Petrol Or Diesel Or Hybrid?
Overview
I have been trying to calculate the total ownership cost cars using variety of fuel types from petrol to diesel and hybrid. I have excluded pure electric cars because it’s hard to judge the running cost and how long the batteries last.
Legend:
- TT TDI = Audi TT TDI (170PS)
- TT 1.8 FSI = Audi TT 1.8 FSI
- BMW 123d = BMW 123d
- BMW 120i = BMW 120i
- Civic 1.4 = Honda Civic 1.4 2002 (current Car)
- Civic 2.2D = Honda Civic Type S 2.2 Diesel
- Civic 1.8 = Honda Civic Type S 1.8
- CR-Z = Honda CR-Z GT
- Sirocco TDI = VW Sirocco GTD (170PS)
- Sirocco 1.4 = VW Sirocco 1.4
The above gives a quick summary of the total running cost and not including the purchase price of cars with different fuel types. The purchase price were not included because I’m looking at the longer term ownership and also not all cars in the comparison will be bought new. The statistics were from Parkers and the manufacturers website. Insurance was based on my circumstances with an estimate 15000 miles per annum.
New Models
Comparing fuel costs alone for the for one year based on 15k miles where petrol costs 130p and diesel costs 139p the biggest difference is the VW Sirocco at £387.31. The Audi TT came out at the smallest difference at £226.33. For a few hundred pounds it does not seem like a lot of difference in terms of fuel saving. The best performing out of all the models is the Honda CR-Z giving diesel like mileage with the cheaper petrol combination. The problem is the performance. The BHP figure is also the lowest.
Looking at the first year costs comparing between diesel and petrol equivalent the Audi TT wins again with a difference of £176.33 and the Sirocco losing at £450.31. With less than £200 between a petrol or diesel I would definitely get a TT TDI because it comes with Quattro all wheel drive and a slight bigger engine. Overall the cheapest to run is the Honda CR-Z again. The second best was the Sirocco GTD by £76.92 from the 2.2 Diesel Civic in third. Noting all the cheaper to run cars in the first year go Petrol, Diesel, Diesel.
The following years of ownership should follow the same pattern as the model doesn’t take into account servicing.
Current Car
Comparing my current car with the others there have been a significant improvement in fuel efficiency. The car is almost 10 years old and the improvements can be seen on the cost of road tax. All the other vehicles in the comparison are in the cheaper tax band with the exception of the 1.4 Sirocco but even then the engine produces more than double the BHP.
The annual running costs of the 1.4 Civic is calculated to be the 6th cheapest to run out of 10!
Caveats
It was impossible to take into account replacement parts and servicing as each dealer and car had different price and each service would consist of different maintenance tasks. Also the MPG figures should be taken lightly as these are what is written on the paper and not what the real world figures are. I suspect the actual MPG will be at least 10 MPG less than what is stated.
Summary
The differences between similar trim for the same model do not have a lot of difference to run. The cost of the car to buy may impact the amount saved at the end of the ownership because there is only a few hundred pounds a year difference so over the long term period (5-10 years) this could add up to £1000-2000 which may be made up when negotiating to buy the car in the first place.
