to the added weight of the battery, electric motor and limited gains from the stored electrical power.

The "Self Charging" moniker was perpetuated by Toyota in this market so they definitely bear some of the responsibility here. If someone thinks their HEV does not need to be filled up with Petrol/Diesel, then that is the fault of whomever sold them the car TBH.

Most people are not interested in the nuances of electrified powertrains, they do not want to know the difference between a Parallel or Series hybrids, what a PHEV is in comparison to a BEV, the ins and outs of when the electric motor is active or where the electricity comes from. All most people want to know is; will it get them from A to B without stopping and what absolutely needs to be done to keep the car on the road.

Anyway, lets not get hung up on the whole Self Charging thing. The OP is asking if owning a Hybrid is a bad idea and I believe for ease of use and less headaches, then YES, they are worth owning.

It will put a little more load on the engine and this will increase fuel consumption as a result. HEVs generally use the energy recuperation model instead where energy is harvested during coasting/braking.

A PHEV, however, will generally have a function to charge the traction battery while driving but again, this will have a fuel penalty.

I expect the rude comment above was directed at me. I'll leave my post in situ as anyone with basic reading comprehension can understand the obvious unwritten caveats that would apply.

Unfollowing.

Yes, but how much? Does anybody know?

Surely there is data somewhere on this.

My Sister in law is getting 60 to 70 mpg from a CHR in rural driving.

Don't worry about it being in or not in EV mode.

Let the car do its thing.

Big advantage of Toyota Hybrids for me though isn't so much the fuel or environmental benefits.

Its the fact that Toyota Hybrids are excellent for reliability and related hassle free motoring.

(corrected mistake in the maths)

That's easy to estimate.

If 30km = 9kWh, then it's 9kWh generated at an ICE efficiency of between 40% to 60% (as a parasitic load), so that's between 22.5kWh and 15kWh of equivalent power.

And 1l of petrol has approximately 9.7kWh of energy, so that means between 2.31l and 1.55l of petrol, or between €2.06 and €3.36 at the pump.

Right, I am breaking my tapping out just to reply to this and I am not getting into a further discussion here about it.

YES, I can get up to 55kms out of my PHEV battery. In fact, at times I have beaten that and got 59kms so it all depends on how it is driven. I do not live at the top of a mountain. Just because you are unable to get more than 20kms from your vehicle does not mean that someone else driving your car could not get more. You are welcome to look back at my old posts to see what car I drive, if you are genuinely interested.

As for my other claims on the HEV, these are true as I experienced them routinely and I will challenge you to prove otherwise. Unless you have a time machine and can sit in the car beside me during those journeys, then you have no idea what you are ranting about.

I am not a person who is prone to hyperbole or exaggeration. In my car owning years, I have regularly been able to meet or exceed the official fuel economy figures on most of the cars I have purchased and it is all down to technique.

You are free to to believe me or not. Either way, I couldn't care less. I will continue to enjoy my decent fuel economy and leave you to do whatever it is you do.

A member of my family had a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV. Living a rural area it was totally unpractical. She was driving around with a fur coat on trying to stay warm in cold weather. Radio and heating never turned on. She tried her best to make it work. The electricity never lasted more than 20km. The petrol consumption kicked in then and was eye watering with the gauge visibly depleting before her eyes. Being used to Diesel cars the change to petrol was a shock. When you look under the bonnet you see a small petrol engine and small electric setup. It seems you are getting half a petrol engine and half an electric engine to run a big SUV just seems underpowered. Can see how it would work in an urban area with trips under 20 km but in a rural area with hills and bends in the road and wind and rain just was not practical on any level. And a car should be comfortable heat wise during the winter your paying enough for it. And everyone has different levels of heat that their comfortable with some people turn it right up high. It may sound whiny but technology should not go backwards like that to make driving less comfortable for people.

The car consistently ran out of electric at the same spot every day which was just under 20kms on the daily commute. It was a 191 reg so it wasn’t exactly on its last legs or anything. She actually cried with relief when she sold it. Had huge interest when she put it on Done deal from people in Dublin. No interest from anywhere else.

To the OP.

I think the key point for you is lack of charging ability. That rules out a BEV and a PHEV.

So your options are then petrol, diesel or HEV.

Diesel- no. Being phased out.

So Petrol or HEV. Work out your mileage the expected mpg of what you are looking at. Do the sums. Whichever is cheaper over 3 years is the one for you then.

‘Self charging’ Toyotas have regen braking as well as engine charging….

All self charging means is that you don’t plug it in ….

in reality, the hybrid is first generation tech aimed at reducing emissions …. rather than dramatically improving mpg

In most Toyota and Lexus hybrid, the car decides when to run on battery only, when on petrol and when on petrol and battery …

IMHO, if you want to be able to drive in full electric, you need to buy full electric car….

I'm not sure of the reason of a hybrid except economy ?

worst of both worlds IMO .. maintenance and a whole heap of plugging in for what 20% extra MPG ?

Also a small battery with all those recharge cycles has a reduced lifespan I'd imagine

I went from a 1.8 Honda civic to a 1.8 toyota hybrid and my fuel bill halved. But if your doing mainly motorway driving go diesel. My civic got better mpg than the toyota going from Dublin to Cork.

The only variable I can think of is driving style. I did get a longer range out of it but I was literally free wheeling around. It’s hard to see how you could teach people to drive like that unless there was considerable buy in and very disciplined driving that really takes the joy out of driving. If you can’t put the foot down it’s a pretty dull experience. I’m not talking about speeding btw. Maybe if they just went the whole hog and retarded the acceleration so it can only be driven sluggishly it might solve the issue of driving style. The commute in this car was a 35km trip each way with no traffic numerous bends in the road and numerous rolling hills and three junctions. As I said each day without fail the petrol engine kicked in fully at the 20k mark. When she engaged the self charge button at this point the petrol would consume even quicker.

The Toyota hybrids are usually more reliable then most ICE cars tbh.

...and a healthy bit of tailgating to boot. Those air molecules aren't going to move themselves!

Tailgating and coasting would fail your driving test