What fuel for my next car?

[njee20]

I suspect it's more like >95% of charging is done at home. This thread is no different to most chat on EVs, where people say "I could never have an EV because once every 14 years I drive to see Aunt Ethel 400 miles away". Of course, for some, they won't make sense. But the average car journey in the UK is 8.1 miles. Even people claiming 240 mile range isn't enough how often do you really do that in one go? Do you do it without stopping for a coffee? Don't get me wrong, the infrastructure isn't there yet, but it will be.

Comparing behaviour patterns to how you fill up a petrol car are pointless. You don't wait until your EV is 'flat', you just plug it in when you get home.

[Webbo]

PLD is not quite right in his maths. A typical Tesla supercharger has an output of 250KW. My Tesla 3 has a 60Kwh battery which means that its nominal recharge time from zero to 100% charge would be 60/250 hours = 15 minutes not the 3.5 hours calculated by PLD. That full charge will get me about 250 miles.

I drove my car from Canberra to Sydney on Xmas Eve, a busy time on the road. Halfway we stopped for a pee and a pie and I decided to top the car up. I put 30% charge in which took less than the 10 minutes it took to buy the pies.

As njee20 says, the vast majority of charging by the likes of me is done at home with only the few trips per year over 200 km necessitating public charging. Home charging is easy, relatively cheap, and quick as it takes only about 10 seconds to hook it up in the evening and another 10 seconds to remove it from the charger the following morning. The average Australian drives less than 40 km per day, and I imagine something similar is true in the UK. So, the car only needs to be charged every 4 or 5 days. Charging on those few trips away has never been a problem either as chargers have always been available in my experience. Charger availability can be determined beforehand using an app.

The hullabaloo about charging anxiety and times spouted by EV naysayers is way, way overdone.

Webbo   

[Greygreaser]

Thanks to you all for real life experiences and a plethora of opinions on the electric options. What I've gleaned so far across a range of sources is:-
1) Any car with 'electrics' will be heavier - this may affect running costs
2) If you can't go full EV then its likely your still polluting
3) Repairs and breakdowns are expensive - bigger tow trucks etc
4) The long term strategy for electricity supply is non-existent
5) the initial costs are very high and battery replacement costs unknown

My gut feeling is MHEVs add cost to buying a car but can offer marginal benefits in economy and cleanliness so they could suit our driving. A full hybrid might also work for us but needs to do at least 20 miles as a pure electric and be capable of a "best economy" setup. Full EVs wont as yet be suitable in our village situation in spite of Virgin bunging super high speed gobbledygook in our footpaths.
Going to look at the Ford Focus mHEV and the Suzuki S-Cross mHEV to see how they stack up against the Kia Niro HEV, its a shame we do so many short 4/5 miles trips to our grandson/daughter otherwise I would also consider a Diesel with AddBlue! I'll let you know in due course what our decision is