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Many of you will already know that we have been wanting to sell our Ampera... OK, I shall be painfully honest with you... "I" have been wanting to sell the Ampera. I have never really made friends with it. I think is a great car in so many ways but for some reasons, some of which I know and some I don't, I am not happy with it.
A lot of that is that I sold a 1 year old Freelander 2 to get the Ampera. That was a great SUV. Very capable on and off road. Superbly comfortable. Fast and quite economical for a SUV at well over 40 MPG. I miss that car and so as I already had a Nissan Leaf I think I never properly gave the Ampera a proper chance.
The out came the Mitsubishi Outlander. Ah Ha! A possible replacement for the Ampera and an SUV EV substitute for the Freelander 2... best of all worlds perhaps? Well, not quite. I had a 3 hr test drive and while it seemed like a perfectly sound EV and SUV it didn't wow me and the problem is that at that price... the best part of £36,000 for the version I'd want, it had to wow me big time.
It didn't... although I can see that for anyone that hasn't been spoiled by previously owning a Freelander 2 it seems to me to be an excellent EV option if you are after an SUV.
So what to do? I want to sell the Ampera and get an SUV but I cannot justify the cost of the Outlander for what it gives me.
So after a lot of soul-searching I have come to the reluctant conclusion that I must consider replacing the Ampera with another Freelander 2.
I have been saying for the past 2 years I could not ever see me buying another ICE but here I am seriously considering it. I feel a bit of a fraud to some extent and yet I cannot ignore the economics of it... let me explain...
The Outlander is about £36k. OK, I will do some miles on battery but the evidence of my Ampera ownership is that I will use this car mainly for longer trips that I cannot use the Nissan Leaf for, so it will be used mainly on trips outside the EV range and so use petrol. The new price of the Outlander at £36k (for my version)... now consider that I can get an almost as new Freelander 2, exactly as we had before, for about £25k... that is £11K less.
Extra costs over 5 years are road tax at £225pa and extra servicing at about £300pa give extra costs for 5 years of £2625 leaving an extra £8375 for diesel... that is 56000 miles of diesel which is more than I am likely to do over the 5 years!
That means I can buy the Freelander 2 and drive over 56000 miles and still have change for what I would spend if I bought the Outlander. I would have a much nicer and better SUV... just one that won't do any miles on electricity.
So why am I fessing up to having having these thoughts to you? Well, I think it very likely that in the next week or two we may decide to sell the Ampera and get a Freelander 2 and as someone who has been so vocally and actively committed to promoting and supporting EVs I felt that I needed to tell you why. This does not indicate any wavering in my commitment to EVs or that I feel any differently towards EVs or PHEVs. It is just a fact of life at the moment that there is a limited choice of SUV EV options right now and that the economics of them at the moment make switching to an SUV EV/PHEV difficult to swallow.
So there you are... please don't think worse of me for this. I am a massive EV supporter and advocate but I advocate the facts and the realities to everyone and the reality for me is that it would cost me £11k more to get an Outlander SUV vs a nearly new Freelander 2 and the latter is by far the better car IMO and more suited to me.
Roll on the day when there is a EV Freelander!
A lot of that is that I sold a 1 year old Freelander 2 to get the Ampera. That was a great SUV. Very capable on and off road. Superbly comfortable. Fast and quite economical for a SUV at well over 40 MPG. I miss that car and so as I already had a Nissan Leaf I think I never properly gave the Ampera a proper chance.
The out came the Mitsubishi Outlander. Ah Ha! A possible replacement for the Ampera and an SUV EV substitute for the Freelander 2... best of all worlds perhaps? Well, not quite. I had a 3 hr test drive and while it seemed like a perfectly sound EV and SUV it didn't wow me and the problem is that at that price... the best part of £36,000 for the version I'd want, it had to wow me big time.
It didn't... although I can see that for anyone that hasn't been spoiled by previously owning a Freelander 2 it seems to me to be an excellent EV option if you are after an SUV.
So what to do? I want to sell the Ampera and get an SUV but I cannot justify the cost of the Outlander for what it gives me.
So after a lot of soul-searching I have come to the reluctant conclusion that I must consider replacing the Ampera with another Freelander 2.
I have been saying for the past 2 years I could not ever see me buying another ICE but here I am seriously considering it. I feel a bit of a fraud to some extent and yet I cannot ignore the economics of it... let me explain...
The Outlander is about £36k. OK, I will do some miles on battery but the evidence of my Ampera ownership is that I will use this car mainly for longer trips that I cannot use the Nissan Leaf for, so it will be used mainly on trips outside the EV range and so use petrol. The new price of the Outlander at £36k (for my version)... now consider that I can get an almost as new Freelander 2, exactly as we had before, for about £25k... that is £11K less.
Extra costs over 5 years are road tax at £225pa and extra servicing at about £300pa give extra costs for 5 years of £2625 leaving an extra £8375 for diesel... that is 56000 miles of diesel which is more than I am likely to do over the 5 years!
That means I can buy the Freelander 2 and drive over 56000 miles and still have change for what I would spend if I bought the Outlander. I would have a much nicer and better SUV... just one that won't do any miles on electricity.
So why am I fessing up to having having these thoughts to you? Well, I think it very likely that in the next week or two we may decide to sell the Ampera and get a Freelander 2 and as someone who has been so vocally and actively committed to promoting and supporting EVs I felt that I needed to tell you why. This does not indicate any wavering in my commitment to EVs or that I feel any differently towards EVs or PHEVs. It is just a fact of life at the moment that there is a limited choice of SUV EV options right now and that the economics of them at the moment make switching to an SUV EV/PHEV difficult to swallow.
So there you are... please don't think worse of me for this. I am a massive EV supporter and advocate but I advocate the facts and the realities to everyone and the reality for me is that it would cost me £11k more to get an Outlander SUV vs a nearly new Freelander 2 and the latter is by far the better car IMO and more suited to me.
Roll on the day when there is a EV Freelander!