Although different, but the same
, I had a Vauxhall Ampera on a 3 day test drive.
It seems to have pretty much the same figures as the Golf GTE, from a miles driven on electric only point of view etc, albeit the Golf has more power available.
Anyway, I drove the Ampera exactly how I would drive in my normal way of working, but perhaps hammered it a bit more to test out the performance. All in all I did 185 miles at 177mpg. Pretty good I think. But, you really need to be able to top the electric up at every opportunity ideally. The Ampera needed around 7 hours I recall from standard mains plug.
The hybrid, plug in tech definitely works, it is just the purchase cost and charging opportunities that are holding it back for now. If you worked at an office with parking near a 13 pin plug and an extension lead you would be quids in ...
As for the Ampera? too compromised for me, had some very nice features, but then didn't have and cant spec things like an auto dimming rear view mirror. The fact the it is only a four seater is that cars biggest draw back though. Did drive very nice though and each journey became like a game of electric v's petrol usage, not sure if that novelty would wear off though.
If the Golf came in at 30K for a well specc'd one, that would become viable to a heck of a lot people I think, especially with Golf residuals. The batteries will always be a concern though in the 2nd hand market, hugely expensive still.
