In the era of fuel vehicles, many friends will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of engine and transmission construction on the Internet, which is very fierce for a period of time, especially in the process of large-scale conversion of naturally aspirated engines to turbocharged engines. People often argue about engines and transmissions for the end result, which powertrain has better performance, lower fuel consumption and better reliability......
However, in the era of new energy vehicles, especially when plug-in hybrids and range extensions have sprung up on the market, people are more inclined to pay attention to the pure electric range, overall endurance level, fuel consumption and intelligent cockpit/intelligent driving level of the vehicle, but rarely pay attention to the quality of the engine. In particular, some engines that did not perform well before, after "entering" the plug-in hybrid system and the extended range structure, everyone seems to directly ignore these shortcomings.
So why is this somewhat polarizing outcome?
First of all, after the electric drive, the engine can always run in a relatively better range, and the probability of occurrence of relatively harsh working conditions such as low torque and idle speed that were common before is much less, so from the user's perception, the overall is much better. Therefore, it is not meaningful to worry about the technical quality and parameters of the engine itself, and many times, the ability of the engine itself, when the friends are driving, can no longer feel it!
Of course, more importantly, for many friends who buy plug-in hybrid vehicles and extended-range electric vehicles, the engine is just an accessory, not even a supporting role, so it is pointless to dwell on engine-related problems. And now, there are essentially only two "core indicators" that these car owners care about the most, or instilled in potential users who have not yet purchased plug-in hybrids and range extensions, that is, charging speed and pure electric range.
In fact, for many car owners who have purchased plug-in hybrid and extended range, at the beginning, they may use both oil and electricity, but in this process, they will unconsciously compare the use experience and cost, and after a little longer, the result will come out, that is, compared with the use of oil, the experience of plug-in hybrid and extended range pure electric driving is much better, and the cost is much lower. So most users, in fact, in the vast majority of the time, drive plug-in hybrid and range extension as pure electric vehicles.
The key problem is that for the vast majority of users, short-distance commuting accounts for the vast majority of the total mileage of most car owners, so a lot of plug-in hybrid and extended range of pure electric mileage can meet such needs, that is, a large number of pure electric driving, occasionally start the engine "emergency", since the engine has become an emergency device, then the "technical component" obviously does not need to be so high.
Many plug-in hybrid and range extender users are more concerned about two indicators: charging speed and pure electric range. Because of the pure electric range of plug-in hybrid and extended range, compared with pure electric vehicles at the same price, the pure electric range is still much shorter, and the charging power is much lower. Therefore, the pure electric range can be as long as possible, and the charging efficiency, especially the maximum power and duration in the fast charging state, can be higher, then for these models, the use experience will be much better, so in fact, many car owners care about these two indicators far more than the engine itself.
So at present, with the continuous development of plug-in hybrid and extended range, although the engine is still an obvious part of the front compartment of the vehicle, in terms of importance, it has been incomparable with the era of fuel vehicles, and has been completely reduced to a marginal role. Because the electric drive makes up for the shortcomings of the engine, and at the same time, users care more about the pure electric range and charging speed, in this context, the technical background and quality of the engine are no longer important.