I'm just wanting to share with you guys my success with a 2 door Toyota Yaris Hatchback.
Basically with a light foot on the pedal, slightly overinflated tires, I'm getting around 50 mpg on the highway, 42 in the city.
I paid $15,000 for the car.
Comparing this to vehicles such as the Nissan Leaf which is fully electric, the numbers work out pretty amazingly with today's gas prices.
Nissan leaf base price is going to be $34,000
Toyota Yaris base price is $15,000
Nissan leaf never needs gas, and as crazy as this may sound, for the sake of argument, I'm going to say that the leaf gets "free gas" and will not compute the cost of the electricity.
Basically with simple math, the Leaf is $19,000 more than the Yaris in base price.
On average, at $3.85 a gallon in Dallas, TX prices, this means that I can fill up my Yaris, 493 times on the BASE PRICE difference.
On average, I get nearly 365 miles per tank on the Yaris. This means I can travel about 170,000 to 180,000 miles BEFORE I even add up the cost of the base price difference on the Nissan Leaf. If I have a heavier foot, 150,000 miles.
Considering that many Hybrids need new driving battery packs, and probably the Nissan Leaf would need a new battery pack by 150k-180k miles that costs thousands, it is hard to imagine just on ECONOMIC REASONS ever paying the price difference for a hybrid. Also factor in depreciation and it just does not make any economic sense. Also the Leaf has a 50-60 mile range with accessories.
Also of course like I said, there are many KWh that will go into charging the leaf that will jack up your power bill. Plug in hybrids are somewhat of the same monster financially. A converted Prius hybrid will have battery packs, KWh's, and has a 40k base price after conversion. When all is said and done, a Prius hybrid will get 65mpg.
Nobody get me wrong, if the base price was cheaper on either a full electric or a hybrid, I'd be right there. But at nearly 50mpg (highway no accessories and slightly overinflated tires) in my Yaris, with such a cheap base price and awesome reliability, it is hard for me to convert to alternative transportation.
Hopefully people here have some much cheaper solutions & less power - consumption - etc. In my area I'd probably be ran over with an ebike. Motorcycles are death traps around here too.
I'm still not sure why the manufacturer rates the Yaris so low in MPG. It does WAY better than they are claiming. I wonder if its so they can sell more hybrids?