@Glos Guy and @kezo, sorry to interrupt but I went to Hyundai today, test drove a Tucson hybrid and then placed an order for the PHEV (Ultimate). They have it on site so it’d be next week. I still don’t have a driveway as Highways and the council are being really difficult with OT. The salesman told me that the PHEV will be the same as the hybrid, shouldn’t need charging all the time, giving me enough time to get the drive and home charging sorted. I then agreed to go ahead but now I’m wondering if I made a mistake that could be impactful in the future if no home parking is possible. Can I ask: have you driven your Tucsons on little to no electric charge in the batteries? Seeing how you both have the car, what would either of you advise may be the best thing I do? Cheers.
@kezo is far more knowledgeable on the mechanical side than me, but my take is that a PHEV is only sensible if you can charge it at home after each use. Whilst the salesman is correct that you can use it as a normal hybrid, a PHEV is heavier and that makes it less fuel efficient as you are carting around a hell of a lot of weight with the battery. As part of my extensive test driving before committing to the Tucson I had a self charging hybrid for 24 hours and I was surprised at how poor the mpg was. Over a 25 mile round trip that I make every week it delivered around 5mpg less than our BMW 2.0i petrol 4WD X1, whereas I expected it to be much better. A PHEV with no charge would probably have been even thirstier over that journey as it’s heavier, unless the higher capacity battery offsets that (again, Kezo will be best to advise on this). My final comment is that whilst I am very happy with our Tucson PHEV, the big positive for me is that I can do most of our total mileage in EV mode as I always leave home with a fully charged battery. The petrol engine, whilst by no means the worst I’ve driven, isn’t a patch on the petrol engine in the BMW. It’s pretty silent up to 2,000 rpm but once you get much over that it’s noticeable, especially in contrast to the hushed EV mode. My personal view is that without the ability to charge at home after every use, a PHEV is rather pointless. A self charging hybrid may be a better bet but as I say I wasn’t impressed with the Tucson version and other more efficient cars might be available. So it really all depends on how certain you are that you will get a home charging solution in the near future.
Thanks for that @Glos Guy, you’ve confirmed what I suspected.
I’ll try and see how I can get out of the situation best I can tomorrow.