This article titled “Porsche Panamera S E-hybrid: car review” was written by Martin Love, for The Observer on Tuesday 2nd June 2015 09.45 UTCPrice £88,967
Top speed 168mph
Fuel economy 91mpg
If you turn left off the A66 at Brough and pick up the old twisting road that heads towards Sedbergh, you pass through the heart of the Howgills – a series of green, treeless mountains. It is breathtaking, unforgiving scenery. At the base of Cautley Spout, one of the deep rocky clefts that slices through the fells, we pulled up outside the Cross Keys. It’s been an inn for 400 years and looks as old as the hills that dwarf it. It does brilliant ham and eggs and an amazing rabbit pie. But it doesn’t do booze. It’s a temperance pub. We thought they were joking at first. I ordered a lemonade and my friend had a pint of milk, which seemed wrong on so many levels. But, as we had driven here in a car which itself is almost teetotal when it comes to the hard stuff, it sort of made sense.
Porsche’s new Panamera S E-hybrid is a 410bhp supercharged V6 car. It can hit 62mph in a shade over five seconds and has a top speed of 168mph. It has barely there CO2 emissions of 71g per km – that’s about a third of what a Porsche 911 pumps out – and will do more than 90 miles to the gallon. It is, as my granny used say, a real Frugal Dougal. And, despite spending a week with the Panamera, I could never get over the whale-and-plankton fact that such a big car could have such a tiny appetite.
But there is no Derren Brown hoodoo here. This hybrid Porsche has two engines – the mighty V6 is paired with a 94bhp electric motor. If you fully charge the car’s 9.4kWh lithium-ion battery pack, you can drive using only this for about 22 miles. The electric propulsion is totally silent and this adds to the sense that some strange trickery is at work. Turn the key – silence. Press the throttle – silence. It feels like you are slipping on ice, rather than driving. Surely you shouldn’t have to check the dash’s ignition light to know whether your engine is actually on. And then the black arts really get underway – using this stealth engine alone you can drive at up to 84mph – in a Porsche with four seats, in Benedictine silence.
You can charge the battery using a conventional domestic socket – we unwound the flex and plugged into the outdoor socket of the pub to top up over lunch. It would take eight hours to do this fully – which would be a long lunch with no booze. A fast charger, however, could do the job in just two hours and, while you drive using the petrol motor, the car tops up its batteries as best it can using its regenerative braking system. If you use the V6 alone you’ll only get about 30mpg – which is poor but not terrible for a supercar and the combined engines mean at least you won’t suffer from range anxiety (#firstworldproblems).
All the extra gadgetry means the S E-Hybrid is at least 300kg heavier than a regular Panamera. That’s like having a baby elephant sitting in the passenger seat, all the time, and all that extra poundage makes the car feel sluggish and laboured at slow speeds. The faster you go the more secure and compelling the drive, like a boat hefting itself out of the water. Once at cruising speed, all that power matched with the active air suspension leads to a ride as soothing as a Bing Crosby lullaby.
Inside the Panamera is huge, your baby elephant could wriggle about in comfort on its individually adjustable seat. The car even has a boot – not something Porsches normally bother with. So, all in all, it’s a very clever car. But would it be a wise move to buy one? No, of course not. The V6 diesel version is 25 grand cheaper – you’ll need a lot of 8-hour lunches to save that – and being simpler has at least 25 things less to go wrong.
Cars in Coventry
Today is the final day of the Coventry Motofest – a three-day festival dedicated to the city’s motoring heritage involving pop-up motorsport displays, demonstration events, static displays, live music and fringe events. It’s well worth going along to have a look if you are in the area. Highlights include: a 1.5-mile sprint circuit on Coventry’s ring road, which will host a wide range of race cars and motorcycles; Rob Austin, one of the most popular drivers from the British Touring Car Championship and his Audi 4, plus all the teams from the Renault Clio Cup series; BTRDA Rallycross association cars including Gary Simpson’s BMW E30 Supermodified car and Gary Pusey’s Subaru Impreza Clubman Supercar; the Rover-BRM gas turbine race car; the Jigsaw Racing fleet of Le Mans Triumph Spitfires; a cavalcade of heritage vehicles from Jaguar, plus many live music events. For more details, go to coventrymotofest.com
Email Martin at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter @MartinLove166
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