So, my current car (an A6 Avant) needs replacing. Its been great for doing the family and bike stuff but it is probably a little too big and starting to need more costly repairs. I think some sort of SUV (I hate the term but it seems that that’s the accepted name) would be a good replacement.
I’m not sure if I should go petrol or diesel though as I’ll be doing around 15k miles annually in it. It used to be that diesel was better financially for higher annual mileage, but with unleaded getting on for 10p a litre cheaper I don’t think that’s necessarily the case any more? My other concern is how diesel cars are getting charged extra for driving into cities and I suspect that this will increase over the next few years. What say you STWers and what’s the current STW choice in SUVs for around 12-14k?

If you are doing the miles, diesel is still cheaper (MPG). We bought a petrol Qashqai (1.6 Ntec+) 2 years ago (second hand about £13k) and that will do about 45-50 mpg on a run, or 36 around town, my older Nissan saloon does 40mpg at best, and 25 around town. It’s still a way off diesel MPG.

The car has been great, took the ‘divan’ of a king size double in the boot to the tip (was in two parts). The boot opening isn’t as square as I’d like, but it’s usable. It’s not a massive car like an estate though – think mid sized hatch on stilts.

My neighbour has had 3 or 4 Qashqai’s and his latest, Mk2 (pre face lift) he recons isn’t as good as the Mk1’s Facelift (that’s the one we have – smaller head lamps).

By brother and BIL have 2.0 TDCI Kuga’s and they get very good MPG, and 190 bhp !! Thing is, you need to be doing the miles for the DPF. OK their’s were £23k second hand (new model), but there should be a fair few entering the £12k-14k

Depends if you want to kill polar bears and melt ice caps or kill asthmatic kids. If neither then I’d wait for a hybrid or EV unless you’re in a rush.

I’ll never have a petrol or diesel car again. the wife is just changing her car and went for diesel but only keeping it for upto 2 years until a hybrid version of the same car is available and got over the initial demand and long waiting lists.

But assuming you can’t wait then as for SUV’s then I guess it depends on your level of badge snobbery. If you like the traditional brands and badges then you can’t got wrong with the usual stuff form the VAG or BMW stables even though you’ll be paying the usual premium. I know of a couple of people with Ford Kuga’s who like them a lot. And a few people…probably the most savvy ones, have the offerings from the Korean manufactures, which from the passenger seat are excellent from what I can tell and well up there with the usual main runners and riders with massive warranties and so cheap you’ll be looking at brand new (or nearly new) vs. used.

How’s that electric T5 treating you wobbbli

I just changed mine, I went for a diesel. Partly because I was buying against tdemand so I got a great deal and partly because it’s a AdBlue equipped euro 6 car. So it produces less Co2 than the equivalent petrol and a max of 25% more Nox than the petrol.

It warms amazingly quickly and has a very efficient stop/start and the gearbox has a coasting function. You’d have to work very hard to get it below 40mpg, 45 is the norm suburban and 50+ on the motorway. My Wife’s tiny little Petrol Ibiza can’t touch that.

It’ll probably be my last ICE car, but the leaf doesn’t work for me and I can’t afford a Tesla so something will have to come into the market to fill the massive void in the market, plus I’m not convinced using lots of nickel to shift the energy production to the most tax efficient place possible is as environmentally sound as we’ve been lead to believe.

I’ve just replaced an Audi 2004 A4 1.9TDi with 212k mi on the clock for a 2014 petrol 2.0 A4 quattro with 50k mi on the clock. I was getting about 45mpg from the TDI and only 30mpg from the petrol quattro. I was thinking about the difficulty of driving a diesel into London etc. I didn’t want a SUV but did want a 4 wheel drive the way the weather seems to be going. Petrol is about 10p cheaper per litre & it did seem to be the way to go and my mileage is minimal at the moment.

1.4 Petrol mine does about 44 per gallon, my neighbour has a new hybrid RAV 4 it does 42.

Def take a look a the Korean offerings, we’ve just bought for work a pair of 1 year old Kia hatchbacks, they come with a 7 year warranty even at one year old ! 135hp 1.6 diesels and they drive great.
I can’t see any reason to buy any other 5 door diesel hatchback unless image means something to you, then again if it does you wouldn’t be buying a 5 door diesel hatchback 😁
They do several SUV models, if you buy a 3 year old you still have 4 years warranty cover, it’s an easy decision.

we bought an SUV recently (a 2.0 TDCI ford kuga), we went diesel for the better fuel economy and performance compared to the equivalent petrol.

If you go for a euro 6 compliant engine, then it’s not affected by any existing diesel engine bans/charges in cities.

The plan is to keep this car for 10+ years like the car we had before it.

its pretty decent on fuel economy on a long run, and no issues with the DPF so far despite lots of short trips.

What form does your 15000 miles a year take? Is it ploughing up and down motorways, or lots of town trips.

The former will be better with diesel, the latter petrol.

15k a year is really right on the tipping point of diesel being more cost effective, so personally I’d go petrol (which I did).

I wasn’t going to get another diesel, until my friend was selling his rather nice diesel estate. This one probably will be my last. (It’s not massively efficient anyway, having 6 cylinders, 3 litres and an auto box).

Petrol engines these days are really pretty good, no dpf issues which can be a pain depending on your driving habits. Floating around trying to get the best mpg out of a modern diesel can be a false economy with choked up egrs, turbo vanes and blocked dpfs.

We’ve also got a Polo GTi 1.8, not a car chosen for economy and even that gets close 40mpg on a run, and easily in to mid 30s if you’re not hammering it.

So in summary, petrol unless you’re sitting on the motorway for 15k miles.

I get to drive a great many different cars, a lot are SUV’s, being ex-Motability cars, and I would still consider buying diesel, as I’m now driving fifteen miles to work, which lets the engine warm up properly, and there are several that I like a lot.
I really like the Vauxhall Mokka, it always feels like it was designed around me, and is very comfy. The Kuga is a great car, very well put together, the latest version has a much better dash layout with a large screen, and it has a heated screen, and has a fair amount of poke. The Seat/VW/Audi/Skoda cars are all good, the auto DSG ‘box is superb, and they’re well equipped and comfy. The Korean cars are very good as well, the Kia Sportage is very smooth and quiet, great seats and I really like the styling of it, the Hyundai range gives several options, there’s the ix35, the Tucson and the Santa Fe; not quite so keen on the styling, but the Tucson is pretty quick, and like the Kia, very well built and a comfy drive.
If money’s no object, there’s the Alfa Romeo Stelvio, which is stunning, but I’ve only sat in one, I’ve had no chance to drive any, sadly.
There’s also Subaru to consider, it’s apparently extremely competent on and off road, and it’s a Scooby, with that flat-four boxer engine, so has that all going for it.
Honestly, there’s a huge range of options, it boils down as much on how a car looks initially, then the finer details and how it drives, as much as anything, because cars are so much better engineered these days.
The Kia warranty might swing things towards a Sportage, I’d certainly be perfectly happy to drive many miles in one.

Just bought a 2.0 petrol SUV. Around town it’s does 40mpg. Out of town we are getting about 50mpg

Much quieter to drive than the diesel equivalent

My understanding of the clean air zones in various cities is that they are Euro 6 for diesel, so it shouldn’t be a problem if you’re buying new. Those regs may change in future, so I guess it depends on how long you plan to keep the car.

It does surprise me how poor real world MPGs are for modern diesels – most of my friends get around 40 – 45mpg from brand new A6s, 3 series, etc, yet my old Elise used to average 45mpg no matter how hard I drove it. Apples and oranges, no doubt, but it was a 20 year old car; I’d expected more from cars with quoted combined MPGs of 60.

JP

Thanks for all the input, it’s really appreciated. My commute is 40 minutes on A and B roads, not plodding up and down the motorway. I will certainly be looking at a Kia Sportage though, as stated above the warranty is very appealing.

most of my friends get around 40 – 45mpg from brand new A6s, 3 series, etc, yet my old Elise used to average 45mpg no matter how hard I drove it.

your elise probably was only about half the weight of those and possibly a lot more aerodynamic. i’m also guessing that averaging 45mpg it didn’t get hammered every time you drove it.

Look at the surrounding tech as well… petrol is less likely to need a dual mass flywheel, different emissions systems with pros and cons, some diesels will need AdBlue (reduction in payload and/or diesel tank capacity) and some won’t, some diesels will be older Euro 6 and more polluting than newer models, etc

Plenty of petrol cars have dual mass flywheels too . .

How’s that electric T5 treating you wobbbli

Cheeky. I actually said i’ll never buy another diesel or petrol car again, so when the T5 goes, probably next year, it’ll be replaced with a hybrid or EV.

Unfortunately if you’re in the used car market then there is little choice, but i’ll leasing or PCP’ing my cars in future so can jump on a new one.

My understanding of the clean air zones in various cities is that they are Euro 6 for diesel, so it shouldn’t be a problem if you’re buying new. Those regs may change in future, so I guess it depends on how long you plan to keep the car.

There’s unfortunately more than one ‘Euro 6’ standard. If you’ve been car shopping recently you might have noticed that a lot of cars (Petrol and Diesel) have downsized engines both in terms of displacement and max output again ready for the new 2020 Euro 6d standard. There’s also a load of new 1500cc engines as China has a tax break for engines sub-1500cc.

In theory all the Euro 6 standards have the same limits, but they’ve changed the test so instead of a rolling road lab test that’s easy to cheat on, they strap a test device on the back of a normal car and drive around to see if it passes.

The EU says cities can ban cars that are Euro 5 from a certain date, it’s a rolling sort of thing to stop older diesels, but some cities have banned early euro 6 cars, it’s been to court.

So long as you buy euro 6 (post 2015), you should be safe for now with city charges. But how often do you drive into a city? Even with the £12:50 charge for London it’s way cheaper for me to hold on to my euro 3 diesel than change it.
Problems arise with diesels when they’re used for lots of short journeys.
If you like SUVs definitely try a Hyundai Tucson, affordable, same underpinnings as the Kia Sportage but less gopping to look at, big boot (much more useful than a quashqai), rides well. But long term engine/gearbox reliability with the Korean brands won’t be as good as Japanese, they’re cheaper for a reason.

What like many have said;

If you are visiting cities, check which ones are likely, if your new diesel doesn’t fit into the “allowed category” go Petrol.

If you sit on a motorway all your life, go Diesel- no ifs or buts- Petrols are causing an increase in emissions on motorways now.

EV’s, you need to be careful – The much lauded Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV was bought up in the 000’s by fleet operators due to subsidies and it’s many green credentials, however only around 5% had ever actually been plugged in and the ICE was very much outdated which makes it not so green.

If you are purely a city/town driver then electric is a good option. (if you don;t want to look at the polar bear killing well to wheel cycle of them)

Depends how you are going to acquire it too. I may not be looking in the right places, but I’m not seeing dirt cheap Hyundai or Kia deals relative to VAG / Volvo / BMW on lease / PCP deals.

My understanding of the clean air zones in various cities is that they are Euro 6 for diesel, so it shouldn’t be a problem if you’re buying new.

My brother lives in Wimbledon. I think it’s something like an extra £100 a year to get an on-street parking permit for a diesel.

Not much in the grand scheme, but definitely a nudge…

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we bought an SUV recently (a 2.0 TDCI ford kuga), we went diesel for the better fuel economy and performance compared to the equivalent petrol.

If you go for a euro 6 compliant engine, then it’s not affected by any existing diesel engine bans/charges in cities.

The plan is to keep this car for 10+ years like the car we had before it.

its pretty decent on fuel economy on a long run, and no issues with the DPF so far despite lots of short trips.

What kind of MPG are you getting? I have a Focus with the same engine and I’m averaging 45mpg. I am thinking about swapping for a Kuga. The Ford TDCI engine is not known for its economy though, my boss has a Passatt with the 2.0 litre diesel engine and he’s getting into the high 60’s.

The much lauded Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV was bought up in the 000’s by fleet operators due to subsidies and it’s many green credentials, however only around 5% had ever actually been plugged in and the ICE was very much outdated which makes it not so green.

That’s why a bought a diesel one instead.

They were available second hand at a bargain price compared to the PHEV ones.

The diesel ones also come with seven seats. I really like mine.

What kind of MPG are you getting? I have a Focus with the same engine and I’m averaging 45mpg. I am thinking about swapping for a Kuga. The Ford TDCI engine is not known for its economy though, my boss has a Passatt with the 2.0 litre diesel engine and he’s getting into the high 60’s

So this is for the 180bhp 2.0TDCI from 2017 in an AWD kuga. for short trips (<5 miles) in traffic its managing about 33mpg, for long motorway journeys about 45mpg.

I dont think its an especially impressive set of fuel economy figures, but I dont think its too bad either given its a bigish not very aerodynamic heavy car with 4wd, and we dont try to get good economy, ie I’m not sitting at 56 mph on the motorway for hours on end, I typically sit around 80mph . So I think if you really tried you could do substantially better than this.

It always hard to compare anecdotes regard fuel economy from different cars and people, as everyone has different driving styles ,routines , traffic conditions etc. I think my driving style/routine etc leads to fuel economy figures on the lower end of the spectrum.

As a comparison I had a BMW 530E petrol & electric hybrid as a courtesy car recently, and it only managed 30mpg getting to/from work, where as my usual BMW m4 manages 24mpg for the same journey.

Depends how you are going to acquire it too. I may not be looking in the right places, but I’m not seeing dirt cheap Hyundai or Kia deals relative to VAG / Volvo / BMW on lease / PCP deals.

That’s because it’s linked to depreciation I think (I don’t fully understand how it all works).

So because the “premium” cars have higher value at the end of the lease they can offer better deals on them. I think.

Last year you could get a Golf R for under £300 a month, which is quite a lot of car for the money.

That’s because it’s linked to depreciation I think (I don’t fully understand how it all works).

Is my point.

Don’t get too hung up on MPG figures comparing diesel & petrol. At 15k miles petrol at 35mpg Vs diesel at 45mpg is only about £400 more per year, which might be offset by initial cost price or VED.

Obviously this falls down if you end up getting something that does 60+ mpg.

If you sit on a motorway all your life, go Diesel- no ifs or buts- Petrols are causing an increase in emissions on motorways now.

It does surprise me how poor real world MPGs are for modern diesels

I wonder how much of this is down to diesel vs petrol and how much down to the continuing trend for ever larger cars. Pretty much every revision of a car makes it bigger and an SUV is pretty much always going to have worse aerodynamics than say, an estate.

We just did the, fairly unusual, thing of swapping an old vehicle for a near identical one with much newer engine and tech (2008 Caddy Maxi Life 140bhp 2.0 Diesel for 2018 Caddy Maxi Life 125bhp 1.4 petrol). We’ve done 1200+ miles in the new one now with our usual mix of motorway and stop-start traffic into/out of London and we’re getting the same economy as we did in the old diesel (if anything I think the petrol is a few mpg better at about 42).

The EU says cities can ban cars that are Euro 5 from a certain date, it’s a rolling sort of thing to stop older diesels, but some cities have banned early euro 6 cars, it’s been to court.

I thought London ULEZ was tougher than anywhwere else had tried to implement – where has tried to ban euro 6 cars?

We got a new SUV late last year and went diesel again. Looked at all the options and considered the hammering derv is obviously going to get along with new tech but decided for the period we’ll have it (3/4 years) it’s still the best bet. Will look again when this one is up for changing.

Not sure what I’d go for with your budget considering you are coming from Audi. The obvious choice would be a 3 year old Kuga/Ateca/Sportage/etc but expect you’d be disappointed after the Avante. X3/Q5/Merc/Jag/Discovery Sport are more like it but you’ll be looking at quite an old one.

My brother lives in Wimbledon. I think it’s something like an extra £100 a year to get an on-street parking permit for a diesel.

It’s now an extra £150 per annum.

That’s because it’s linked to depreciation I think (I don’t fully understand how it all works).

So because the “premium” cars have higher value at the end of the lease they can offer better deals on them. I think.

Last year you could get a Golf R for under £300 a month, which is quite a lot of car for the money.

In simple terms yes.

The PCP cost is the cost of the car, minus the estimated value at the end of the term divided by the term. Plus of course interest.

Where it gets more complex though is the biggest players in the market also own their own finance companies.

The Golf R was a good example – new they’re £35k, a 3 year old 30k mile one is about £16.5k-£18k

So they’re going to lose £18.5k-£17k over 3 years, but you could PCP them for £300 a month, so you’d actually pay £10k to keep it for 3 years. Did VWFS think they’d be worth £25k after 3 years, did they lose £7k on each one – or did they inflate the price of them in the first place?

There’s been a lot of talk in the doomsayer financial press that the next big crash is going to be Motor Manufacturer backed Finance Houses. It seems in the last few years every man and his dog is buying a new car, the deals are so go it’s also daft not to, but once the market is saturated and everyone who used to actually pay cash for their cars is now leasing one and/or we stop buying so many can they survive so many coming back that are, on the face of it at least worth a lot less than they’re owed.

If mpg is of concern why hobble yourself from the get go with an SUV?

Again, thank you all for your input, I’ve spent the morning wandering around the local dealerships. The Kia Sportage was nice enough and the 7 year warranty is a big plus. I was ignored at Renault and Vauxhall, the Ford Kuga did nothing for me and the rattle from the drivers door when it was closed didn’t scream high build quality. The Tiguan and T Roc are out of my price range but were very nice and the Hyundai Tucson and IX35 looked ok and have 5 year warranties.

I have more research to do. Thanks STW

If you don’t care about 4 wheel drive, get an X-Trail.