Kia Niro Hybrid Plug-in - impressions after a weekend trip. It has a battery with a usable capacity of 8,9 kWh!

We have already described our first impressions of contact with the Kia Niro Plug-in (the manufacturer currently uses the name Niro Hybrid Plug-in). During this time, we went on a longer trip, measured energy consumption, fuel consumption and tested how the car's active cruise control works in harmony with the radar.

But let's start with an important discovery:

[The following text is a continuation of the impressions from communicating with the car. Everything will be collected into an ordered material]

Kia also provides useful battery capacities for its hybrids!

We praise Hyundai-Kia quite regularly for showing usable battery capacity. electricians... We are glad that this practice is gradually appearing among other manufacturers (for example, Volkswagen or Mercedes), because it is known that usable capacity is more important to the car buyer. It is she who determines the power reserve of the car.

Of course, companies are tempted to indicate total cardinality (= useless) because that number will always be greater than the useful value. However, from the point of view of an ordinary person, it is like giving gross earnings. This is good and a lot, but what if some of this amount never goes to us?

> Total battery capacity and usable battery capacity - what is it about? [WE WILL ANSWER]

Even worse, even those manufacturers who are convinced of the use of usable capacity in electrical engineering, in plug-in hybrids, insist on full capacity. We thought this was common market practice, so we usually subtract 2-3 kWh from the manufacturer's catalog value.

And we just found out that Kia plug-in hybrids also sound clear and provide usable capacity.... Just look, charging from about 9 percent to full:

The car is new, with a mileage of less than 5 kilometers, so a passivating layer has not formed on the electrodes. Thereby the capacity of the Niro Hybrid Plug-in battery is even higher than the declared 8,9 kWh and is at least 9,3 kWh!

So if we were to use the other plug-in hybrid methodology here, the Niro Plug-in battery could be said to have a total capacity of 10,5-12 kWh. This is only ~ 9 kWh of usable value.

Kia Niro Hybrid Plug-in (2020) reimagined: more attractive appearance, application and economy

Appearance

The current model year of the Kia Niro Hybrid, Plug-in Hybrid and e-Niro presents a slightly updated silhouette of the car. The upper part of the radiator grille is closedas if the producer shouted, "Hey look, the new Niro is electrified / electric!"

Kia Niro Hybrid plug-in on the market in hospitable Piche

We were curious if such a blind dummy would cause the engine to overheat, but we did not observe anything like this even when driving fast in the heat. Temperatures remained tough at just under 90 degrees Fahrenheit.

Returning to the form: the silhouette of the car remains the same, it is classic and unobtrusive, but pleasing to the eye:

Kia Niro Plug-in Weekend Ride in 2020 and Renault Zoe ZE 40 Weekend Ride in 2018. Children grew up, the car had to grow too 🙂

The rear lights were also refreshed: they are more expressive and more modern. After all, people tend to ignore the car until their eyes catch the charging cable connected to it:

The plug-in Kia Niro is connected to the post office at the city beach in Pisz. The car reported "Charging", although this meant only communication with the blocker - the charging point had not yet been taken by the Technical Inspection Department.

Then the comments “You, this is the new Kia!” or “Oh, that Niro from the commercial with this actor, cool!” Although, to be honest, it's worth adding that the charging bar appeared in statements more often than the car ("We can finally come to the beach with our Tesla!" Etc.).

How does it drive

He rides well... Definitely best in electric mode, when no noise is heard in the ears, because in combustion mode the car likes the range of 2-2,5 thousand rpm, in which the engine noise cannot be overlooked. To be honest, if I had 130+ thousand zlotys that I could spend today, I would not hesitate to go to the salon and take ... an electric e-Niro.

We will come back to this when discussing prices and summing up the results.

> Kia e-Niro in subscription from PLN 1 per month (net)? Yes, but under certain conditions

This is also normal on the road, because although the tires make noise (even in electric mode), the braided combustion engine quickly attaches itself to them. But active cruise control, which works with radar (ACC) and lane assist (LKA), allows your hands to rest, at least on a well-signposted expressway. My kids were delighted that the car goes by itself, slows down and accelerates to accommodate other road users, and can also turn the steering wheel (autonomy level 2):

Of course, the "trip" lost to phones and tablets in about 30 seconds, but the moment of surprise came. 🙂

Let's add that the photo above is a little set. Your hands must be on the steering wheel, otherwise the car will start asking for them. The gauges also lacked visualization of what the car was seeing.... Tesla spoiled us with signs, traffic lights, garbage cans, queues on the roads ... nothing like this will be here. What a pity.

The UVO app is good, although it can use other features

An important addition to the vehicle for model year (2020) is the Uvo app (actually: UVO Connect). It allows you to remotely check the location of Kii, send a route to it, see the battery level and range, check the condition of the air conditioner or engine:

Unfortunately, don't be confused by the icons in the circles... From the app engine or air conditioner does not turn on / off... You can only schedule charging, start or stop charging, and open or close the vehicle.

At first I thought that this air conditioner might be related to the battery level, but it is not. Even with charged batteries, you will not cool down the passenger compartment before leaving.... And you can't warm it in winter. There is no such option, at least not yet in this model.

There are two more problems with Uvo. First, that By default, the application shows the last registered, not the current state of the car.... Check out the middle screenshot above. I was a few hundred meters from the car, lost sight of it, launched Uvo, and the application surprised me with the message "Can't locate the car." She also reported that the car was not connected to the pole (I just plugged it in!) And that the engine and air conditioning were working.

Then a cold sweat poured over me, I already had a vision of a Kia that did not belong to me, leaving blue ...

And only after a while I realized that the hour indicated in the pop-up window tells me that I read the messages 19 minutes ago, from 21.38, when I was just approaching the charging point. I refreshed myself. Uf.

> Peugeot e-208 - automotive review

The second point is no less important. On the night of July 6-7, I often ran the application to check the status of the car. The traction battery was close to discharge (~ 12%), so the next day the car immediately started the internal combustion engine. I had a vague feeling that I would see something unusual and ... get into it. Here is the message I was greeted with (8th second):

Starter battery discharged by external devices. electric. So the electronics responsible for communicating with the Uvo / Kii servers are using a 12V battery? Sounds reasonable. The main battery is discharged, so the car decided not to charge the 12 volt battery? This also sounds reasonable.

But does this mean that a remote check of the car in winter will immobilize it due to the discharge of the battery?

By the way, while we are at the counter: compare their appearance in the version before facelift and in the current one. The previous ones were late Mesozoic, they are simply cut from the meters of the gasoline version:

Kii Niro plug-in sensors before facelift, US version. Of course, the European one had European units, and besides, it was no different (c) Alex on Autos / YouTube

The real ones are much more pleasant to perceive and do not breathe in the automobile museum. The only thing that annoyed me was the speedometer, because with a comfortable steering position, I did not see the last digit. At first, I did not fully understand why these ECO - POWER - CHARGE labels are so scattered, because the rectangles next to them almost do not differ in color (blue versus darker blue):

But that's enough to look at. Let's move on to the numbers.

Energy consumption and combustion

The charging station found out the capacity of the car's battery. Based on the collected data, we can tentatively calculate how much energy was consumed in good weather:

• 15,4 kWh / 100 km in traffic,
• 24,2 kWh / 100 km out of town and cruise control 120 km / h (map below).

During the trip from Warsaw to Pisz, we reached the green line on the battery, and went the rest of the route in hybrid mode:

So what about this combustion?

Described above on a 199,5 km highway (data from the meter), fuel consumption was 3,8 l / 100 km.... Arrived 9 minutes po Google's predicted take-off time (2:28 minutes instead of 2:17 minutes, + 8%), but it's hard for me to judge whether this is the impact of one of the traffic jams on roadworks, or maybe my slightly quieter driving on the sections, where the pavement hasn't seen new asphalt in years.

We didn't linger... As proof, I can report that I was planning to publish a GPX file of the route, but when I thought about driving, I decided that I preferred to keep my driver's license. 🙂 And Google tells me the average on this route is even better!

> Polestar 2 - first impressions and reviews. A lot of pluses, praise for the design and quality of materials.

When we returned from Pisz to Warsaw, I decided to take the dimensions of the sections. He noted the following fuel consumption:

• 1,4 l / 100 km on the first 50 km of voivodeship roads... Some villages, a little acceleration, a little overtaking. At launch, the battery was at about 80 percent, so we covered most of that stretch in electric mode (not counting overtaking).
• 4,4 l / 100 km at the distance covered by the cruise control on the counter 125-126 km / h (119-120 km / h by GPS) in hybrid mode,
• 6,8 l / 100 km at short distance in sport mode from the odometer 125-126 km / h in hybrid mode.

Consider these figures preliminary—heavy traffic over the weekend prevented me from doing more extensive note-taking experiments.

Kia Niro Hybrid Plug-in = vehicle without battery charging mode, but with ... battery charging mode

If you go to this Kii you will notice that the vehicle does not have an internal combustion energy generator mode... Unlike plug-in hybrids from BMW, Toyota and many other brands, Kia does not allow the combustion engine to be started and the batteries are charged in the background while driving. There is no such option, button, switch.

Luckily, there is an easy way to recharge your battery while you're on the go. Simply slide the drive mode switch (formerly: Gear Shift) to S (Sports). The percentage of batteries will start to rise, obviously due to more noise and higher fuel consumption:

And everything would have been, if not for one observation:

Lyrical digression: I already understand why so many editions do not like electricians

Reading reviews of electricians in popular media, you regularly come across information that "they are completely unsuitable for long trips." I think I found the answer to why this is the case. Well, cars borrowed from distributors are mainly used to heat them for hundreds of kilometers.... Literally.

Do you remember the fuel consumption just mentioned? The following numbers have been saved to the vehicle computer:

• July 5 - cold city check-in at the charging station; Sport mode - average fuel consumption 4,7 l / 100 km,
• July 4th – trip to Pisz (beginning: battery charged up to ~90%) and wandering around, about 1/3 of the route is express road – average fuel consumption 3,8 l / 100 km,
• July 2, arrival from Nadarzyn, battery charged under the traffic jam - average fuel consumption 1,8 l / 100 km,
• 30 June another edition, long route, 365 km - average fuel consumption 9,7 l / 100 km,
• 13 June another edition190 kilometers (something like Warszawa-Pisz) - average fuel consumption of 5,6 l / 100 km.

Kia Niro Hybrid Plug-in (2020) - Model with 1,6 GDi engine, naturally aspirated petrol engine. To achieve fuel consumption of almost 10 liters per 100 km, you need to either drive hard in the cold (not in June ...), or completely ignore battery charging and drove 140+ km / h and overtook everyone else.

With such a ride, the electrician's power reserve will be reduced by at least half. A racing editor would probably think stopping at the toilet (and loading up) would be disrespectful to him.

The only thing that can be a shame is the need to go below 140 km / h...

> We announce and invite you: Volvo XC40 Plug-in aka Twin Engine (plug-in hybrid) revised July 17-23 [announcement, short]

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