To buy a petrol car

[Goldenbpineapple]

Buying a new car, we do not normally lease or pcp.
I can spend up to £40k but we will not be able to replace the car for at least 10 years, preferably longer.

Would i be stupid to buy a petrol car?

I think fully electric would be silly to buy outright as the range will be so much better in 4 or 5 years time, and an older electric battery will loose a lot of value.

Hi we have a 9 year old Renault capture. 900cc engine so fairly economical with the petrol. Its going strong, normally we would buy or exchange but like you not sure what to get. We have decided to run it to the end!! Hope I've not jinxed this!!! My DH used to work in the battery industry and has no confidence in electric car market due to technology and expense.

I've never charged my ev away from home. Just plug it in and overnight it charges at a significantly lower cost than filling up with petrol.

I know what I prefer.

If you are travelling serious miles every single day, then obviously that doesn't work. But who in reality is driving beyond the range of a typical ev without stopping in a single day? A tiny number of people, is the answer.

I'd probs just spend £20k on a nice almost new diesel car. I wouldn't bother spending more unless it was something really sporty or a modern classic. I've got a newish Golf R and a classic V8 pickup which is mainly for fun.

The pickup only does about 10-15 mpg (🤣) and the Golf is better but still only in the early 20s in traffic. So I bought an old 2013 Passat as a runaround and to chuck tools in and it's still running flawlessly at 150k. I kinda want an excuse to replace it but it's just given me no reason to. You could mistake it for an almost new car as the interior/exterior is in great condition and I machine polish it annually plus put polymer sealant on it maybe twice a year.

I can't see any reason to spend £40k on a daily driver. You'd get something nice for £20-25k second hand and it'll go forever if looked after properly.

👏 👏 👏

This thread just reminded me to go plug my car 🤣

I'm sorry @Moonmelodies but why is that automatically being recommended by you when you don't at all know the OP's usage of their car?

Diesel cars are great if you're doing 50-100 miles a day up and down the motorway going to see clients. They're great if you do 1 or 2 regular long journeys a week.

However modern diesels have the diesel particulate filter (DPF). If the engine isn't taken up to temperature on long distances, the car can fail to automatically kickstart the DPF, which can lead to a build up, and all manner of problems.

My neighbour just paid £1000+ to a garage at Christmas to sort out numerous DPF problems. Most of their journeys are 10 miles or fewer, but they bought diesel because they had a "diesel is best" mentality from the early 00s when it was being promoted as a fuel.

As I said before, diesel has its place, but not for everyone, actually not for most drivers, but plenty of folk think it's the car they need because of the perceived fuel cost savings .

I wouldn't touch a modern diesel personally for the short journeys I do, it seems lunacy knowing what' could be in store in repair costs. Way too complicated engine structures.

You need "plenty of range"... I don't get this @Ablondiebutagoody ?

One of my petrol cars, our main driver, does 450 miles on one tank. Isn't that enough range? It gets us to the North East from London ( a regular journey we do) in one stint, with a bit of fuel to spare. I then refuel before I come back home.

As per my earlier post, how many long journeys do you do a week?

My neighbour paid £1000+ at Christmas to sort out her DPF filter, having taken most of her journeys that year under 10 miles.

Diesel engines are way too complicated in modern times - unless you're regularly doing 100 miles every other week, and getting the car up to temperature on the motorway to get the DPF to kick in, I wouldn't bother with diesel.

the reason you hear more about electric cars catching fire is because the papers are owned by oil interests who want to delay the change. This is not me being synical. It’s a fact. There are the same papers who tell you heat pumps don’t work - they do. It’s just some installers that don’t!

iCE cars are 10x more likely to catch fire if you look at the data. The difference is that if an EV catches fire it’s harder to extinguish due to the battery.

also, the data from Tesla’s (as the make with the most 10+ year data) shows that the battery performance at ten years is far far far better than they had ever imagined.

my EV is 3 years old. Does c. 300m on one charge. I have only charged out of the house about a dozen times - and I only have a slow charger at home due to dodgy electrics!

the only consideration for me is looking ahead for the best service statiiin on. A long journey. Highly recommend one near Gloucester and the one just before exeter 😂

yes the first bit 🙄self charging is the car's petrol engine charging the hybrid battery.

We have an EV and know dozens of people with EVs and am on many EV forums and literally never heard this. I just can’t see how it’s possible - the sensation is no different to an ICE. I can believe that certain cars cause nausea but not just because they’re EVs.
its literally ridiculous.

This.

I unplugged my EV from its lamppost charger, and set off to drive to Manchester. Was held up briefly by a car on fire on the M40. After the nonsense posted on this thread I had a good neb at it. It was a petrol Ford Fiesta, because I could still see its rump poking out from the back in amongst the flames.

Luckily its former occupants were standing with another vehicle a bit further up the road.

If someone proposed a mode of transport where you have to carry 60-100l of highly inflammable liquid around in a thin steel box, with temperatures around 1000°C in close proximity, they’d be dismissed as idiots.

We’ve only been happy with it because up until recently there was no alternative, and now there is. Don’t believe the garbage about EVs being more likely to catch fire. And they will only get safer as LFP and Sodium-ion battery chemistries become more common.

Op, Yanbu to buy petrol if you prefer but the range of EVs is unlikely to go much higher in the next few years. Many these days go 350+
miles between charge
and have powerful enough to be recharged in 20 minutes at ultra rapid chargers (which are at almost every motorway services these days). Unless you drive 100s of miles every single day, range anxiety is just not a thing. It’s anti-EV spin.

🤣🤣🤣

if you rely on public charging you have a point. But clearly have not seen the charging stations with 20+ points and no queue.

if you can charge at home you don’t. We only ever use public charging when we go on holiday.

I wouldn’t touch an electric car
run out of fuel in a petrol/diesel 10 mins you’ve got a full tank
in electric ,hours to charge and if you forget your stuffed

Does that mean that Toyota’s marketing spin is just a lie then? The car doesn’t actually charge the battery itself, on its own. Burning petrol in the engine, that you have to fill the car with, charges the battery.

I am shocked, shocked to find a car manufacturer being less than honest about its product 😀

I know a fair few people with electric cars, all privately owned not company cars . I’ve never heard of people feeling sick in them before this thread , wise to check though. It would be interesting to see actual data on them catching fire versus petrol cars, not just anecdotal. I’ve never known one in real life. I absolutely love electric cars, we have two now. Home charger , cheap to run, lovely to drive. Drive Scotland to Devon , no problems charging.
We don’t intend to go back to petrol or diesel ever .

😂

So you drive around with a petrol pump in your vehicle? Or do you have a personal concierge service that follows you around to top you up in case you forget to?

I have seldom read something so ridiculous. If you run out of fuel on the road, you have the same wait time for rescue as anyone, and that could be hours.

And an AA / RAC vehicle can get you topped up and ready to reach a service station (or rapid charger) so you can be on your way.

And remember that only a tiny % of vehicles are rescued because of running out of juice. I have never, in over 40 years, come close to running out, and I don’t intend for that to happen - it’s what instrument clusters and GPS is for.

But you wouldn’t leave home in a diesel car with 20 miles in the tank and try to drive 100 miles . Same with an electric car, if you have a home charger put it on at night and you’re ready to go in the morning. If anything it’s more accurate, it tells you how many miles you have , both when you leave, and also what you will have when you reach your destination. It becomes second nature, it’s so easy.

But most of us aren’t motoring journalists and just need a car to get us from A to B. I find electric cars great to drive, much nicer than our previous petrol and diesel cars .

👏👏👏

That speaks to the fundamental issue I think. Driving an EV is different, and it takes a (small) mindset shift that some people are reluctant to make. But once you do, it becomes second nature.

They have got used to setting off on a long journey with whatever fuel is in the vehicle, knowing that they can pull in at a service station at some point and fill up within a few minutes. I have sat waiting for a vehicle in front to clear the pump many times in 40 years, so anyone that says “I fill up in 90 seconds” or whatever is a liar. But it’s still only a few minutes for sure.

But with an EV you just set off with enough charge to guarantee you can reach your destination, or any of a whole host of rapid chargers that are now available on your route at roughly the time you would take a break anyway.

When I was driving my faithful Ford Fiesta from London to Edinburgh I learned how far I could drive and where I liked to stop and grab a coffee. I was comfortable with two stops of around 30 minutes each, with a stop to refuel at some point.

Nowadays, we know exactly how far our Polestar 2 can go from a 90% charge and leave us with more than 10%, and it’s Waaaay further than we would typically drive without a break (> 250 miles). So we choose to charge at any of a number of different locations depending on who is in the car and what facilities they want to make use of - If we’re heading to Manchester from London we just drive there and charge overnight at the destination.

Now EVs are available that can comfortably do > 250 miles, the whole “range anxiety” thing is something being pushed by the car industry wanting to sell plug-in hybrids, which are a technology dead end worse than petrol engines - why lug around two power trains when an EV can simply do the job for the vast majority of people?

I’m still driving my 2009 petrol Audi and hoping it’ll last a few more years. When it does need replacing I’ll have to buy another petrol car or a self charging hybrid as I have no way to charge a car at home as my parking bays aren’t directly next to my house. This is the problem many of us face, we don’t have the facility to charge at home so it removes the choice of a full EV.

I liked to stop and grab a coffee. I was comfortable with two stops of around 30 minutes each, with a stop to refuel at some point

But many people don't have time within a journey to spend an hour at service stations, even the 15 mins it takes to put fuel in and go to the toilet is pushing it.

Plus all this service station coffee adds to the expense, on top of seriously expensive electricity, which often works out more per mile than petrol, which puts a dent in 'my electric car costs buttons to run' claims.

I can see the attraction if you're not short of money and have the time for the journey to take longer, but if you're doing a fair comparison between petrol and electric, this needs to be factored in. Many people could only justify one if they save significant money on fuel because the purchase/lease price is well above the petrol equivalent.

Yes, the Lexus LBX is the current favourite but waiting a bit longer to see how they perform as very new, so sticking with the current petrol car for now. It’s a 2litre turbo so there will be some sacrifice on performance whatever hybrid/ev we go for.