Tesla Model 3 dominates UK EV sales figures The Model 3 is the best selling car in the UK in 2019 to date Tesla’s Model 3 has taken the UK electric car market by storm, with more than 5,300 units registered in Q3 2019. The pure-electric saloon outsold the following four best-sellers combined for the three months covering July to September according to recently updated Department for Transport (DfT) figures. It has also shot into first place in the year’s sales charts, despite having only been on sale for a fraction of that time. Now that deliveries of the Model 3 have fully come on stream in the UK, Tesla’s most accessible model is only likely to continue that trend for the foreseeable future. Although the cheapest model in Tesla’s range, buyers opted for the most-expensive specification – the Model 3 Performance – most out of the three available trim levels. The Performance version has taken 42% of Model 3 registrations to the end of September 2019, while the entry-level Model 3 Standard Range + has accounted for a third of sales, leaving the Long Range model with 25% of the mix. Having only had 173 Model 3 units registered in Q2 2019 – deliveries only really started towards the quarter – Tesla has shifted huge numbers of the premium electric saloon since. With 5,311 units registered according to DfT data, it made the second best-selling electric vehicle in Q3 2019 VW’s e-Golf. Volkswagen shifted almost 1,200 units, putting the electric Golf just ahead of the ever popular Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV. The Mitsubishi sits in third place for Q3 2019, with 1,177 registered during that time. Rounding out Q3’s best-sellers are the BMW i3 – now predominantly pure-EV registrations since i3 REX models have been phased out. With 1,135 registrations, it sits ahead of the Nissan Leaf’s 1,118 registrations, and Jaguar’s I-Pace with 1,057. The Mini Countryman Cooper S E, BMW 330e, and BMW 530e come in ahead of the Range Rover Sport P400e, LEVC TX range-extended taxi, and Renault Zoe. It’s worth remembering with the BMW models and the Zoe that these are end of run versions, with updated models released since the end of Q3 2019. These are likely to start appearing in the next set of figures for the BMW PHEVs, and in Q1 2020’s results for the Renault. It’s encouraging to see that pure-electric models have taken many of the top places in Q3. The Model 3, e-Golf, Leaf and I-Pace show plenty of blue on the left of the above table. The BMW i3’s figures are largely pure-electric too, with only 53 of the i3’s quarterly figures made up of i3 REX models. A similar picture is painted for 2019 to date, with all of Tesla’s Model 3 figures accounted for since the start of the year. It leads the table for the first nine months of 2019, and it seems exceptionally unlikely that it will be replaced when the next set of statistics for 2019 as a whole are released in March next year. The other models remain, though in a different order. The Outlander PHEV is in second place for the year with more than 4,600 registrations, BMW’s i3 with over 3,000 units, the Jaguar I-Pace with almost 2,900 registrations, and the Mini Countryman Cooper S E just 11 units behind the I-Pace with 2,863 registrations. It’s still a little early for the Model 3 to have an impact on the UK’s total plug-in sales charts, where the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV retains its significant lead. In fact it’s stretching the gap between it and the Nissan Leaf in second place – but only just. Mitsubishi has seen 43,616 Outlander PHEVs registered to the end of Q3 2019, compared to the 26,766 Nissan Leaf models registered, increasing the lead by almost 60 units compared to Q2’s figures. The BMW i3 retains third place, ahead of the BMW 330e and BMW 530e, with around 15,000, 14,000 and 11,000 registrations respectively. The Mercedes Benz C 350e comes in ahead of the Renault Zoe, Tesla’s Model S, the VW Golf GTE, and Mini’s Countryman Cooper S E for the top cumulative registrations. The Model 3 misses out on the top 10 total UK electric vehicle sales then, but only just. Having had registrations for just over three months of the figures available – which go back to the start of 2012 – it sits in 11th place overall, and has already overtaken UK sales of the Tesla Model X, which has been on sale since Q4 2019. Newer pure-electric entrants include the MG ZS EV and Mercedes Benz EQC, which only became available towards the end of Q3 2019. As such, we expect Q4’s registrations to significantly improve on the 66 MG models and 47 EQCs registered so far. Relative growth naturally saw a big increase for the Model 3, up more than 3000% compared to the Q2 2019. PHEVs such as BMW’s 745e saw a 120% increase between the two sets of statistics, and sales of the Mercedes Benz E 300 de increased by 87%. The pure-electric Audi e-tron showed growth of 78%. All of these are new models for the quarter – with only a handful of sales accounted for in Q2 – picking up
Origin: Tesla Model 3 dominates UK EV sales figures
figures
This 25,000-piece Hot Wheels collection is for sale for six figures
When someone is set to splash north of a hundred grand on a car collection, it would be logically assumed at least one of the vehicles in the purchase would be able to move under its own power.Not this time. A collector in Virginia is parting with their entire fleet for US$125,000 and theres not a runner among them.Oh, yeah, did we mention its a Hot Wheels collection?An enormous Hot Wheels collection, to be precise. With the seller asserting there are no duplicates, nearly 25,000 of the toy cars are on offer. Like all good car ads, it contains the holy trinity of classified prose: bad grammar, a claim stating they know what they have, and assurances theyre definitely not parting it out.Spotted on a Hot Wheels collector page on Facebook by the gearheads at Hagerty, the ad contains twenty-six pictures of a mammoth Hot Wheels collection. The toy cars line walls, are neatly stacked on shelves and are displayed on a large dining room table. Asking price is in the US$125,000 ballpark according to the seller, though that sum was tossed out in the ads comment section and not in the advertisement copy itself.Everything looks to be meticulously organized and catalogued, with many of the models bearing a colored sticker dot on their box and others methodically arranged by year hung on enormous pegboards. Its a delightfully psychotic attention to detail.While $125,000 is certainly a lot of cheddar, it seems like a veritable bargain when one considers that collector Bruce Pascal once shelled out over $70,000 for a pre-production prototype Volkswagen Beach Bomb Surf Bus in hot pink. That toys current valuation? About double that amount.Included in the asking price are all the displays, so at least youll have a spot to park all these non-running
Origin: This 25,000-piece Hot Wheels collection is for sale for six figures
Octobers pureEV figures up 150 on last year
October’s pure-EV figures up 150% on last year October 2019 was the third best month ever for pure electric sales Pure-electric vehicle registrations in the UK achieved their third best month ever in October 2019 – and the highest total outside of a new registration plate month – according to the latest statistics from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT). Pure-EV figures are up 152% compared to October 2018, and the fuel type is 133% ahead of the first ten months of 2018. More than 28,000 pure-electric models have been registered so far in 2019; over 54,000 plug-in vehicles when PHEVs are included in the figures. Combined sales of electric cars – pure-EVs and plug-in hybrids – are 10% up on 2018 year-to-date, showcasing how well pure-electric models have performed this year, and the relative lack of registrations for PHEVs. Plug-in cars account for 2.7% of all models registered in 2019 so far, with pure-EVs accounting for a little over a half of that figure. With new registration plates out in March and September, the two months traditionally record the greatest number of new cars sold across all fuel types. As such, for October 2019’s pure-electric registrations to be the next highest total after September’s figure of more than 7,700 and over 3,900 sales in March earlier this year, it represents a real show of strength for what is a fast-growing market. Where 2018’s total combined electric vehicle market share – EV and PHEV – ended up on 2.5%, pure-electric models are approaching that figure on its own. The combined figure for 2019 to date is 2.7%, and the last 12 months show a share of 2.9%. Average registrations for 2019 now stand at more than 2,800 for pure-EVs and a little over 2,600 for PHEVs. A combined figure of approaching 5,500 registrations a month for 2019 is around 500 units a month ahead of 2018’s total, and 2019’s figures are accelerating as the year goes on.
Origin: Octobers pureEV figures up 150 on last year
Toyota may have underrated the Supra’s torque figures
Toyota’s 2020 Supra is fitted with a BMW engine, but not in the full-blooded 382-horsepower trim the German brand is saving for its top-of-the-line Z4. Instead, Toyota’s version of the engine is detuned to make a little less power—or so we thought. According to Car and Driver, the 2020 Toyota Supra actually makes more horsepower than advertised. The publication previously found the BMW M5 was also making a lot more power on a dynamometer machine than what was quoted, so they decided to reproduce the test with the new sports car from Japan. When strapped to the dyno, the engine made 339 horsepower and 427 lb.-ft. of torque at the wheels, which is a damn sight higher than the 335 horsepower and 365 lb.-ft. of torque Toyota said it would be making at the crank. This substantiates the publication’s test drive of the vehicle, which saw it sprint to 96 km/h in just 3.8 seconds; and cover the quarter-mile in a staggering 12.3 seconds, outperforming a BMW M2 Competition (which uses a 410-horsepower version of the same engine) and eke-ing into bigger-Bimmer territory. Dyno tests aren’t always the most accurate, and this one should be taken with a grain of salt. The test vehicle was also a press car from Toyota, so it’s entirely possible the automaker turned up the boost for the test, but this does show not only is the engine in the new Supra worthy of the sports car, but also a great starting point to push into the higher echelons of
Origin: Toyota may have underrated the Supra’s torque figures
All about car 