Adrian's ScrapBook (CAR 12)

After many years of promoting Diesel cars, the UK government is taking steps to make diesel a "nasty" thing of the past.

Following a change in circumstances where my milege reduced to mainly small local trips with occasional longer ones, the GTD was no longer practical - The GTE hybrid represented a perfect solution for my needs; Electric for small local trips, Petrol (I know ... I know !!) for longer trips, Hybrid for combination of both with impresssive performance.

Along with the "normal" engine, it carries a heavy battery along with an electric motor making it seemingly not as quick as the "old" GTD. Though it is still pretty rapid when needed.
The DSG gearbox in Automatic mode does seem to have a bit of a delay before changing on initial hard acceleration.
Whilst official figures say it has a 30 mile electric range, I have never seen more than 28 on the meter.
Heating really eats into the battery but on average a full charge (costing about 46p in the days of cheaper electricity), with non-conservative driving, gives me about 22 real electric miles in the winter.

Having driven in the winter with pre-heat when plugged into the mains, with pre-heat on battery before the return journey and using a combination of Hybrid, GTE & Battery Hold modes, I was getting an almost dissapointing 58 mpg (when converting electric costs to equivalent in fuel)

I absolutely love the "pre-heat" option which nicely defrosts the car in the winter (or cools in summer) and can be set by timer or switched on by phone app. The Adaptive Cruise Control is fantastic and overall, despite the build quality ( VW have now joined all other car makers to cut costs [though not customer prices!] ), it is a fantastic car and, dare I say it, the best so far!.