Plug-In Hybrids Are Not What You Think They Are | Talking Cars with Consumer Reports #429

front, rear or both, eh, and gas

cars

,

they

're all pretty similar. There are many different ways to run a

plug

-in hybrid, straight up the Alfa Romeo tone engine in the front with the transmission, but then you get an engine. in the rear and offline, and then others put the motor inside the transmission and direct all the power to the wheels in a more conventional way, so there are many ways to do this and control it, and it's really cool, Well, the other part is

what

is that vehicle when it's not in the EV, is it a really fuel efficient hybrid or is it a gasket, and we've looked at different things where we're going to get into that control.

I thought because you're absolutely on the right track here, but let us know, let's talk about some of our experiences with the

plug

-in

hybrids

that were currently doing miles or testing right now, so Jake, I want to start with You spent some time with the Jeep, huh , Grand Cherokee 4 of E, well, how was it? You know, living with this car for a few days, sure, so I went and took a little trip to Boston, so I'm moving on. I came back to Boston because my kids go to school there and, you know, I've usually been taking a lot of EVs and I'm always sweating trying to find chargers on the road, which on the Mass Pike are still all broken.

I can't understand that, it's been two years, you keep breaking them all, you keep breaking them all, I keep breaking them, man, it's all my fault really, but now it's a strategy, so you know, I've driven it. some of these plug-in

hybrids

and you could charge them at home. I can almost run them, you know, completely on electricity, but here I am driving 100 miles around Boston and

what

we know about electric vehicles is like traveling the highway at 70, you know, or 65, I guess I was driving exactly right, just this one red flag thing, it's not the ideal place, but getting around downtown Boston in electric mode is really good, there are low speeds and that's stop and go.

It's like I have a strategy so I'm going to use it in Eevee's later modes, you know, most of these have these modes so it either does its thing. I just want to use gas. or I just want to use electricity, so I put it on the road. I just want to go gas on the highway and then when I get to Boston I put it on electric and then I drive electric all over downtown Boston and that was actually a strategy. that worked, the problems were as soon as I stopped for gas, well I didn't stop for gas, I stopped to get, you know, go to the bathroom on the massive bike, I had no power because it was broken, the toilets were running very clean.

I might add but when I stopped when I got back to the car it restarted it and it started late all of a sudden I'm using the electricity oh so the default is the factory default so again okay I have to go on with the remaining electricity, um, but the other thing is. you know you're driving the Jeep Grand Cherokee and like right you have all these modes like you know what kind of mountain I'm crawling you know I'm a sand and how steep you know there's a lot of different modes. for them in the center, on the center console, do you exactly want that rock to crawl down the hill, but then the controls that I needed to control them I'm using the electric vehicle and that whole powertrain?

We're hiding behind the wheel like I'm going like this, trying to look underneath, trying to figure out what to do, so it's the things that you need to access or almost like an afterthought. I understand that the car probably wasn't designed to be a plug-in top raid. but it's like I want you to look at a lot of new

cars

right now,

they

have all these driving modes, right? You want a sporty, extra sporty, super sporty track mode in your Minivan and you know, but these are all the controls you want to access? because suddenly now you're the guy at the head of the train operating the power plant, you know and you need access to that stuff, but the track button container that's there on the left side that carries an objection to the driver Alex, How has your experience been so far?

I mean, yeah, the strangest thing that's happened to me so far that I've noticed was driving the plug-in Ford Escape, so it also has all the modes you can play with. you go to the center screen and you can have them name them in a way if initially fun but actually very intuitive, it's like EV, that is, Evie now Eevee, then hybrid now or whatever they were sure, um, I

think

now and later it's candy, no. Yeah go ahead now there was no candy in it so you put it in EV now so I'm using the battery after charging it properly and in a lot of these vehicles the way it works is because and this is part of the reason why The reason they don't have that blistering EV acceleration is because only a certain amount of the total power comes from the engine and the other comes from the engine.

It's a combined output that's appropriate for the car, so you put it in EV. Only mode and you only get so much acceleration, but if you have to do a lane chain or know how to accelerate aggressively, the engine will kick in to give you full power regardless of mode, so most of them do it with a kick. down on the switch there is a little o on the pedal, you hit a certain point on the pedal, the engine in Ford Escape handles it a little differently, so you put it in EV only mode, floor it and it appears a message. in the group to press the OK button, decelerate, press OK on the steering wheel to enable the engine, that's the message really wow, so I'm nervous because I have to let you know that it merges aggressively to the right and I have forgotten that I have it in EV Only and use full power and then have to remember to press OK on the steering wheel to start the engine and go full throttle.

Now, will you have to do that every time? Yes, my God, yes I did. I don't realize that, we looked, we looked, we looked at Jake's face, he learned something too, on the one hand, super nice, if you don't want to use the engine right now, it was very easy to keep it in EV mode, some of them They are not that easy. because you can't really feel on the pedal where the motor is going to kick on the opposite side here, but I

think

maybe in some situations that's not a good thing. I almost imagine you are in a corral situation and you hit the brakes. and then a popup will say: do you really want to increase?

Would you like to eat? Would you like to be full? Know? Yeah, yeah, like, yeah, that was alarming, yeah, so getting into traffic or something, trucks going by, you're getting the freeway, I mean, just let me look down and yeah, let me make my request because I'm turning left, turn the buttons over here, oh, forget it, you know, yeah, that was, it was so, so, to the point here, I mean these. Do you know again types of vehicles that are not underestimated by the majority of the public? Vehicles that most manufacturers probably don't understand. I mean everything we see when there is something new, there are growing pains and this is growing pains.

I mean, this is a technology that is new. to a lot of automakers and we're seeing it because there's no consistency in how they make these things and how they interact with them and there's a lot of opportunity to make things better when we tell people we live with these cars. Every day, this is a great example of exactly how we do this and my experiences were with the Mazda CX-90 and I was going to drive to Saratoga Springs, you know your backyard, one weekend and I plugged it in. on the night before, but I knew it was going to be like driving on the highway, yeah, but to be honest with you, I went out early in the morning, I unplugged the car, I closed, you know, I closed the garage door, I got in the car, I started and made sure.

I'm crossing, you know, passing through Hartford Connecticut and you know Eevee's range has pretty much disappeared, so I just forgot about it. I treated it like a normal car, so if I was doing that type of trip on a regular basis, the consensus would probably be good, maybe a plug-in isn't for you because you're on the side of the road because I spent hours on the road and it You paid a lot more to get the plug-in version. Yes, it probably would have been better. wealth like a hybrid right yeah right you know that so we're determining you know plug-in hybrids don't make sense for everyone.

Short trips maybe work on a normal trip, but yes, depending on what you do. Reusing it could make a lot of sense or it could make no sense at all and we already mentioned that there is a price premium here because five to fifteen thousand dollars more than a comparable non-plug-in hybrid. So while there may be some tax incentives for them that could get rid of that, I mean, I know even from the beginning, like when they introduced the plug-in Prime version of the Prius very quickly, that's how it became the best. The seller is right because again in the census there were many situations where depending on where you lived you could actually pay less even if you weren't going to plug in the battery just take it with you and you're done you know you are. driving down the special lane, you could go and get these stock incentives and you know if they're tax credits, tax incentives that motivate people as they try to save money and it's important to keep in mind that on average, electricity costs a lot. less than gasoline, I mean, we calculate that everywhere around here, yes, but a year on gasoline compared to a similar car that only uses gasoline, so that's another kind of factor to take into account and, um, and You know, just a reminder that we have a great story written by Keith Berry about asking the question: Is it a plug-in hybrid?

Right for you. We also have an article on tax breaks for these that Jake mentioned, so we encourage our

talking

car audience to definitely check those out. Going back to knowing one thing, we're trying to learn and really figure out who they are for and I think we have a good idea, but we're still learning one thing that I can say with some confidence, regardless of taxes. Incentives or price are who they are not for and I think it is not for the person who wants a simple and straight forward vehicle, yes you can use it but then you have wasted time and money buying the right add-on.

Because you have to plug it in to get the most out of it, you have to be pretty religious about plugging it in daily to get that range. All these ways we're

talking

about, it's okay to be the driver of the train, no. everyone wants the right train driver, they just want to get in their car and go somewhere right, so I think if you're looking for a simple experience, you're not in for one of these addons. Yeah, what's exciting going forward with Consumer Reports testing? We are going to find more and more differences between the plug-in versions and perhaps the pure gasoline version and the plug-in and normal hybrid version.

We finished our testing a couple of years ago for the Toyota RAV4 Prime, which really blew a lot of us away, I mean, yeah, Jake, you talked about these not being as fast as an electric vehicle, you're absolutely right, but the Toyota RAV4 Prime is pretty fast, compared to the regular F4, right? just all over the place, yeah, I mean, that was also a vehicle that gets really good fuel efficiency, even when the electricity goes out, going back to my Grand Cherokee that I was traveling with. It got like 21 miles per gallon on the highway, it's about what a regular, which is regular, gets like that, so it's all over the place in terms of simplicity.

Yes you're right. I'd say it's simpler than an electric vehicle because, again, you're not worried about charging it on a trip, right? um and the other one. Simplicity compares to a full AV. If you're buying a full EV, you really should have a level two charger in your home. You don't need it for these. That's a great point. You can plug it into 110 and overnight. You're actually going to get enough charge to charge that smaller battery well and you won't be relying on that anyway because you have the right gas. You forgot to charge your Eevee on my home charger.

I have it plugged in, it's connected to the network. our electric company because they give me some kind of blue data or whatever and um so what it does is and I don't know why it does this, but it puts off charging until the middle of the night because you know. the rates are cheaper my rates aren't cheaper so I don't know why he's doing well but it's like he's doing his thing but I'll tell you every time I plug in the car and go up the stairs I'm sweating I really hope this continues this night because if it doesn't I won't get to where I need to go tomorrow, whereas again these things, if for some reason the thing doesn't load, you're fine, that's great.

Period, yes, yes, there are going to be pros and cons with plug-in hybrids, just like any type of vehicle you choose to buy, so as we continue our testing of all of these plug-in models, we're going to uncover all of these nuances, whether you know maybe it's the handling is different, the handling is different, we're going tomeasure fuel economy in gasoline mode and in normal hybrid mode, uh, and we have at least a dozen on hand that we have. We're going to be testing so you know if you're a fan of talking cars or Consumer Reports, keep checking back as we get closer and closer to the final test results for all of these plug-in hybrids and that brings our audience questions for this one. episode we love your questions text messages 30 second videos send them all to talkcars icloud.com that's talk cars on icloud.com first is Jan from Regina Saskatchewan Canada Hi hockey season is about to start so I'm excited to that Jane writes I I'm thinking about buying a hybrid or plug-in hybrid vehicle, but I'm not sure what to buy.

I drive 180 kilometers a day to work, mostly on the highway. It is also very cold here in the winter months. Sorry, that's Captain Obvious. Yes, Saskatchewan. I'm looking.I was researching the Mitsubishi Outlander plug-in, Toyota RAV4 Prime, Mazda cx-90 plug-in, Honda Accord Hybrid and Toyota Camry Hybrid, what would you recommend based on my scenario? Keep up the good show, um Jake, can you give Jayden an awesome answer? I have a feeling it can so I agree, I love the question and I just wanted to say that I'm going to give the most complicated answer to the simplest question ever asked and this is just a perfect demonstration of why these plug-in hybrids are so It's so complicated, so I created a little spreadsheet here to answer Jn's question, so first of all I went and converted things, you know, Eunice, which I understand, so it's 112 miles.

In fact, I looked up energy rates in Saskatchewan, which are about 15 Canadian cents per kilowatt hour, which is about 20 cents per kilowatt hour, and then I looked up gas prices, which right now are around $75 a liter in Saskatchewan , which is almost nine dollars per person, oh wow, it sounded good at first, yeah, it's like Monopoly. money, first of all, I want to say you have to start like what's the situation you're in, how far are you driving, he drives a lot, which is not good for plug-in hybrids, but he's also paying a lot for the gasoline, which is like So, again, looking at these vehicles, the Mitsubishi Outlander, the CX-90 and the RAV4, which are plug-in hybrids, and the plug-in hybrid and the Camry Hybrid, they looked at the EV range, they just looked at the economics of fuel, for those, it is very interesting again.

This shows that not all are created equal, so interestingly, the RAV4 is much more efficient than the other two plug-in hybrids, meaning that with the same amount of kilowatt hours, approximately 15 kilowatt hours of electricity, you can go 42 miles in the RAV4. you can only go 26 miles because that Mazda 690 is totally different, so you calculated the cost of electricity for the EV range, then you looked at the remaining trip you had to make and you had to pay for gas and lo and behold, the winners. In terms of cost for that trip, the RAV4 Prime and Camry Hybrid Camry Hybrid get about 50 miles per gallon and the RAV4 gets about 38 but consumes 42 on electricity.

They'll both cost around 20 bucks, but yeah, it gets more complicated, so you're running cold, you're going on a highway, so we might as well pull a little bit. I love this part so I say, let's say you're getting about 85 out of your range because sometimes you're running cold and other times you're on the road, all of a sudden the Hab cam looks better. The RAV4 doesn't look as good, but let's say you're not going 110 miles, let's say you're going 90, which is about 56 miles in my head at this point, the RAV4 is way off. cheaper so the point is that without knowing all these variables you don't really know the right answer two again we are here to answer chair, not to go play spreadsheets all day although you would like that and I have to put Stop, just We have a limited number of hours in a day.

I mean, really, I mean, the answer is that the RAV4 prime or the Camry Hybrid will be the most efficient and will cost you the least on your trip. The RAV4 is obviously the fastest four. -all-wheel drive, more room inside, well, I was going to mention that and, you know, throw it at Alex because, because again there's more nuance here, I'm glad Jake mentioned that, you know, the all-wheel drive is the Saskatchewan. "We're going to deal with snow all the time, um, the RAV4 Prime is more expensive than a Camry Hybrid, so there's that factor too, yeah, I don't know this situation in that part of Canada, but they." It's harder to get revenge on the RAV4 Prime compared to the hybrid camera, you probably won't have any trouble getting one of those, while the RAV4 might be on a list of some sort, probably something to do with that nine bucks a gallon.

Well, listen, yeah, it's, it's, it's kind of a complicated calculation here for JN, but Jake, you definitely get extra credit for doing your homework on this and your spreadsheet is amazing, and honestly, Jane, keep in touch we. Leave us. I know what you decide because we are interested in how you finally arrived at your final answer uh and we have time for one more question and this one comes from Dan who writes I have a 2023 Honda CRV hybrid that will be parked this winter will plug in a trickle charger Ctec to the car's 12 volt battery and will also keep the hybrid battery charged for the five months that the car remains unused, otherwise the hybrid battery will be damaged if not used during this period of time, um this is a interesting scenario because we always say that a car is better when you drive it, so in this case, Dan knows that this vehicle is going to sit still for a while.

Alex, what do you think? What do you think we should? We should? We should tell Dan yes, so I mean, generally in these hybrid vehicles, the 12 volt system and the hybrid system are pretty isolated, I mean, when the vehicle is running, they probably interact with each other, but if you have this CRV hybrid plugged into a Ctec trickle charger it won't charge the hybrid battery so you know we have a lot of cars on hand so just flipping through some of the owner's manuals and things like that you know they do recommend If the car is going to be stopped for a long time, you start it and drive it every two months at least so that the engine is running and charging the hybrid battery.

Now the nice thing about these and the way that hybrids and even plug-in hybrids work and the spirit of the episode is that they will always maintain a certain amount of battery or a certain amount of charge in the battery, they are never really at zero percent, so that there's a little bit more stability when you let them sit, that's the opposite of something like an electric vehicle where, if you were to drive it to zero or zero plus miles and then let it sit, the battery is actually at a lower level of its total total capacity, right, um, but still I would say you know if it's really going to sit for five months, try to start it and drive it twice or so if you can, yeah, yeah, I have a Prius in the garage that it stays there when one for my son when he's out and uh I drove it actually this weekend we have a battery controller that's in the trunk and it's wired.

I plugged it in there because, unfortunately, the battery, you know, it has batteries in the back, so it's easy. to get there, but um, but yeah, you know it's definitely good to start it and you know cars like that for other reasons too, yeah, right, yeah, for a lot of things, several of us here at Consumer Reports, the auto testing center , we have cars that don't get used much, uh, certainly, in the winter, so we can definitely appreciate how to keep it healthy without even thinking about having a car that's sitting on tires for the right months.

Yes, flat spots, there is a good reason. to do it a little bit right, yeah, it's exercise, it's interesting, in fact, we've had a couple. I know we're not necessarily talking about electric vehicles, but a couple of our electric vehicles, the 12 volt batteries have died because they were sitting idle for, say, two weeks or a little longer and even though that high voltage battery had a ton of power because it wasn't discharged, when the car is there it doesn't feed back into the 12 volt system, so it can still run out even if you're big. The giant battery still has a lot of charge so the same applies there, in general cars are complex and they get even more complex yes as time goes on and that will do for this episode which was produced by Dave .

Abrams and edited by Andrew Belize and Anatoly Shumsky, as always, check out the show notes for more information on the vehicles and topics we discussed. Just a reminder, keep your talking car questions on icloud.com. Thank you very much for tuning in, we'll see. next week thanks