C350e owners club

[WillofBill]

You did much better than me. I've just travelled 225 miles and got 34.9

Don't get me wrong, I weren't really trying to be economical as I just wanted to get there lol.

Started with full electric and ended with nothing. I did try a charge whilst driving to see if the short hit on mpg to charge it would up the mpg in the long run but it didn't! I've definitely done better than this before but road conditions, full car load and a heavy foot.

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I picked up my 350e on Friday. Have to say it’s a fine looking car inside and out and is a long way from my 56 2litre d Touran. I bought a 66 plate pp model on 28k.

naturally I’m straight into the mpg watching! I haven’t charged it yet but have it in comfort on hybrid and it’s putting enough energy into the battery to do a few miles pure electric. It’s definitely keeping me driving sensibly though I did try out sport plus and that’s great!

can anyone tell me if I add the engine off miles to the mpg to get the actual mpg- or is that figure calculated into the mpg figure already. So far I’ve averaged 30mpg. That’s Birmingham to bristol and then around town- steadily. I appreciate it’s winter and I haven’t charged it yet to get the teal benefits of the battery but how does that sound? Any tip very welcome!

cheers, Bill

 

[Dodgy]

I picked up my 350e on Friday. Have to say it’s a fine looking car inside and out and is a long way from my 56 2litre d Touran. I bought a 66 plate pp model on 28k.

naturally I’m straight into the mpg watching! I haven’t charged it yet but have it in comfort on hybrid and it’s putting enough energy into the battery to do a few miles pure electric. It’s definitely keeping me driving sensibly though I did try out sport plus and that’s great!

can anyone tell me if I add the engine off miles to the mpg to get the actual mpg- or is that figure calculated into the mpg figure already. So far I’ve averaged 30mpg. That’s Birmingham to bristol and then around town- steadily. I appreciate it’s winter and I haven’t charged it yet to get the teal benefits of the battery but how does that sound? Any tip very welcome!

cheers, Bill

The mpg readout is total miles divided by fuel used. Engine-off miles are a subset of the total miles. Makes the engine sound pretty inefficient, doesn’t it? There are a couple of things to bear in mind though:
1. The engine is tuned for power rather than efficiency
2. There’s a huge difference between doing a journey using 90% of the battery capacity and one using none of it. If you’ve not charged at all, you might see some journeys when you finish with higher state of charge than when you started, which does horrible things to your economy (but at least you get it back next time out)

I did a 26 mile run on country roads at the weekend. 13 miles in eco, using 60% of the battery and doing 57mpg. Then I remembered I wanted to try out sport mode and after 10 miles of the return journey, I’d used no more battery but the mpg was down to 44 (I make that 27mpg for the fun bit). I did the last 3 miles through town in e-mode and ended up with 50mpg for the whole journey. The car is a bit Jeckyll and Hyde.

Can you have a home charger fitted, or run the three-pin charging cable from a socket at home (or work)?

 

[WillofBill]

Thanks, that’s really interesting. Jeckyll and Hyde makes sense. Different drives will give different mpg. I have had more charge when have finished a journey compared to the start- I really like the way you can build charge by driving carefully. Have you found it best to do longer gentle breaking with less charge bars or harder breaking creating more bars for a shorter time?

50 mpg for a mixed drive sounds brilliant- especially if you get in a bit of sport mode! I’d be really happy with 40 if I could drive in hybrid and recharge enough to offset some
Electric miles against the mpg but I think that’s unlikely on short journeys. I’m going to get a home charger fitted as I think it’s essential to charge it for use around town

Thanks again. Any more driving tips and advice very welcome.

 

[Mikep2]

I picked up my 350e on Friday. Have to say it’s a fine looking car inside and out and is a long way from my 56 2litre d Touran. I bought a 66 plate pp model on 28k.

naturally I’m straight into the mpg watching! I haven’t charged it yet but have it in comfort on hybrid and it’s putting enough energy into the battery to do a few miles pure electric. It’s definitely keeping me driving sensibly though I did try out sport plus and that’s great!

can anyone tell me if I add the engine off miles to the mpg to get the actual mpg- or is that figure calculated into the mpg figure already. So far I’ve averaged 30mpg. That’s Birmingham to bristol and then around town- steadily. I appreciate it’s winter and I haven’t charged it yet to get the teal benefits of the battery but how does that sound? Any tip very welcome!

cheers, Bill

Welcome, glad you are enjoying the car. 30mpg is a bit low but as stated in many other posts is very dependant on driving style understanding where to use the electric power to best advantage. ( use electric to accelerate up a hill and you will see the % drop rapidly).
I almost always drive in eco mode which gives the highest level of regen when braking or coasting, always start a journey at 100% battery where possible and make sure you have enough electric power left to complete the last few miles.
You will see that even when the last mile of range disappears the car will still run on electric for 1 to 2 miles if driven carefully.
The longest journey I have done is 157 miles which returned 45.5 mpg with engine off for 45 miles.
Did 25 miles today which returned 62.7 mpg with engine of for 18 miles.
The car just calculates mpg from total mileage and volume of petrol used so no other calculation required.
Let us know how your figures look when you have the car charged.

 

[WillofBill]

Thanks Mike, thats really helpful. I will definitely post how it goes, obviously a little concerned having just laid out a fair bit of dough! I assume the charge drive mode uses ice to charge and therefore reduces the mpg further- is there a good trade off though if you then use the charged battery?

thanks again

 

[Masterstein]

Thanks Mike, thats really helpful. I will definitely post how it goes, obviously a little concerned having just laid out a fair bit of dough! I assume the charge drive mode uses ice to charge and therefore reduces the mpg further- is there a good trade off though if you then use the charged battery?

thanks again

It will all depend on the range your car gives to your 100% charge. For me, I get 6 in bad weather and 8-9 in the summer so not worth the charge mode.

It melts your mpg in charge, I've done a couple of tests and found it better to just drive using the engine. But equally, it might change things if 100% charge actually gave 14 miles which I know some people get.

There's so much to learn with the car modes and working out what's right and when to use which modes.

I live 5 miles from work so I use electric to get to work and pretty much get there with nothing remaining, maybe 20-30% (it is the city centre with some stopping/starting) - thus giving back the generic 99mpg. I then come home, starting with the 20-30% and generally achieve 50mpg.

Theres probably a better way of doing this, but I don't like my engine to come on for my first journey at all, at the minute I'm using pre heat aswel (best function on the car imo)

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[CaptainChaos]

I find Charge really hurts the mpg. I use E-Save a lot.

 

[WillofBill]

Thanks, I’m starting to build an idea of how to drive the car, what programmes to use when and how to use the charged battery to good effect. It will be interesting to see how each mode effects the mpg. It a bit of a shame the car isn’t just set up for it but it seems it’s going to be a car that keeps on giving In terms of working all this out as I go.
You’ve helped reassure me that a decent mpg for a 300bhp luxury car is achievable and I’ll slowly embrace The challenge of achieving that!! I’m off to Lidl to charge it tonight- can’t wait!

cheers

 

[WillofBill]

Th

I find Charge really hurts the mpg. I use E-Save a lot.

The picture is getting clearer all the time- thanks!

 

[Dodgy]

There are only two reasons to use charge that I’ve heard:
1. To allow pre-heating/pre-cooling to work when you’re not plugged in
2. To ensure you have enough battery to cover a specific stretch of a journey

Both use energy inefficiently. Avoid if possible.

 

[Dodgy]

Hard braking engages the friction brakes, so regen is lower. If you want good economy, use coasting and light braking as much as possible.

 

[WillofBill]

Great, that’s what I assumed. When people mention pre heating is that the cabin or the battery? I that something you have to have Mercedes me for?

 

[Dodgy]

Great, that’s what I assumed. When people mention pre heating is that the cabin or the battery? I that something you have to have Mercedes me for?

It can be done from the car or the app. I use the app. I can set the departure time in the car, but I’ve never tried to set the pre-conditioning. [emoji849]

It uses quite a lot of energy, so for a long time I assumed it’s the battery as well as the cabin but now I’m not so sure...

 

[WillofBill]

It can be done from the car or the app. I use the app. I can set the departure time in the car, but I’ve never tried to set the pre-conditioning. [emoji849]

It uses quite a lot of energy, so for a long time I assumed it’s the battery as well as the cabin but now I’m not so sure...

so are you trying heat the car or the battery then? I imagine cold batteries don’t perform so bcwell- I’ve often rubbed a couple of aaa in the tv remote to get a bit more life out of them! I assumed pre heating was warming up the cabin so it’s nice to get into on a winters morning?

 

[WillofBill]

If you can pre condition the battery that should get more miles shouldn’t it?

 

[Deleted member 126969]

It's called 'Pre Entry Climate Control' and certainly heats/cools the cabin. Don't know if it heats/cools the battery pack though, which would certainly be beneficial. It takes a lot of energy so make sure you have the charge current set to maximum if you plan on using it. If you don't you end up losing a lot of heat before the battery is back to 100%. Even 16A can't quite keep up with demand.

 

[Dodgy]

My current guess is that pre-entry climate control doesn’t heat the battery. The battery is 250kg (roughly, from memory). The air in the car is roughly 5 kg (I looked that one up). If I drive off without having pre-conditioned and the car is designed to warm the battery, I’d expect a high drain for the first few miles. I only get that if I have climate control switched on.

 

[WillofBill]

My current guess is that pre-entry climate control doesn’t heat the battery. The battery is 250kg (roughly, from memory). The air in the car is roughly 5 kg (I looked that one up). If I drive off without having pre-conditioned and the car is designed to warm the battery, I’d expect a high drain for the first few miles. I only get that if I have climate control switched on.

Right, so preheat the car in the winter whilst it’s plugged in so you don’t drain the battery or use fuel on the air con when driving and warming the car in the first few miles. Makes sense- another way to save and bump up the mpg.

 

[WillofBill]

It's called 'Pre Entry Climate Control' and certainly heats/cools the cabin. Don't know if it heats/cools the battery pack though, which would certainly be beneficial. It takes a lot of energy so make sure you have the charge current set to maximum if you plan on using it. If you don't you end up losing a lot of heat before the battery is back to 100%. Even 16A can't quite keep up with demand.

Thanks Chris

 

[CaptainChaos]

Right, so preheat the car in the winter whilst it’s plugged in so you don’t drain the battery or use fuel on the air con when driving and warming the car in the first few miles. Makes sense- another way to save and bump up the mpg.

That's it. You can activate it from the key as well (I think!) if you don't want to use the app. It means if you wake up and the car is iced over, you can go out to it deiced. My wife calls it "the defroster" which I think is much more catchy than "pre entry climate control".

In very approx terms it will take a 100% charge down to 75% in about 10 minutes. I set mine 30 minutes before I went to set off so it de-ices but I leave the charger plugged in. I'm only on the 8 Amp brick charger and it will get it back up to 80'ish % before I set off.

Your earlier comment about it's a shame the car doesn't sort the settings out automatically - I really enjoy using the different modes and it helps brighten up an otherwise dull commute. I borrowed a C200 recently and it was very boring having no modes!! With our relatively small range, it's satisfying (if not a little sad ) to get back an extra few% here and there through careful driving and mode fiddling.