THE MINI
I believe that is what they are called now. Some time ago I remember them as the Morris Minor. It is a small, cute, automobile made in the UK. Even though it is small, it has a substantial look to it. A well rounded body that makes it look like a tough little car. The selling price on it is tough too. Comes in at $20k and higher.
I have always admired it but never seriously considered owning one. Now that I see it has a luxury car price, I will probably never own one. Just would not be prudent.
Still I have always considered it to be an economy car due to its size. I was just certain that it got at least 50 miles to a gallon of gas. Yesterday I discovered that it only claims 40 miles to a gallon!
I know that 40 miles per gallon is a lot better than 15 but when you realize that the mini is less than half the size of most sedans, you got to ask why it can’t get at least 50 miles per gallon.
I have owned and driven a four cylinder Camry since 1996. It is a full sized, four door sedan, with better than average performance. My Camry gets 32 miles per gallon! I find it hard to imagine a car half the size of my Camry only gets me 8 more miles to the gallon. That is just not worth a switch.
This got me interested in some of the hybrids that are being offered by a variety of manufacturers. I discovered prices ranging from mid 20’s to mid 30’s and gas mileage claims around 40 miles per gallon! For a Hybrid!!??? No wonder they are not selling like hot cakes!!!
Unless I am sadly mistaken, I recall that in 1980 a rabbit diesel with a four cylinder engine got around 50 miles per gallon of fuel. Twenty seven years later, after much research and development, the automobile industry offers us a vehicle that costs four times as much and only gets 80percent as much fuel efficiency. And we wonder why areas of the automobile industry are having financial problems. One step forward and two steps back is not going to work.
When you consider the maintenance on the electrical part of the prime mover, the replacement of batteries at significant cost every two years or so, then add that to the depreciation and the initial price, you suddenly discover that hybrids are a bust.
The way I see it, a hybrid could easily cost twice as much to own as a normal automobile. It would have to get at least 60 miles to the gallon to justify such an cost and it would have to last for more than ten years and gasoline would have to get to 5 dollars a gallon. I am pretty sure none of that is ever going to happen. Except maybe gas going to 5 dollars a gallon (with 3 dollars of that being tax.)
Ten years from now we are going to look back on today and realize what joke hybrids were.