Currently I see only second hand, year or two old Leafs as the only realistic finacial option. In those cases only as a second car or for someone that does lots of city driving.

I'd love to buy an electric car, especially with 11 and 12 plates Leafs from 10k to 13k with battery included, but a couple of things have prevented me.

Firstly the driving room is way to small and the front seats don't go back anywhere near far enough. This isn't just the Leaf, most cars in general have this problem. Secondly I often travel a 75 mile trip, this is within range (in normal weather), but an accident or road closure would snooker me. 150 mile range is what I'm after.

Edited by carl_a on 12/12/2013 at 11:05

Perhaps you should contact the writer and question the credibility of his article, then share the response on this thread?

The article quotes "3 key areas where Formula One engine thinking" (whatever that means) has been used in the design of the revised 1.6 diesel.

1 Undersquare, oversquare or simply square is a debate that has been going on since the internal combustion engine was invented. Each has advantages but for race engines big bores have been the norm for many years. You don't need to be an F1 engineer to realise that if the engine has a bigger bore you can fit bigger valves. Many manufacturers use big bore engines today, its not exclusive to Renault.

2 Waterflow designs have improved as casting techniques and materials have been improved by all manufacturers. One example is most cars have bypass circuits to improve their warm up times.

3 Designs, machining techniques and materials to reduce friction and improve efficiency have again been developed over the years by all manufacturers. If a piston ring is being used that takes its design from one used in F1 for the past 10 years I would guess the F1 engineers have come up with a better design for next seasons engines. They are not going to allow competitors to by a humble 1.6 diesel and copy a feature that possibly makes the F1 engine unbeatable are they.

Its just a publicity article that has been written to make the gullible buying public think that Renault are putting F1 engines into Clio Diesels. Its journalism and it proves nothing.