Hi, not been on here for a while! At the moment we have two cars: the wife's petrol VW Polo (I can't remember the engine size, but it's 3 cyl) and an E39 530d. We generally use the Polo for short journeys around town, and the E39 for long motorway journeys (for comfort more than economy to he honest.) But with the recent fuel price hikes, which look unlikely to improve, we are thinking about swapping to a single car, and a used 330e or 530e appear to fit the bill. While we use the E39 for long journeys, they are fairly few and far between: I do a ~250 mile round trip to see my family two or three times a year, and I drive a ~90 mile round trip to work once or twice a month, and at work they have provided free charging. Most other journeys are a few miles mainly pottering around town: some stop start traffic, some on the 60mph ring road. Our house has a 4kW car charger already. Does a 330e or 530e make sense in our case do you think?
Be cautious of the real fuel consumption. A colleague had a 330e and he was always bemoaning the consumption. If your trip is less than 10 miles you might get most of it done on the battery. Otherwise it’s a petrol car dragging around additional load in a spare engine and battery.
I have had a few people I know moaning about the MPG on these Hybrids however when quizzed it seems they don't actually charge them, they've them because the company car tax was lower....used correctly they could be an excellent solution...your usage would seem to suit that profile especially as you can charge while at work and you already have a home charger......I would look at both could be perfect...
Does the E39 cause you issues? If not keep that, get rid of Polo as anything you 'upgrade' to will take ages to recover your costs back and wait for Hybrids to become more common (cheaper)
That depends what you mean by "issues." It's rather tatty, several panels need respraying, the boot lid is rusty (like all of them pretty much), one of the sills needs looking at, and consequently needs ££££ spending on the bodywork. The power steering also leaks fluid. Every bill these days doesn't see much change from £1000. It had to have a new turbo last year. It could also probably do with new injectors at some point. It's always in the back of my mind that the auto box could die tomorrow, I just don't know. For most of the journeys we currently do in the Polo, the E39's engine doesn't even get fully warmed up, which can't do it much good. Also, the wife doesn't like driving it: she says it's too big. It's lovely to drive though, and I know a newer BMW won't have the same build quality. My brother suggested keeping the E39 and replacing the Polo with a Nissan Leaf or something similar. I've seen 330es for sale on Autotrader for £11K or so.
E39's are lovely cars (I still miss mine) however they are old cars now so age takes it toll, there are some pretty big ticket items (Auto box is one) and bodywork can get very expensive....I got to this point with my E60 where there were lots of small jobs that needed doing + a dying DPF which would have mounted up to £2-3K which was pretty much what it was worth.....so I sold it while the prices are high, helped by the fact that we had access to a cheap Skoda Fabia as a run around from the Mother-in-law who was giving up driving... The Fabia is great for trips into town...so much easier to find a parking spot. Hard to call but sometimes it's better to get rid before you're forced to as you are then in control...
I had a G20 30e on loan for a few days. Do a search on here, I did a small review. Long and short of it was that with a full charge I did 25miles on EV only (most of our driving) and when going further I was a averaging 88mpg over the whole journey. When I collected it there was no juice in the battery and averaged 35mpg or something like that. For us they would be perfect. I just can’t get over the initial purchase price. The premium versus keeping and running the current X1 just doesn’t work and buys huge amounts of premium unleaded even at £2 per litre.
Yep, but I would be looking at a used one like this one, and surprisingly they seem to be no more expensive than a 320i of the same age.
I think buyers are nervous of the hybrid tech however, I have seem some with starship mileage, and the petrol engines are well proven, BMW battery tech seems to be holding up too...
It’d only be the battery condition that I’d be concerned with. And the circuitry. My preference would be for going down the AUC route if I was going to get one of that age.
The hybrid systems seem to be holding up well in BMWs, AUC would be useful alas only covers the battery for 6 years and 60K which won't work if someone plans to keep the car for some time...
FWIW my local BMW specialist just told me he has several customers with these and has seen no problems with the electrical side so far, and only the usual problems you'd see on the 320i for the rest of it. I guess you're taking a risk with any used car that's out of warranty... The cheapest 330e AUC I could find was half as much again as the one in the ad above.
I had an airport run in hybrid Corolla estate taxi….260k on the clock…. Does that help your thoughts on hybrid tech…?? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
That's a Toyota though. Everyone knows they last forever! Different battery technology from the 330e, too. I think I am going to go for it, but pay a bit more to find one with a lower mileage. The battery modules can be replaced individually if the worst does eventually come to the worst. I am going to miss having a straight six engine though
