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Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

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Mike4
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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411608

Postby Mike4 » May 13th, 2021, 11:30 am

I too would add my voice suggesting there is no point or benefit in shelling out on a 7kW dedicated charger for a car with such a small battery. They are intended for battery-only electric vehicles AIUI.

AF62
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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411620

Postby AF62 » May 13th, 2021, 12:01 pm

Howard wrote:I'd still consider just charging from a 13 amp supply to start with as it will easily charge the car overnight and, frankly at around 12p per kWh it's less than £2 of electricity per charge.


I would also suggest that is a good idea as the thrill of plugging it in regularly may fade and you might decide to simply benefit from the charging provided by the regenerative charge.

If you do decide to charge it regularly then Octopus Energy do a number of electricity tariffs designed for charging vehicles (or other high energy off-peak use) with rates as low as 4.5 p/kWh for a few hours overnight - although the car would need a timer to take advantage (or you plug it in at the right time).

swill453
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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411623

Postby swill453 » May 13th, 2021, 12:06 pm

Dod101 wrote:
richlist wrote:No it's a plug in hybrid vehicle ....PHEV.


And it seems singularly useless as an electric car except maybe as a town runabout.

Like most cars, then.

Scott.

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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411631

Postby redsturgeon » May 13th, 2021, 12:17 pm

Dod101 wrote:
richlist wrote:No it's a plug in hybrid vehicle ....PHEV.


And it seems singularly useless as an electric car except maybe as a town runabout.

Dod


Not at all. I have a BMW PHEV, the real world electric only range is 15 miles max but during lockdown I drove 1000 miles over three months and did not use the petrol engine at all. Most car journeys are less than 10 miles and indeed most cars are just used 90% of the time as "town runabouts".

At the moment my car usage has completely changed though and I am doing 1000 miles a week on the motorway so arguably this PHEV is not ideal and a diesel would be better but I'm not sure how long this new usage pattern will last so I won't buy a diesel at the moment. For these type of journey though switching the car to "ECO mode" and letting it decide how to mix the electrical and ICE power I am getting about 50mpg.

JOhn

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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411637

Postby Dod101 » May 13th, 2021, 12:28 pm

redsturgeon wrote:
Dod101 wrote:
richlist wrote:No it's a plug in hybrid vehicle ....PHEV.


And it seems singularly useless as an electric car except maybe as a town runabout.

Dod


Not at all. I have a BMW PHEV, the real world electric only range is 15 miles max but during lockdown I drove 1000 miles over three months and did not use the petrol engine at all. Most car journeys are less than 10 miles and indeed most cars are just used 90% of the time as "town runabouts".

At the moment my car usage has completely changed though and I am doing 1000 miles a week on the motorway so arguably this PHEV is not ideal and a diesel would be better but I'm not sure how long this new usage pattern will last so I won't buy a diesel at the moment. For these type of journey though switching the car to "ECO mode" and letting it decide how to mix the electrical and ICE power I am getting about 50mpg.

JOhn


I must say my comments are probably nonsense since I know nothing of electric cars, but I would say my usage pre Covid was around 1000 miles per month, mostly broken down into 100/150 mile round trips with the occasional long trip of maybe 600 miles round trip so it was used as anything but a town runaround. Where I live that is not going to happen.

That is a lot of driving, 1000 miles per week and I do not envy you that. I did about half of that for about 18 months when my first wife was very ill and knew every bump in the road. It was hard work and not on motorways either. However I was a lot younger then.

Dod

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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411645

Postby Howard » May 13th, 2021, 12:57 pm

redsturgeon wrote:
Dod101 wrote:
richlist wrote:No it's a plug in hybrid vehicle ....PHEV.


And it seems singularly useless as an electric car except maybe as a town runabout.

Dod


Not at all. I have a BMW PHEV, the real world electric only range is 15 miles max but during lockdown I drove 1000 miles over three months and did not use the petrol engine at all. Most car journeys are less than 10 miles and indeed most cars are just used 90% of the time as "town runabouts".

At the moment my car usage has completely changed though and I am doing 1000 miles a week on the motorway so arguably this PHEV is not ideal and a diesel would be better but I'm not sure how long this new usage pattern will last so I won't buy a diesel at the moment. For these type of journey though switching the car to "ECO mode" and letting it decide how to mix the electrical and ICE power I am getting about 50mpg.

JOhn


John,

I know this is totally off topic, but on a car/electric thread like this we'd usually get a comment by dspp. Maybe not as a supporter of PHEVs.

Is he ok and taking a sabbatical? I'm asking you because you are/were both moderators and you may know the answer. His comments on electric cars were always worth reading.

Hope he's ok.

regards

Howard

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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411657

Postby redsturgeon » May 13th, 2021, 1:41 pm

Howard wrote:
redsturgeon wrote:
Dod101 wrote:
And it seems singularly useless as an electric car except maybe as a town runabout.

Dod


Not at all. I have a BMW PHEV, the real world electric only range is 15 miles max but during lockdown I drove 1000 miles over three months and did not use the petrol engine at all. Most car journeys are less than 10 miles and indeed most cars are just used 90% of the time as "town runabouts".

At the moment my car usage has completely changed though and I am doing 1000 miles a week on the motorway so arguably this PHEV is not ideal and a diesel would be better but I'm not sure how long this new usage pattern will last so I won't buy a diesel at the moment. For these type of journey though switching the car to "ECO mode" and letting it decide how to mix the electrical and ICE power I am getting about 50mpg.

JOhn


John,

I know this is totally off topic, but on a car/electric thread like this we'd usually get a comment by dspp. Maybe not as a supporter of PHEVs.

Is he ok and taking a sabbatical? I'm asking you because you are/were both moderators and you may know the answer. His comments on electric cars were always worth reading.

Hope he's ok.

regards

Howard


This question was asked on the Biscuit Bar last week and yes he is just taking a break.

John

9873210
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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411680

Postby 9873210 » May 13th, 2021, 4:07 pm

AF62 wrote:The car does not charge the battery from the petrol engine, but charges it from regenerative braking. So if you used the car in town then the battery will keep itself topped up, but on a long journey with little braking it will run itself down.

I'm not familiar with this Skoda but this is almost certainly incorrect. It's not how hybrids work. At least it's not how hybrids that are designed for fuel efficiency rather than tax efficiency work.

If you drive a hybrid at a constant low speed (30mph) the engine will run for several minutes driving the car and charging the battery. Then the car will run on motor only for several minutes depleting the battery. Repeat. It does the same thing in normal stop and go town driving but it's more difficult to observe.

When the engine is running it runs at peak efficiency, rather than running at whatever power level is required to move the car at the particular speed. This is the main reason hybrids get better fuel economy. Regenerative braking is a bonus.

Also with a well designed hybrid the driver does not control whether regenerative braking is used. When you step on the brake you get regenerative braking. When the cars software determines that regenerative braking can't do what is required it will apply the friction brakes. Using one pedal or two pedal driving modes does not change this. Driving like a maniac with very hard braking will.

Howard
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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411734

Postby Howard » May 13th, 2021, 7:17 pm

9873210 wrote:
If you drive a hybrid at a constant low speed (30mph) the engine will run for several minutes driving the car and charging the battery. Then the car will run on motor only for several minutes depleting the battery. Repeat. It does the same thing in normal stop and go town driving but it's more difficult to observe.

When the engine is running it runs at peak efficiency, rather than running at whatever power level is required to move the car at the particular speed. This is the main reason hybrids get better fuel economy. Regenerative braking is a bonus.


I can only comment on driving a BMW PHEV, and I don’t think they behave in the way you describe. In normal or eco mode the car used its SatNav to decide the method of drive. On a journey where one went from a dual carriageway to a 30 mph limit the car would change from petrol to electric. This happened at the same point at the 30 mph sign on repeated journeys provided there was a reasonable charge in the battery. At a constant 30 mph the car only used electricity. And at the bottom of a steep hill the car would always use both electric motor and petrol engine as the ascent began.

If the driver set a destination on the SatNav the car would eke out battery power to use in town sections and use petrol on fast sections.

On moving away from start, the car always used electric power and the petrol engine took over at higher speed depending on how hard the accelerator was pressed.

Yes it always used regenerative braking where possible but this just felt like normal braking.

Our car always started the day with a full battery. It never appeared to run down completely.

regards

Howard

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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411792

Postby brightncheerful » May 13th, 2021, 10:28 pm

Thank you.

chris
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Re: Skoda Octavia Estate hybrid

#411793

Postby chris » May 13th, 2021, 10:31 pm

I run a Passat GTE which is going to be very similar to the Octavia as they are hybrids from the same group.

Most of my travel is to and from work, 23 miles away. The car is 4 years old and I bought it a year ago.

The Eco mode that I run it on uses all the battery first and then switches to petrol. Because work is at a higher altitude than home, I cannot get to work on a full charge but I can mostly get home on a full charge.

Because the hybrid fully recharges in about 4-5 hours, I can see no point at all in installing a fast charger. I have an outside electric point with a smart plug in that automatically charges my car with cheap electricity at night. Fortunately, I can charge my car at work. In this way I get about 1900-2500 miles from a tank of fuel which costs about £60 to fill up (before it gets to the red), so 2 months in winter and 2.5 to 3 months in the warmer weather as batteries are not as efficient in cold weather (I could not get home on a charge in the cold weather earlier this year).

When there is no charge left, the petrol engine kicks in but it does recharge itself slightly but not by a lot, so you find that next time you stop, you may have some additional battery that it will use, before the petrol engine takes over again, so you do get some regenerative electricity, but not a lot.

At the end of 2019, my average monthly fuel cost for my car and my wife's Fiesta was £300, now it is £70, so it has been a big saving for me and although my electric will have gone up a bit (different rates so harder to compare as we are paying a single amount DDR), it is certainly nowhere near £230. It helps that work are paying for almost half my travel with no benefit in kind though!


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