I've been eyeing up a 330e touring to replace my wifes Octavia VRS estate. Her commute to work is only around 6 miles each way so doable on electric only. My only concern was that I read that fuel economy on a long run when running on petrol only was quite poor. I was swaying towards a 330i touring, but reading this thread doesn't make it out anywhere near as bad as i thought.
BMW 330e owners thoughts?
- Thread starter SwedishChef
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Soldato
I’m averaging about 32mpg, but I mainly do the 4 mile drive to work and back. Only once or twice a week do I do anything more economical.
It’s a 330i
It’s a 330i
Soldato
On a run they are great, round town, when not on electric it can be as low as mid 20’s in winter.
My long term average was 55mpg, that’s over 90k, probably 80% motorway.
Soldato
Didn’t have that feature on mine, i guess yours is the facelift with the newer drive?
Thats similar to what my wife is getting averaging now with her commute. Whats the 330i like on a run? We usually see late 30s/very low 40s in the VRS
Soldato
Surely you need to look at the number of miles you'll do on electric, and then what mileage you'll do beyond that to see if ti makes any difference? Loads of people have this issue with public EV charging, they complain that it costs 75ppkWh or whatever, but they'll only use it 3 times per year so their average cost is something like 8ppkWh, in the grand scheme of things it increases the running cost minimally. I mean you could go the whole hog and just get an iD.7 or Enyaq etc. then stop worrying about the MPG's.
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You won't be using public charging with a 330e - the battery is small and it won't fast charge so it'll take hours and hours. You charge it at home and drive it like a normal car if you're away from home for long enough that charge becomes an issue.
I am not convinced it makes much difference in terms of running costs - the electric range is low enough that its hardly expensive to do that with petrol so the saving isn't massive. The benefit is that its nice to drive.
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Soldato
You need re-read what I wrote, I didn't say they would be public charging, I was comparing the cost per mile issue on a long run. If the commute is 6 miles each way 5 days a week, that is 60 miles per week, at 48 weeks per year assuming standard holidays are taken, that's 2880 mile s that are guaranteed to be electric if it is charged, if you then include other 'local' driving e.g. super market runs, etc. then you are probably hitting 4k miles per year on electric, if doing 7k miles per year then the other 3k would be impacted by the lower MPG, but the offset saving is bigger from electric than the loss of the MPG figure for the longer runs.
It's not hard to calculate either, 4k miles at 7ppwkWh and 3 mpkWh - under £100, add 3k miles on petrol at 30MPG at £1.4l you get £635 for a total of ~£735, same total 7k miles at 40 mpg in a 330i £1100ish. So a lower MPG doesn't make that much of a difference, and even if you are getting more MPG in 330i or less in 330e you'll still end up at a similar cost. You personally will like come back and say saving £300-400 doesn't matter, but its the point that it isn't more expensive
Soldato
It's a 69 plate
Soldato
I’d say really similar to that really. On a really long lazy drive I seen mid to higher 40’s, but I’ve only done one drive like that.
I found this issue. Wanted to replace m340i with a 540i but all the facelift ones were hybrid 545e.