Only the two original hybrid autos are selling, Honda Hybrid and Prius. The other SUV and luxury cars with hybrids are a marketing flop.
What went wrong was rudimentary. The marketing research teams would have told anyone who asked that they couldn’t find hybrid buyers who wanted SUVs and vice versa. Researchers would have found a few families that owned both but the reason for the SUV was to haul a sail boat, surf boards and canoes.
The two great automobile trends, one to big-solid-high-powerful vehicles and the other to save the environment have two different motivations and only overlap in a very few cases.
Putting the hybrid engine in an SUV or luxury car is irrelevant. The enviro will still drive the real hybrid and if the enviro is rich enough will buy a separate SUV without regard for the gas mileage.
Moreover, the Ford hybrid doesn’t use the electric engine when moving. The Ford hybrid is really an oversized starting motor that allows the gasoline engine to turn off when the car is stopped.
The image on the left is a real hybrid engine that uses a planetary gear to shift drive power between electric and gasoline.
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