GTE... almost there?

[Andy B]

So autocar has tried one. (I didn't post this in reviews because I wanted to ask...)

If you ignore the boot size issue, doesn't this do a better job than the GTD - much more so if you've got regular journeys though 30-40mph roads?

It looks like the car has the same boot size as the R, which has always been an annoyance for me both in the Golf R and the Audi S3 as we manage to cram  loads in the back of our current car (mk5 golf) and I'd not like to lose that practicality.

But for the first time, I'm a little bit tempted by a hybrid. No flat-battery worries, great range, 'better than diesel' economy on ordinary journeys, and *far* better than diesel on commuter-style journeys.

And the 'slow' charge is only 4 hours from an ordinary socket.

If we don't get a car like this, I bet the next one will be!

http://www.autocar.co.uk/car-review/volkswagen/golf/first-drives/volkswagen-golf-gte-first-drive-review

[Pixelmix]

I considered it before ordering the GTI, but was put off by the thought of the extra weight and the worry of that extra tech going wrong. Interesting that autocar still thought it handled well.

[p3asa]

Looks good. I loved the MPG
VW Claim 188mpg
Autocar got 73mpg

Nothing new there then!! 

[fredgroves]

I wonder roughly how much the thing costs to charge up each time?

I'm guessing you need the electric bit to get anything like decent MPG, but I wouldn't be surprised if the test they did to get their mileage figure wasn't actually not driving it in the way its designed to be most efficient.

I've never really looked at any hybrids before, the lentil and sandals thing isn't really me, but this looks strangely attractive... is it just because its a Golf and not some piece of hideous looking weird jap juink?

[monkeyhanger]

No mention of it being a cylinder-on-demand petrol engine - that would have improved the real mpg in petrol mode by a very real 10mpg or so.

If you want to be doing the equivalent of 180mpg or thereabouts, you'd probably have to be having it in 100% electric mode for 70-80%  of the time. In fact, the CO2 level of 35g CO2/km suggests that at around a quarter of the petrol model's own figures, the official cycle has this car working in electric mode for around 75% of the time.

Fine if you want to drive like a nun while doing a 30 mile round trip commute - you might hardly have to dip into the petrol side of things. Who wants 204ps on tap, knowing full well that they can only tap into a quarter of it if they want to get appreciably getter mpg than the GTD? It'll likely cost £9k more than a GTI/GTD (their "estimate" seems wildly optimistic when you see that the e-tron has a confirmed price of £34950 after subsidy - albeit with more equipment than is usually standard for an audi), or £4k after the £5k current government subsidy (funny how all these electric cars are around £5k more than they should be while that is in place. If the subsidy got pulled, they'd find a way to reduce the price so it didn't look ridiculously expensive).

£4k can buy you a lot of diesel in a typical 3 year ownership of the car, enough to do 33k miles at 50mpg (assuming current diesel prices of £6 a gallon/131p/L). Even if you are getting your electricity for free (free charging point at work?) I can't see why you'd pay the extra for the GTE over the GTD.

This car makes perfect sense in London to avoid the congestion charge, but outside London you'd be better off with a GTD when all you are trying to offset the extra cost with is fuel savings. The extra weight of the battery pack blunts the all-in GTE performance to worse than that of a GTD (just).

If you have a strong environmental conscience or you live in London you might be swayed, but if not and you only intend on keeping the car 3 years, you'd be better off with a GTD from a financial point of view, while these come at such a premium.

[monkeyhanger]

Looks good. I loved the MPG
VW Claim 188mpg
Autocar got 73mpg

Nothing new there then!! 

And the further you drive it on a trip, the lower the mpg will be Take this car 200 miles and the mpg all in will be around 53mpg. The petrol engine on it's own is probably good for a real 45mpg. Seems to me then that Autocar's tests were probably for around 65 miles (50:50 electric and petrol trip) if they used real-world electric pricing in their mpg calculation. Cost per mile for the average (non-economy 7) customers charging on their own domestic electricity supply is around 4.5p per mile for most electric cars or hybrids running in pure electric mode. Of course, Nissan and the like boast of 2p per mile driving because they always quote maximum range (driving like a nun, high ambient temps) and purely economy 7 charging.

[fredgroves]

It's all a bit of a con anyway - you mention the subsidies, but also you imagine that you are going into this not paying road tax or congestion charging only to have them change their minds about that further down the line.

Also no doubt the batteries suffer exactly the same as the ones in my mobile phone do and after about a year you'll be lucky to get half the range it did on day one.

Given that in this country we've not figured out where we are going to get electricity from in the future, probably buying something which needs charging isn't a good strategy.

Fred

[p3asa]

Even if you are getting your electricity for free (free charging point at work?) I can't see why you'd pay the extra for the GTE over the GTD.

You can just imagine all the works electricity bills shooting up 10 fold 
A guy at my wife's work has a Nissan Leaf and he was expecting just to plug it in while there!!

How does the electric / fuel part work I couldn't pick that up? If my commute is 12 miles to work and 12 back could I in theory not use any fuel at all?

[mullermn]

It's all a bit of a con anyway - you mention the subsidies, but also you imagine that you are going into this not paying road tax or congestion charging only to have them change their minds about that further down the line.

It would require quite a big change of policy for there to be a 'road tax' impact, as vehicle excise duty is related to the emissions of a vehicle rather than the fact that it's using the roads. This is also why bikes aren't required to pay it.

Congestion charging is another matter though - if everyone in London gets an electric car then congestion would rise and you'd assume the policy would change to take account of it.

[fredgroves]

Bikes do pay road tax... https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-tax-rate-tables

(BTW, the Mk7 Golf GTD is actually a "low emissions" car by those standards, being only a category B - if you have the hippy flowers in its hair electric car, next year you will save 20 quid on your road tax!!)

As for future changes, they definitely happen - they've already changed the congestion charge for "low emissions vehicles"

http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/nissan/leaf/64775/london-congestion-charge-rules-tightened

I can see that shortly the hybrid won't be exempt, only the fully electric - the pattern is obvious.

While I'm typing this, don't forget that we also have running the current "war on diesel", which after incentivising all of us to drive more fuel economical, low CO2 oil burners, they now are telling us that that's bad.

Basically, things can and do and will continue to change - the b*****s will get you one way or another!

Fred