One reason I chose a PHEV vs a Pure Electric

Hmmm... I’d probably just take towing to the nearest DC rapid charger. That is, assuming my (future) pure-EV takes rapid charging, and I probably wouldn’t buy one that can’t do at least take a 50KW rapid charge.

In any case, true, for now at least, road tripping requires more planning in an EV than in a gas car.

 

"Of course, we now know that the Chevy Volt proved to be the top-selling affordable electric vehicle in American automotive history."

Spin like that makes you wonder. When the actual numbers are looked at, sales were terrible. Averaging between 1,600 and 1,700 per month was far below business expectations for sustainability. Such heavy dependency on the $7,500 subsidy meant profitability was not realistic.

 

Largely true; that’s why they discontinued it.

 

amazing how someone can turn a thread about bev's and phevs into an anti gm thread with one quick post

there are several reasons i'm not driving a bev yet, but triple a charging is not one of them.

 

I picked a PHEV because I calculated that I'll use less gas with a PHEV and an old SUV than a BEV and an old SUV, since the PHEV works on long trips. So far I'm driving the Prime even more of the time than I expected and in EV mode more than I expected, so I think it was a good choice.

 

I picked a PHEV because my driving is mostly either short trips around town (no long commutes), or long road trips. I don't need a long range EV for around town, and even the longest range EV does not have the range I need nor the charging infrastructure in many of the backroads places I go.

With the PHEV, about 90% of my driving locally is on EV, and on the long trips I get good fuel economy, long range and availability of fuel.

 

I can't say I gave it much thought. I took my Prius V to the dealer for an oil change and left with a Prius Prime. The paperwork was signed before I even got to test-drive it, and even then the EV battery was dead.

If I HAD given it much thought, I probably would have made the same choice. Charging stations aren't plentiful enough today for my comfort, and while they seem like a Good Thing, their cost per mile is about 2x the cost of gas, which seems ridiculous for something that's supposed to be more energy efficient than a regular gas-powered vehicle. For a while, they were free. Then they became not free, and their cost seems way too high to me.

My Prime gets me 24-28 miles per charge, and most days that's more than I need to drive.

I posted elsewhere here that I put in $6 of gas whenever the gas light comes on, and my most recent refill showed I got 1200 miles since the previous refill.

I've calculated my cost per mile of electricity at about equal to gas at $2.75/gal. The chargers at malls and other places work out to about twice that, so I've never used them. Driving cross-country, I'll take my hybrid's 38-42 MPG for highway driving over the cost of electricity any day, because it's cheaper, easier to find gas stations today, and it takes far less time to fill up my gas tank than to fill my EV battery. (Never mind that a full tank of gas gets me 500 miles or more, while the EV battery only gets me ~25.)

(I drove from Phoenix to Denver and back last fall. I filled up the gas tank before I left, then in Santa Fe, and then before I left Denver although there was half a tank left. I went west to Moab in Utah, then south, and filled up again in Holbrook with 1/4 tank left, before heading back to Phoenix. All in all, the gas mileage was impressive.)

Hopefully, in 5 years or so, electric charging stations will be more plentiful, and most will be solar-powered and 1/3 the cost per mile as they are today.

But all things considered, the design of the PRIME PHEV seems optimal for what's available today. By the time my loan is paid down to about what the car is worth in a few years, we'll see if that's still the case.

 

Due to work and personal schedules, we did a 450+ mile day trip last weekend to see dad; approx. 4 hrs each way so an 8 hr drive. Using a BEV trip planner, it laid out a route that was 7 hrs EACH WAY and 220 miles longer to reach the closest chargers. Umm, I'll pass for now.

 

If there was a brand new BEV that could be had at anywhere close to the final price I paid for the PRIME, I might have bought it. Then again, if I have done that, I might have regretted it by now. I am glad I did not. PHV with ~30 EV (though I wish a bit longer in ~50 miles range) and a long HV+EV combined range of over 500 miles works perfectly for my current driving needs.

 

The standard range model 3 is actually a pretty good option. It wasn't available when I bought my prime. It's more expensive, but if you've driven one there's almost no comparison to the prime. And the charging network is decent unlike every other BEV.

 

But nowhere near decent compared to the number of gas stations. If you drive primarily Interstates in parts of the US, you can find them. None in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, northern Minnesota, North Dakota, etc.

 

When they have a hatchback model under $20K, and when they built supercharger within 200 miles, and when we have plenty of places I can bring it for services when needed, I may consider.

 

The charging infrastructure isn't good enough to make it work as an only car, at least out west. But it's at least good enough for most trips. In Colorado it looks like I could go almost anywhere I would normally go on a weekend with between zero to two stops to charge. That's less convenient than getting gas, but it's an inconvenience I could live with in exchange for all electric driving.

If price is your only consideration then it's hard to beat the Prime. But the model 3 is basically a luxury sports car. For about $10k more than a Prime I think it's a good deal if you value things like that. I'm not sure if I would choose one over a prime if I was buying today, but after having driven one it is tempting. The biggest downside is that if I configure it the way I'd want it would be a lot more than $10k more than a Prime.

Sedans are the stupidest type of car. I don't understand why car companies still make them. It seems like they could have made the model 3 a liftback like the Prime, and that would make it more practical.