Chrysler working on electric cars and plug-in hybrids (AutoSpies.com)

Here is from their Oct 08 issue. Sorry that the header line is not aligned
with the table. Note that the hybrid is upscale with virtually all features
of the XLE:

Price mpg 5-year fuel cost 5-year fuel savings Total
5-year owner cost Total
5-year cost savings
(or loss) Years until payback With federal tax credit
Tax rebate Total
5-year cost savings Years until payba



Toyota Camry Hybrid 28,460 34 7,000 3,000 34,000 4,250 1 NA NA NA
Toyota Camry XLE (4-cyl.) 26,720 24 10,000 38,250

Clearly gas saving is not enuf to explain their payback period. Here is
what they write:

"It would take many years for most hybrids to pay back their premium price
just on fuel savings. But fuel costs are only a relatively small part-25
percent-of the overall owner costs in the first five years. Other factors
include depreciation, insurance, interest on financing, maintenance and
repairs, and sales tax.

In this affordable hybrid analysis, we compared the five-year owner costs of
12 hybrids with those of similar conventional vehicles, using Consumer
Reports' new-car owner-cost estimates, introduced in our April 2008 issue.

The Toyota Camry Hybrid, which got 34 mpg overall in our tests, saves the
most money, about $4,250 over five years, compared with a similarly equipped
four-cylinder Toyota Camry XLE, which gets 24 mpg."

 

Insurance is lower on hybrids? Why? Where does sales tax come in?
Interest on financing?

This is, in short, why Consumer Reports is regarded by people who come
in without a "they don't take advertsising so they must be Pure In
Heart" bias as completely without a shred of credibility: they're
cooking their numbers to get the Right Answer.

 

I agree - but...

The comparison cost calculations all assume mixed highway/city driving.

I have a neighbor who bought one of those Priuses a few months ago.

He just told me the other day that he just bought his first tank of gas
for it, and has close to 1200 miles on the odometer.

Of course I didn't believe it, so I started asking him questions about it.

Turns out he has never driven the vehicle faster than about 40 mph
and average speed is more like about 20. We live in the city, close in,
everything he drives to is connected to him via feeder roads that are
posted speed of 35Mph.

So, he basically has no wind resistance of any kind to deal with, and
none of his fuel is being spent on braking effort.

I'm still not convinced he's getting 1100 miles on a tank of gas,
but it should serve to illustrate that the hybrids shine the most
in city driving. And there's a lot of people like my neighbor out
there who live in the city and commute around the city and getting
on a freeway is a major thing for them.

Ted

 

Here are a couple of brain teasers for the people who don't understand
physics and therefore lack critical thinking skills on this subject:

(1) So would he have done better or worse if he had taken the batteries
out (excess weight - only help mileage if a lot of regenerative braking
is taken advantage of) and run only on the IC engine that it came with?
With that implied fuel mileage he obviously did not take advantage of
the extra acceleration that the batteries have the potential of
affording - he was just hauling around dead weight.

(2) This fellow who got 1200 miles on a tank of gas, would he get even
*greater* distance on that tank if he had had even *more* stop and go
(use of the regenerative braking) than he did in the driving situations
that got him that 1200 miles? Could he have gotten perhaps 1250 or 1300
miles on that same tank had there been even more stop and go?

(Those are rhetorical questions for anyone who understands physics.
They only are brain teasers for those who are subject to the "golly gee
whizz" factor.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

No offense to your friend but I would have to call bullshit on that
one. The Prius holds 11.9 gals of gas. I'll assume he ran it low and
had to add 10gals. EPA number is 48mpg with city driving and he's
claiming to get 120?

Steve B.

 

Maybe his wife is pulling a joke on him. Adding gas without telling him.

 

Prius's are in short supply. Maybe it was a demo and came with 700 miles on
it and he forgot.

 

That to me is much more likely. He's recently retired and has no
inherent need to buy absolutely brand new, his main concern was
monthly costs remaining constant and lower.

Ted

 

Adding weight always reduces fuel mileage no matter what kind of
driving you do.

Hey, Bill, stop spilling the beans on my new business plan for
making a million dollars on my new perpetual motion advanced
engine design!

Ya see I figure to build the regenerative brakes into the engine,
and feed them with an oscillator circuit. If I get them to come on
something like 120 times a second, I can generate ac power and
feed that into a washing machine motor I put into the trunk to
feed the rear drive wheels.

Ted

 

Hybrids are effective in stop & Go city driving.
However if the cost too much and the battery replacement is too
expensive the cost saving can be of ones imagination.
Here cabs are very successful using the Prius, but they can easily drive
them 100K miles per year.

 

The engine being off when not needed is a very significant saving.
No engine idling at stop lights.

 

True, I have a '95 Concorde and it gets 29 (US) mpg at 70mph.,
even slightly higher MPG at 60mph.
At that speed it equals my wife's 2.7L V6 Sebring.
I just got a 300M, it will be interesting to compare them with my
driving.

I know a chap with a 300C, highway mileage is OK, but urban mileage is
the shits. That's where he drives mostly, so he's going to dump it.

 

Yes a hybrid's saving is mostly on the city driving.
There is little saving in highway driving.

 

No offense to your friend but I would have to call bullshit on that
one. The Prius holds 11.9 gals of gas. I'll assume he ran it low and
had to add 10gals. EPA number is 48mpg with city driving and he's
claiming to get 120?

Steve B.[/QUOTE]

He's probably old and forgot he refilled it.

 

Even so, if you look just at gas, 4 year payback on a hybrid is very
reasonable.

 

I actually saw a "report" ()
about that guy in France who's designing and building those cars driven
by compressed air. The narrator actually said (towards the very end of
the "report") that they could put a compressor on board the car, run by
the engine, so the engine could compress its own air to be used by the
engine, "a no cost fillup ever". How many people in the general public
and politicians would hear that and believe it and make policy decisions
to subsidize it based on that kind of crap?

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')