4 x 4's back in favour

[MichaelE]

Interesting article in a motoring magazine this week.
Interest in 4 x 4's/crossovers has increased by over 250% in the last 2-3 weeks with the Santa Fe the most enquired about.

 

[JonnyRockstar]

Not quite sure how you measure "interest" !!!
Of course people have thought about these vehicles - there has been snow on the ground.

 

[trevor123]

Glad that we got a 4x4 for the last 16 years would not be without it for many reason,
Happy Xmas and take care on the road, Trevor123

 

[otherclive]

Went to see a new Santa Fe last week and they are a nice car, drove very well and with a 2000kg tow weight (auto) and near 40mpg reported by user reviews it is quite economical fora 4wd. The 194bhp engine is a real delight so smooth and what torque! Overall witha 5 year warranty the Santa Fe seems to have taken the slot that the Sorento achieved when first released into Uk some 7 years back. Some of the car brokers are offering good discounts on both Style and Premium models, which our local dealer said he would match.

 

[emmerson]

Isn't it strange how, for most of the year, us 4x4 drivers are seen as the devil incarnate? That is, until it snows, then we're everyone's friend!

 

[PR]

Obviously it is only certain parts of the country where 4x4's are not in favour for the majority of the year. Round here they are very popular, with the majority being Landrover Discovery's, Freelander2 's and Range Rovers.

 

[Surfer]

On a 4 x 4 forum one fo the drivers went to help some poor guy stuck in a ditch. As he was about to hook up he spotted a sticker on the back window calling for a ban on all 4 x 4s. He was so annoyed that he packed away the tow rope and left the driver there!

 

[xtrailman]

Nice one.

One day all cars will be electric 4x4?

 

[Oldsalt49]

I can see it now!!! The countryside festooned with millions of wind generators and on windless days no-one going anywhere. The AA & RAC towing diesel generators behind their electric vans to recharge stranded motorists!!!

 

[xtrailman]

Backed up with solar panels, and spare battery packs, yes it will work..

Think what it must have been like when every one used horses.

If some one had said one day petrol stations would cover the world, they would have been taken away in a straight jacket!

 

[SteveW77]

When they develop a system that will put enough charge in for 400 miles in the same time that it takes me to pump 10 gallons of diesel and allow me to use the heating for 14hrs non stop when I am stuck on the snowed in motorway surrounded by jack-knifed lorries on all sides and still have enough power left to drive home once the roads have been cleared, then and only then would I consider an electric car of any description. As for spare battery packs, have you actually seen the batteries on an electric car, they are enormous and take ages to replace, not to mention the problem of disposal of non serviceable units.

Steve W.

 

[xtrailman]

When they develop a system that will put enough charge in for 400 miles in the same time that it takes me to pump 10 gallons of diesel and allow me to use the heating for 14hrs non stop when I am stuck on the snowed in motorway surrounded by jack-knifed lorries on all sides and still have enough power left to drive home once the roads have been cleared, then and only then would I consider an electric car of any description. As for spare battery packs, have you actually seen the batteries on an electric car, they are enormous and take ages to replace, not to mention the problem of disposal of non serviceable units.

Steve W.

Steve
So negative.
If you get stuck on a motorway, can you guarantee the fuel won't run out?
Can you refuel your car at home, or work, or parked up in town? No but one day you will be able to recharge it.
While its being topped up by the built in solar panel perhaps?
Will you oil fired car act as a generator, while decelerating or traveling down hill?
Look at the parts required to run these ancient engines, hundreds of moving parts, compare that to a electric motor.
Its a no brainier.

Agree the batteries are the weak link. The range is limited. But as a runaround, the electric car wins.

 

[SteveW77]

If you get stuck on a motorway, can you guarantee the fuel won't run out?

No, but I can guarantee that it will last a lot longer than any electric car will, As for solar power, a real flight of fancy I fear. I have yet to see a solar panel that works at night, or do you suggest staying in during the hours of darkness. How will people who have no road access to their homes recharge these wonderful new vehicles? will the pavements become a snake charmers basket of crossed wires? what happens when you can't park near to a charging point, do you think that complete strangers will let you plug into their charging system? Then we come to the cost of battery replacement, at this time it cost's somewhere around £3000 to replace the batteries on a Toyota Prius. It's never going to happen in my life time,so I will continue with my oil burner chucking out all the pollution that it takes for me to do the things that I want to do, when I want to do them. not when there's enough in the battery.

 

[emmerson]

Now, Now, stevew77, don't mince words! Give it to 'em straight!
I'm with you all the way mate.We are slowly being brainwashed by those in power that anything which may, in however infinitesimal a way, affect global worming/climate change must be taxed. It is all simply a way to extract more and more money disguised as tax.
As I have said before,the earth has survived ice ages and heat ages before, and will do again, however much tax we are forced to pay.Puny little man cannot stop nature.

 

[OmOnWeelz]

Agree the batteries are the weak link. The range is limited. But as a runaround, the electric car wins.

Pal and his Mrs had an electric Mini on test for a few weeks. Not sure how useful the mini is as a runaround as it only has two seats, as the back seat is ful of batteries to give it some range. 10 miles each way to work with a detour to shops had it crawling home. With heater and lights on at same time it zapped the batteries and the range beacme a dangerous joke. Where you fill your tank and hit the motorway, the battery Mini could have a full charge, but if you needed use the lights, heating and wipers range is in the lap of the gods.
Pals wife cut short the trial loan period as the car was pretty useless for commuting a few short miles and family use around town

 

[Oldsalt49]

My company has bought a small fleet of battery powered Mini One's. The biggest problem I have with them, is there are no back seats, the space is taken up by the batteries. Hardly a car for a 2+2 family?

 

[xtrailman]

I wouldn't have thought a mini would be big enough to be of use ?

By the way i have no interest in crap about climate change, IMO it does not have any connection to being man made.

No whats really happening is that oil is getting harder to extract, so alternative fuels will come sooner or later.

Steve mentions 3k to replace batteries, i loose more than that on my xtrail every year?
If the turbo goes that near a grand.
Same for the fuel HP pump.
Neither of which a electric car has.
Lets face it, we grow up with electric milk carts, its not a new idea, electric fork trunks are common place.
And two cars have been launched recently, shown on the news, the Nissan leaf is one i recall.

 

[SteveW77]

All the examples given suffer from the same basic problems, poor range and lack of recharging points. My next door neighbour has 4 cars in his household, how on earth would he be able to recharge 4 cars between 20.00 and 06-30 the next day, especially as two of them have to be parked on the road at night. Even this doubtful procedure would be made a lot worse by the fact that you can not guarantee being able to park outside your own property. Then of course there is the problem of going out in the evening, take a taxi? because you have to recharge your own car, ready for work the next morning. I do not think that people would be happy with rows of charging points lining every street in town, let alone the people like me who are lucky enough to live in a village. I suppose they could always dig up the village green and turn it in a recharging station. ( Over my dead body). There will always be a few people who take on these things because they are new and trendy, but as a transport system for the masses, I don't think so. As has already been stated they are fine as a runabout, but as for the future,any system that would replace 1 petrol/diesel car with the need for 2 cars, 1 electric runabout and 1 proper car for everything else, is doomed to failure I am afraid

 

[xtrailman]

All the examples given suffer from the same basic problems, poor range and lack of recharging points. My next door neighbour has 4 cars in his household, how on earth would he be able to recharge 4 cars between 20.00 and 06-30 the next day, especially as two of them have to be parked on the road at night. Even this doubtful procedure would be made a lot worse by the fact that you can not guarantee being able to park outside your own property. Then of course there is the problem of going out in the evening, take a taxi? because you have to recharge your own car, ready for work the next morning. I do not think that people would be happy with rows of charging points lining every street in town, let alone the people like me who are lucky enough to live in a village. I suppose they could always dig up the village green and turn it in a recharging station. ( Over my dead body). There will always be a few people who take on these things because they are new and trendy, but as a transport system for the masses, I don't think so. As has already been stated they are fine as a runabout, but as for the future,any system that would replace 1 petrol/diesel car with the need for 2 cars, 1 electric runabout and 1 proper car for everything else, is doomed to failure I am afraid

I think you're missing the point with the electric car.

As i see it, the car is designed primarily for short commuter runs.

London is a good example, no congestion charge to pay.

While the goal is to have charging facilities at the work place, and eventually at the road side, or parking areas.
If you need to troll the motorways, hybrid cars are already available, such as the one Lutz runs.

 

[Surfer]

Oil reserves are huge as there are many huge fileds that have not been tapped. The latest one, Tupi field, to be tapped is off the coast of Brazil and is one of the biggest fields tin the lasty 30 years. We have more than enough oil for the foreseeable future. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8530228.stm and this is just for the UK!

 

[xtrailman]

Oil reserves are huge as there are many huge fileds that have not been tapped. The latest one, Tupi field, to be tapped is off the coast of Brazil and is one of the biggest fields tin the lasty 30 years. We have more than enough oil for the foreseeable future. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8530228.stm and this is just for the UK!

So explain why BP would bother with deep water extraction.?

The results seen this year off the american coast.

 

[SteveW77]

I don't see how replacing one car with two (One electric, solely for commuting to work.) is going to be an improvement, As for hybrids, an over priced option if ever there was one. If You have an electric car just to go to work, that means my partner & I would then have four cars, two for work and two for "trolling the motorways. With only two parking spaces, that means even more cars parked on the road.

Steve W

 

[Philspadders]

Li-pos, the new wonder cell for electric cars. You have them in mobile phones, laptops, ipods, everywhere, but in most cases they are on single cell use.
When Li-pos are used in series which they are in cars they have a little problem that no one is telling you about.
When charging over discharging multi cells some of them become unbalanced, that is they develop a different capacity and voltage to its neighbour. If Lipos are over discharged they will never regain the original capacity. Now when you come to recharge it wil get hot,,, and catch fire.
Evwn in use, if one cell becomes over discharged its neighbours then have to make up for the loss of voltage and current, these other cells become hot and.... catch fire.

Its no use using water as Lithium releases its own oxygen when burning, these things bvurn under water.
In the Uk last year there were 3 house fires caused by Li-Po cells, plus of course we had the lap top fires from a few years ago, the ipod failures etc.

And li-pos do NOT like being used below about 5degs c. They must not be allowed to freeze and if they do, they must not be used as the internal structure will have failed and they will catch fire. At 5deg and below they lose upto 60% of their performance.
They must not be recharged at temps below 5 degs c as this will result in an over charge which will once again damage the internal structure.

Also with lipo.s the car manufacturers do not actually know how many charge / dishcharge cycles they are going to get, some believe it may be as low as 300, others believe it may get 600. So potentially thats £3k plus every 300 trips, and not to forget that over time the capacity of the lipos will fall, so over time the vehilce will only be able to make it to the end of the road.

I ise multi cell li-pos as p;art of my hobby, and i have had a 3 cell 100% balanced pack overheat and explode. Yes it exploded and the resulting fire is very intense. I know store all my cells outside in sealed tins.eus

Befor buying an electric car that uses li-pos wait a few more years for the new A123 cells and Li-Fe cells to be developed as these are much less susceptible to the charge/dischrge/temp issues that Li-Po suffer from.

http://www.electric-cars-are-for-girls.com/lithium-polymer-batteries.html
im taking bets on the next poster being......

 

[Steve L]

4X4's have always been favorite of the farmers and wealthy so no supris there that interest in new car purchase of these models has increased now the farmers friend is in power.

Seriously though. The winter's getting worse year on year, people do look to 4X4's to help. But once they see the tax disc price, the service charges, etc etc. They think again.

I think there is perhaps more of a market place for 4X4 cars like Subaru Outback and Audi All road to be taken up by car manufacturers as it is already common knowledge that a vast majority of disco's, range rovers, mitsi's and Isusu don't see the rolling grass of rural britain, let alone have a tow bar used.

 

[Philspadders]

Seriously though. The winter's getting worse year on year, people do look to 4X4's to help. But once they see the tax disc price, the service charges, etc etc. They think again.

????. My VED is £210 for the year , annual service is £125. Tyres are £65each, A new set of of brake pads £35.0 front or rear and i get 24mpg towing and 35mpg urban.
Reliable, comfortable, good forward visibilty and i get to look down on you "saloon"car drivers. Its quite shocking what goes on in the front seat of some of those cars.
Insurance fully comp with £100 excess and no windscreen excess £185 per year.
Whats the issue.