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I currently have a Tucson PHEV on 24 hour test and have a few questions for @kezo @JohntheLeg and anyone else who has one.
The car the dealer has given me, whilst brand new, is unfortunately the pre facelift model, so it’s a bit different from what I had researched. They are giving me a facelift one for another 24 hours when I take this one back, but it’s not a PHEV, so my education on PHEVs is right now.
I’ve just been on a decent drive in both EV and Auto (which was mostly EV) and deliberately let the battery run out so that I could then see what it was like on petrol only. All worked fine but I’ve just parked it in the garage with a view to recharging it and the ruddy cable in the car is one that only works in a charging station – not the 3 pin (granny charger) that I expected. This is irritating as tomorrow I wanted to take my wife on our usual ‘local’ journeys on EV mode but now can’t 😡. Two questions;
1) Does the Tucson PHEV come with a charging cable that can be used in a 3 pin plug as standard, or do you have to buy one?
2) There is a third driving mode that I haven’t used yet (Hybrid?), although I think the car may have now been ‘forced’ into it by the battery running out. Is this a mode where the petrol engine charges the battery? If so, if I take it out for a drive tonight (which I intend to do anyway to test the headlights) will I be able to ‘charge’ the battery? Is there a way to do this?
Thanks
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Agree. Harry knows his onions as an ex editor of EVO magazine and others. He has run a PHEV X5 and others and his comparison with a RR sport diesel was interesting. A few years ago, he presented some analysis of CO2 output from a gas fired power station that often charges a BEV. The disingenuous “sustainable” tag used by the ill- informed evangelists has again been exposed by another report on the wood burning DRAX Power station. Moving the tail pipe toxic and particulate emissions from urban to remote locations is brilliant, but the co2 savings more nebulous.
I checked some weights during my investigations, and your PHEVs are @25% or 400kgs heavier than a similar sized Touran. You have considerably more combined bhp and torque to shift the added weight, with the instant max torque of an electric motor available from standstill. The VAG 1.5 has a small amount of brake regen during “smart” start stop, shuts down two cylinders during low load cruise and the dsg disengages drive allowing coasting. The tractable engine pulls effortlessly from 1200rpm and allows a higher gear to be used at town speeds. A different approach from the highly sophisticated Tuscon powertrain and I physically could not cope with charging cables even though have a drive and external sockets. Good luck with the new cars, the HEV version might have suited but Mrs didn’t care for the looks, although the Touran won’t feature on many beauty lists!
ps: Tyre and road wear are a function of weight amongst other factors. Particulate pollution from tyres can be as toxic as diesel. 2.5 ton BEV pax cars are not a free lunch, imho. Harry didn’t mention the fire risks, so neither will I !!!
I took the same view on that £600 pack. Totally worthless for me. Picking up Friday, all being well (hoist fitting etc).
All the best for Friday and if I don’t here anything later that day I’ll catch up with you Monday afternoon sometime 🙂
@kezo (and anyone else interested). We have taken delivery of the new car. Photos below. I was hugely impressed that it was handed over to us not just fully charged but with
a full tank of petrol as well. That’s exceptional service!
The Cypress does look nice with the sun on it (never saw one at my dealers) The Moss grey also make’s it look a cut above the rest.
Its a nice car, hope your happy with it, once you got use to it 🙂
How’s mrs GG’s hoist?
The Cypress does look nice with the sun on it (never saw one at my dealers) The Moss grey also make’s it look a cut above the rest. Its a nice car, hope your happy with it, once you got use to it 🙂 How’s mrs GG’s hoist?
Hi @kezo The dealer mentioned that since they’ve had a couple of Cypress Green cars in (including ours), and people have seen the colour in the flesh, it has become a popular choice. We are very pleased with our colour choice, both exterior and interior.
I’ve set up pretty much everything in the car since we got home (blimey there’s a lot of features isn’t there – it’s taken a good few hours 😂) and I’ve even managed to get Apple Car Play and, more significantly, Amazon Music to work! Tomorrows job will be to plough through my 3 pages of notes that I made from the manuals 😂
I’ve only driven it 8 miles so far (back from the dealers) but I’ve managed to charge it without incident, albeit just at the default 6 amps. I might brave 8 amps next time, as that will make it quicker, but I’ll keep an eye on the plug to see if it gets warm. If that works without incident I might even try it at 10 amps the time after, but I don’t want to push my luck 😂
We need to play with the hoist a bit more. The first attempt was terrible. I couldn’t find the socket to plug it in (now sorted) and I struggled to get my wife’s feet in. However, we stopped for lunch on the way home and I realised what I was doing wrong so we’ve sorted that as well. The straps on the sling don’t seem to be set right as my wife is tilting back when hoisted. I called the company to remind me which straps to adjust, but what they said didn’t sound right so we will have to play with it until we get it sorted. Each attempt so far has been easier than the one before!
Having spent around 3 hours in the car I only have one criticism so far, and that’s the lack of storage space. In my BMW, the rearmost (widest) part of the boot had netted compartments both sides which were incredibly useful for storing things. The same spaces on the Tucson have nothing, so anything placed there will roll around, which is a pain. Door pockets on all four doors are also much smaller than we are used to. We can’t use the glove compartment for much as the fixed mount for the hoist fouls the door and it only opens about 2 inches. The only bit of storage space that is impressive is the big box under the armrest, so that’s now full 😂
Don’t forget to turn the “welcome tune” off, otherwise it will get on your pip after a while 😂
Warning volume set to “0”, I have “lane keep assist” set to vibrate steering wheel although can be turned off on steering wheel. “speed limit assist” can be deactivated by pressing “mute button” for a few seconds, untill notification appears on top of infotainment display. However all is pretty hushed with radio on and warning volume down.
Honestly, you will be fine ramping the charger up to 10A, as double socket’s are generally rated at 20A (14A & 6A, if two items plugged in), so well in the scope of the charger and garage door motor.
Loosing access to the glovebox doesn’t sound right! I thought these adaptions were made to order to fit the car – couldn’t they have fitted a differently or used a different hoist? Its a shame, as the glovebox is a decent size, unlike many of the european cars with matchbox’s from switching from left to right hand drive. Worth ringing the company and questioning them?
The door pockets are pretty small, enough for a bottle, clth and bag of sweeties. I ordered a net for the side space in the boot on my last one but, forgot to take it out. I plan to look in BM for a container, I can velcro down or a painted “L” piece of wood, with velcro, similar to Skoda’s simply clever thingy 😂
Morning @kezo The welcome chime isn’t bothering me yet, but I’ve noticed you can turn it off, so I will keep that in mind 😂
The vast array of safety aids and features on the car was one of the biggest attractions of the Tucson for me, so I’m going to leave everything on for now and gradually turn off any that start to irritate me (at least you can)! I didn’t get it for its looks – my wife and both my daughters love the look of it, but I still think it’s over-styled. It’s growing on me a bit and the colour helps detract my eye from the styling 😂 . However, I really like the interior and, of all the cars that we looked at, it’s the only one that didn’t look like a step down from the BMW. As you said before, it’s the interior we are looking at whilst driving the thing!
We were warned about the glovebox prior to installation. It’s fairly common with person hoists due to where the fixed mount has to be. Thankfully it opens enough to get the manuals in (separately rather than in the wallet) and a few other bits, so not a show stopper but a bit irritating, especially as the door pockets are so small. If you find anything that will fit the boot corners (either side of the tailgate end) I shall be very interested to know, as big pockets in those areas were incredibly useful in the BMW.
Lovely colour inside and out, Glos guy. As a former resident of the north Cotswolds, admire your stone walls and iron gates too! Enjoy all that tech.
Lovely colour inside and out, Glos guy. As a former resident of the north Cotswolds, admire your stone walls and iron gates too! Enjoy all that tech.
Thanks. We are on the doorstep of the Cotswolds, but don’t actually live within the posh bit 😂 Lovely though the Cypress Green is, it’s very dark and I can tell already that it’s going to show the dirt. I can’t say that washing cars is something that I take pleasure in!
Paying hand car washers a necessity for me these days. Fortunately less frequent as no longer a long range commuter. Gloucestershire was bad enough, but years in native mudfordshire/Herefordshire meant wearing mud splatters as a badge of pride was the only sensible option. I have gone for a new colour called oyster silver. Guess with a hint of blue. Stirling silver was surprisingly good at disguising dirt.
Yes I’ve always found silver to be the best colour at hiding dirt, and black the worst (I had one black car and won’t make that mistake again)! I was keen to get silver this time for that very reason, but the Tucson Ultimate has big plastic wheel arches and sills which I don’t like, and they really stand out on light colours, so we had to go with a colour that ‘masks’ them 😂
I used to wash my cars years ago but life’s too short so, like you, I use a hand car was company. I know that they are usually staffed by illegal immigrants and are fronts for organised crime, but needs must 😂
What have I missed! Ah washing cars by the boat people 😂
Actually not washed mine since, Ive had it and bar the wheels it doesn’t actually look too bad! We use to have the Pole’s running these car washes but, since Brexit they have being taken over by the dirty people, who I wouldn’t trust sweep a road let alone wash my car!
How’s the car been @Glos-Guy have you got it all setup now?
Jus’t back home after weekend attending my grandaughters christening in a lovely old church yesterday. Filmed journey hove but, no way putting video up, so just captured image from it, as it was going into hybrid mode!
Hi @kezo Update so far. Only done 3 short journeys so far. Journey 1 home from dealership. Journey 2 out for 20 mins playing with the regenerative braking (more on that later) and journey 3 out for lunch with our daughters yesterday. All trips in EV mode, so the petrol engine hasn’t been used yet. After the first trip I recharged at 6 amps, upped it to 8 amps for the second trip recharge and 10 amps after yesterday’s journey. No power trips and the plug was just very slightly warm, but certainly not hot. It was only a 3 hour charge though, not a full one from 15%. If I ever charge overnight I’ll charge at 6 amps as there’s no rush, but I’m now happy to charge at 10 amps if it will finish before I go to bed, which will be the case in the vast majority of situations.
I’ve had a good play with regenerative braking. I’m still amazed that this is not referred to at all in the owners manual, so I’d bet a large sum of money that the vast majority of Tucson PHEV drivers are completely unaware of it and never use it. Thanks to your advice, I’ve tried levels 1, 2 and 3 (activated by pulling and holding the left paddle to turn it on, then using the left or right paddle to increase or decrease) plus ‘max’ which I now realise is only activated when level 1, 2 or 3 are active and then the ‘max’ mode is only applied for the time that you hold the left paddle in (that’s quite severe, so only advisable when there’s no traffic behind you)! Like you, level 1 is ok but I found the higher levels resulted in a more EV like drive, which I don’t like.
What I discovered by accident (I don’t think you’d mentioned it) is that if you pull and hold the right paddle you activate ‘Auto’ regenerative braking. As with normal regenerative braking, it has 3 levels but it seems to react differently. I think it works in the same way that the BMW adaptive regen braking works I.e. in conjunction with the Sat nav (possibly only if guidance is selected) and reacts to bends in the road, approaching junctions & roundabouts etc. Again, level 1 is bearable.
I’m doing the first journey tomorrow that is beyond the EV only range, so the petrol engine will be used for the first time! I shall use ‘Auto’ mode from the off and then switch to EV mode on the return journey once the remaining EV only range equals the miles left to reach home. My aim will be to get home with just the 15% minimum charge, therefore using the petrol engine as little as possible. I won’t do any proper mileage costs (and therefore ‘true’ mpg equivalent figures) until I first fill up with petrol, but a quick back of a fag packet calculation shows that the EV only trips are, as expected, around half the cost of doing those trips in the BMW. Longer trips will be the acid test though, as I could easily get 50 mpg in the BMW with no charging costs. I’ll let you know, but I think it will be another month until I get a really good handle on it, especially after our holiday (when I won’t be charging).
Only problem so far is the Bluelink App. I have set it to display values in miles, yet it persists in using kilometres on the range figures. There’s obviously a glitch, because whilst the current electric range (38 miles) is showing as the km equivalent (61 km), the current petrol range of 350 miles is showing on the app as 350 km 🤔
I didn’t know by holding the right paddle would turn on auto regen however, that would irritate me and make me feel, as I’m not in control!
I’m not getting bad mpg on 300-400 miles trips, the first trip where I only charged going was inline with the 50mpg you got from the x1. That said, my mind is, if trips within elecectric range or 20 miles or so outside are around half of what it would be with petrol, it, will compensate for any shortcomings on longer journeys I do however, alls well so far and I’m far from slow.
What I noticed travelling at 70+ heading up a steep in parts dual carriageway, that takes me up, to where I turn off to go over Brecon my electric range dropped to 31 miles. I’m now wondering whether to try that in HEV mode and hold the battery, then switch to Auto, as I go over the top and drop down the other side. My mind, is thinking, if I shift the electric part, I should net more electric range and overall better economy over the journey? Of course my electric range is deplated by the time I start climbing on the homeward journey, acting as a hybrid and electric few miles every so often when the battery has regenerated enough.
As for the app, I simply haven’t bothered to download it, yet alone use it!
Have you dabbled with sports mode yet?
Todays journey is only 80 miles round trip so, starting with a full charge, hopefully around half the journey will be in EV, so the stated mpg in the car (although not an accurate reflection) should be stupendously high (fingers crossed).
Over the next week I have two more similar journeys and then one slightly longer trip. I’ll start each of them with a full charge so petrol usage should be quite low. I strongly suspect that the running costs on all four of those trips will be less than the BMW.
The real acid test will be our holiday in a few weeks time. That will be in the 300-400 mile range, again starting with a full battery but not charging thereafter, so most of the mileage will be on petrol. In fairness, whilst the BMW would have achieved 50 mpg there and back, the running around in between would have been closer to 40 mpg, so if the ‘true’ mpg equivalent (once the initial charge is factored in) is mid 40’s or above then I’d be very happy, as I’d be no worse off.
We don’t do as many very long journeys these days, so it may be some time before I can test out the mpg equivalent on those, but if it falls a little short of 50 mpg equivalent that won’t matter because, as you say, we will offset that on all the other trips.
On the short journeys in EV mode I’ve noticed that the electric range drops by more miles than I’ve travelled but, even allowing for that, it’s still working out at less than half the petrol cost. When I did the trip using regenerative braking it didn’t seem to add any extra EV miles. I’m going to leave it in ‘Auto 1’ today and see how that goes. Incidentally, I haven’t used the car since Sunday and it hasn’t dropped any charge (something I had wondered about), although a full charge doesn’t always show as 100% (that might be the dodgy app though).
I never used Sport mode in any of my last half a dozen cars. Two reasons. All have been powerful enough in Eco to render it pointless and secondly I don’t like the fact that it tends to hold on lower gears too long and makes for a noisy experience. I’m hoping that I won’t need to use it in the Tucson either, unless I find that in situations where I need some poke it feels lacking.
Although the app has a fault with the stated range, it has its uses. It messages me when the charge is complete. It also alerts me if I leave the car unlocked, which is a bit irritating as I tend not to lock them as they are in a secure garage! It will also notify you if a window (or the sunroof) isn’t fully closed. The main thing other than charging status that I like with the app (as with the BMW) is the ability to search for a location and ‘send’ it to the car so that when I get in the destination is already there and waiting.
Whils’t your out and about today, I’ll download Blue Link, have a play and report back later.
I have found, once the battery range hits zero miles in the PHEV screen, its another 2 or more miles before it switch to hybrid. There was alot more traffic on the roads coming home yesterday, with speed more in the 50 to high 50mph range on 60 -70mph roads, netting me 41 miles electric.
When driving on battery power, aircon, is powered by the 13.8kW battery, which will explain why EV range, isn’t always equal to the distance travelled. In a similar way load on the battery through sudden/heavy acceleration or going uphill will not always be equal to the range you travelled. Hence the reason I only get 34 miles locally, yet travelling home from my parents, where the roads are flatter, I can easily acheive 38 miles, at high speeds. If I use aircon to cool, its on the lowest fan speed.
Sport mode gives maximum combined power and torque, rather than a percentage of, you see in eco EV and eco hybrid. Its highly unlikely you will ever need to use it though however, that doesn’t stop me having a dabble, as I do in any car I have. Besides, it brings up a cute little red rev counter 😂
Enjoy you trip!
Well @kezo the learning curve continues! I did my 82 mile round trip today for lunch with some mates. I set off in ‘Auto’ drive mode and put regenerative braking on ‘Auto 1’. As soon as you activate cruise control the regenerative braking switches off and only comes back on when you cancel cruise.
On the outward run, all non-motorway driving seemed to be in EV and I felt quite a bit of the motorway run was as well, but I still had about 20 miles EV range when I arrived.
On the return run it was my intention to switch from Auto to EV mode when my remaining EV range equalled the distance to home, but I didn’t get that far as the electric range ran out half way home. However, when it switched into Hybrid mode it obviously charged the battery a bit as EV range went up from 0 to 2 miles at which point the car went back into EV mode until that 2 miles was used up. It did that twice and may well have kept doing that had the journey been longer. Oddly, when I got home I had zero EV range yet when I plugged it in it said it had 20% charge, rather than the 15% that I thought it should be.
As for economy, it’s anybody’s guess. The outward run showed 70 something mpg and the return run 60 mpg but, of course, these figures are meaningless as they don’t take into account the cost of the charging and assume that all electric miles are free! Given that the petrol BMW would have done 50 mpg on that journey I expected better, given probably half the journey was on electric. However, my petrol range was 350 miles when I left and is now 313 miles after an 82 mile trip, so I’m not even going to attempt to work anything out until I next fill up with petrol, which won’t be for a few weeks at this rate 😂
The petrol range will increase when you top the battery up, as the petrol guage shows the total range available with a full or empty battery.
As previously said, what I found with this and the previous Tucson, is the economy will start to improve after 1,000 miles.
Your journey isn’t adding up! If your outward journey was for simplicity 40 miles, you would have got, dependng on how fast you drove? around 35 miles say in electric, meaning you had 5 miles to your destination in Hybrid driving, arriving at your destination with zero electric miles!
Your return journey therefore, should have been in Hybrid mode!
However, you are saying, you acheived 40 miles electric going and 20 miles electric on the return journey, making a total of 60 electric miles? The best I have acheived was just under 42 miles coming home yesterday in slower than usual 50-60mph traffic.
Something isn’t right their buddy! My thoughts are (a) most likely scenario – In Auto mode, the car deemed it necessary, to do some of the outward journey in HEV as well as EV mode, probably on the motorway at “x” speeds (b) you accidently at some point knocked it into HEV mode, hence for one of these reasons the car held the battery level at times driving as a hybrid and the reason for your 20 mile EV range at the start of your return journey.
As long a the power meter stays in eco range or no further than about 25-30% into the power range, you should theoretically stay in EV mode. I can do about 83mph in electric as long as I don’t plant it to overtake.
When, we did my last calculation after Oscarmax kindly posted the sum, I arrived home according to the GOM with an average of 53mpg however after doing the calculation it was actually 56.6mpg. So I’m going to have a stab in the dark and say you acheived at least 80mpg for your trip 😁 I base this on the fact that Wales is mountanous and therefore hilly, which I will trade for your constant speed motorway journey 😂
What, I will say is, do as I did at the begining, which is to get a costing for each out of town journey/per mile. By that, I mean fill up tomorrow and do the costing for this journey and do the same when you go on holiday. By doing this you get an average of what each journey is likely to cost, otherwise you won’t have a clue of whats likely cost what, to start with. Then move on to costing a full tank per mile.
Finally before I fall asleep. If a gallon of petrol costs £6.22, you would need a car capable of 83.65mpg, for the equivulent cost of a PHEV, based on a range of 35 miles per charge. Well that was pointless wasn’t it 😂
You misread my post @kezo 😂 I said that all the non-motorway driving on the outward run was in EV, but that was just about 10 of the 40 miles. It felt as though a lot of the 30 miles on the motorway was too, but it couldn’t have been as I still had about 20 miles left when I arrived. As we’ve discussed, the switch from EV to petrol is thankfully imperceptible.
The return journey was also in Auto but seemed to be running in EV until it ran out of puff. I’ve no idea how many miles I did on electric but it was showing 38 when I left, I gained 2 x 2 miles on the way back and, of course, there’s a bit from the 15% that the car holds in reserve.
I can’t possibly have achieved 80mpg. As discussed, the ‘real mpg equivalent’ is always going to be less than the fuel computer states as it takes no account of the cost of charging. If we say that the fuel computer averaged 65mpg (70 out, 60 back) then the mpg equivalent has to minus out the charge cost in petrol equivalent. I’m confident I now know how to work all this out but I can’t do it until I put petrol in, and I haven’t used enough of the stuff to warrant a pit stop yet. Tomorrow’s journeys will all be in EV only so I won’t get a figure for yesterday alone.
While I don’t do it in the XC40 if I get a Phev again I’m more inclined to keep better track of my charging costs and rather than an mpg do a cost analysis as that’s a bit more relevant as while I only get 22 ish miles of electric often it’s charged at a rate much lower than 10p/kWh.
Each 32 mile day is saving me approx £2 based on 50mpg in previous car, and 45mpg in Volvo and 8p kWh
i wish id been more disciplined in recording though 🙁
Morning @kezo As it’s now the morning and I’ve had some sleep, I’ve attempted to work out the approximate mpg equivalent of my trip yesterday.
The total journey was 82 miles. Assume 42 miles on electric (38 from the initial full charge plus 2 x 2 miles generated in HEV mode on the return) and the remaining 40 miles on petrol.
The car states an average of 65 mpg for the journey, but bases that on the petrol used divided by the full 82 miles. That means the car consumed 1.26 gallons. However, that 1.26 gallons was actually used over just 40 miles, so the actual mpg when driven in petrol mode alone was 40 divided by 1.26 which equals 31.74 mpg. In isolation that sounds dreadful. However, the electric mileage helps balance that.
The 42 miles on electric cost me £2.60. 1.26 gallons at £6.32 a gallon (current price here) = £7.58 petrol cost. Added to the electric, the total journey cost me £10.18. Had that £10.18 been spent on petrol alone, that would have paid for 1.61 gallons. Therefore the ‘true mpg equivalent’ for the journey yesterday would be 82 miles divided by 1.61 gallons which equals 50.93 mpg, which is pretty much what I would have got from the BMW on that journey.
Broadly, what this is telling me is that round trip journeys of less than 40 miles in the Tucson will cost considerably less than they would have done in the BMW. Round trips of up to say 70 miles will still cost less than the BMW. 70-100 mile round trips will probably cost roughly the same as the BMW, whereas round trips of over 100 miles, with just one full charge to commence with, will cost more in the Tucson than the BMW. Thankfully these longer journeys are now infrequent. Your long journey the other day worked out at an mpg equivalent of 56 mpg but you had (almost) two charges whereas if I was doing that journey I’d only have one charge so would have got a lower mpg equivalent.
However, the above doesn’t take account of the regenerated power, nor the residual 15% in the battery so, in reality, things should be a bit better. I won’t know for sure until I fill up and do the sums properly.
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