You may have heard hybrid cars being talked a lot about, after all they’re becoming increasingly popular – but what exactly are hybrid cars? How do hybrid cars work? And, crucially, why has there been a 40% increase in hybrid electrical vehicle registrations from January 2022 to January 2023?

In this article Ucan provides answers to all of your questions around what hybrid vehicles are and how they work. Let’s get straight into it.

 

What are hybrid cars?

Hybrid vehicles are powered both by a traditional combustion engine, and by electricity. They primarily use a conventional combustion motor to help run and move the car, while electrical battery systems charge simultaneously and can be switched to-and-fro as the primary power source.

By utilising multiple power sources, electric vehicles (EVs) are typically less fossil fuel dependant than combustion-only traditional vehicles; and are more environmentally friendly.

 

Types of hybrid cars:

There is not just one type of hybrid vehicle, and they all work in slightly different ways.

Here is a breakdown of how each of them works:

 

Mild Hybrid

Mild hybrids run the normal conventional way of fuel powered engines. These models usually cannot run on electricity alone and instead use the electric motor as a boost to support the internal combustion engine (ICE engine). As a result, the charging system on mild hybrids are your traditional petrol or diesel fuelling rather than electrical plugins.

However due to them being partially electric, their batteries recharge through regenerative braking. Regenerative braking allows for the batteries to recharge through encapsulating the kinetic energy created when braking and converting it back into electrical energy to recharge the batteries.

Mild hybrid vehicles are generally manual and have a larger battery than your regular petrol/diesel car.

Examples of mild hybrids that we currently offer include:

 

Full Hybrid

Full hybrid vehicles generally work through power split hybrid drivetrains meaning the motors can work both electrically and together with the ICE engine.

Through this, recharging the battery either works through generating energy via regenerative braking or acceleration and coasting (e.g., the car being in neutral, or your clutch pedal being held down).

In terms of power ratio, full hybrid cars operate using the electric motors meaning it uses electricity to power the vehicle at lower speeds but only for short distances. Because of this, it runs more efficiently and economically friendly, however with this, it makes full hybrid vehicles slightly pricier than your mild hybrid vehicles.

Similarly, to mild hybrid vehicles usually have larger batteries compared to traditional petrol/diesel fuelled cars.

Examples of full hybrids we offer here at Ucan includes:

 

Plugin Hybrid

As the bridge from hybrid to complete electric vehicles, we have the plugin hybrids. Plugin hybrid cars work by self-charging their batteries using the energy their combustion (petrol or diesel) engine creates but they also can be plugged in into an electrical charging point to charge its electric battery.

They operate in two ways:

  • Fully electric
  • Using both electric motor and ICE engine.

In simple terms, you can drive them electrically and when the battery runs out, it will use fuel. With hybrid plugins, you can travel up to 40 miles on electric power.

They are often a pricier type of hybrid, however, they certainly remove range anxiety you get with EVs due to it extending mileage.

Examples of plugin hybrids we offer include:

 

Find a Hybrid car for you:

Now you know how hybrid cars work and the types of hybrid cars, if you are interested in learning more or investing in one, you have come to the right place.

For more options on used hybrid cars we offer at Ucan, take a look at our wide range of Ucan vehicles we have an available with new cars coming through every day. Get the showroom experience with Ucan.

Want more? Experience driving a hybrid vehicle of your choice through booking in a test drive through our showroom page – get the most out of choosing the right car for you with Ucan. Just click your favourite hybrid car and fill in the simple form to request a test drive