Hello,

I just paid $27k, for our Toyota agency in Saudi Arabia for Hybrid CAMRY 2019. I was quite confident about this purchase, but I saw a YouTube video for a Saudi man talking about his experience with the Hybrid CAMRY 2018 after 20000 km, and was saying that the car isn't like when he purchased it.

It was running 200km with the fuel pointer at the top as he fill it to full tank, it runs 200km and the fuel pointer still at the top.

But after running 20000km the efficiency decreased, as the can now runs 250km with the fuel full, but the fuel pointer is pulled down more than before it runs like the first quarter.

That means the battery efficiency decreases after a time.

Now what should I do? I live in a hot country, and people say on forums that it's not OK to put the hybrid car under the sun.

And mostly the car would be under the sun, which is a tropical weather in our region, it's not like Europe or USA.

 

I drove a 2007 Camry hybrid in Phoenix over 100K miles (~160Km) over 9 years. Phoenix is in the Sonoran desert with a climate very similar to Saudi Arabia. My car was parked in an open parking lot at work 5 days a week. There was never a heat issue with the car. The milage stayed pretty much the same the entire time I kept the car. Only the 12V battery needed one replacement at about 7 years. The only reason I sold the car was because Lexus finally released their version, the ES300h in 2013, so I upgraded to the Lexus version of the same car (except the Lexus is built on the Avalon platform with is slightly larger than the Camry). Both cars were/have been nearly trouble free.

 

People on Telegram say that USA get Hybrid cars with Lithium batteries and we in the middle east get the ones with Nickel batteries. And there are a lot of sayings that Nickel batteries are prone to fail, can't hold with HOT climate, they won't last long enough until I need to change the batteries, so there's not much of a saving here!

Also, the most idea I thought of is that, Hybrid cars are new in our country and there's not much of an experience about this technology, and the only way to fix the car if something fails is the car's official agency maintenance center which is HIGH costly and also the batteries are expensive too.

I thought to leave this idea for several years until Hybrid cars get much more in our market and get a good reputation, and statistics about its savings ratios, then in that time the idea would be more reasonable to buy one.

 

"People on Telegram" are full of crap. Battery type depends ONLY on manufacturer/model. Some are Nickel, some are lithium. If a given make/model has Nickel in the U.S., it has Nickel everywhere else. If a given make/model has Lithium in the U.S., it has Lithium everywhere else.

As Alan indicated, Phoenix climate is highly similar to Saudi Arabia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix,_Arizona#Climate

On average, it's a little hotter than Riyadh:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riyadh#Climate

My personal experience with approximately 200 Nickel hybrids in the Phoenix area puts about 2/3 of battery failures at 225,000 km to 274,000 km. Low outlier is 135,000 km and high outlier is 621,000 km. Pretty common for many to exceed 322,000 km.

Your idea that this is somehow an unproven technology when it comes to heat suggests that you don't know how to use Google or your search results are censored.

You can do the savings calculation yourself: Compare the annual fuel cost between the two vehicles based on their mpg ratings. Given the very low price of gas in Saudi Arabia, it's highly likely that you would never break even when you factor in the additional cost of the hybrid model over the non-hybrid model. With such low fuel prices, the only reasons to drive a hybrid is for personal desire or environmental reasons.

 

Yes, well .. anyway, the agent called me today to convince me more. I actually don't care much because the car isn't so bad, and hybrid cars don't have a bad reputation.

They seem OK until now, and of course with the American experience with hybrid cars, it seem pretty well. My first doubt is that the climate in USA is cloudy most the time, an it is actually in most of USA states, but some states; like, Arizona, Miami and Texas have more sunny days. So yeah, the reputation from USA side seem to be OK with hybrid cars.

And as you said it's about the preference, but as you mentioned that the possibility that I may put additional costs in the hybrid! Is that true? Do hybrid cars require additional costs?

How likely that possibility is to be, is it often, less or rare which means that hybrid cars would save fuel and money as well?

I don't want to get in more problems in the future, the main complain that people say in the telegram is that the battery may fail and in that time and money I saved in fuel would be paid for a new battery!

It's all doubts to me now, but I hope everything works well. I said to the agent .. well, just send the car with the good hopes that I would actually enjoy its ride and some fuel saves.

 

If you don't care, why did you ask?

Had you bothered to read the links for Phoenix and Riyadh, you wouldn't have made "cloudy" comments.

From the previously provided links:

Hours of sunshine per year:
Riyadh: 3224
Phoenix: 3871

Phoenix is hotter and has more sunshine than Riyadh. Phoenix is a harsher climate. Period.

Hybrids by their very nature are more complex and costly to repair. They have two propulsion systems. That said, the Toyota hybrids are extremely reliable, but when they break, it's expensive.

 

I'm sorry I said that expression but didn't clear it more!

I meant by "I don't care much" is that eventually it's not a huge issue. I mean I don't care whether I get a gas or hybrid car. What I care most is this:
This is what I care most, I don't want to get in troubles in the future, but also you said that they extremely reliable.

But the question is, "Is a hybrid car better than a gas car?" At least for the current time, or for me in Saudi Arabia as we don't have the gas price getting very high. Now 91 octane is $0.37/L

That's not very expensive as in other countries. Maybe my decision to buy a hybrid car wasn't a wise one!

But even if the oil price in Saudi Arabia is fairly cheap, the question still arises "Is it a good idea to get a hybrid car?"

No, because the information you provided to me was enough and I know that there are hot regions in USA not all cloudy and cold ones, USA actually contain most of the weathers in the world HOT/CLOUDY/SNOWY.

WOW Phoenix is actually hotter than Riyadh. Thanks for the information.

Thank you for providing me you opinion and sharing my concern.

My only fear is the maintenance, I don't care about the other things.

I still can cancel my purchase order and get my money back, but I don't know I'm not sure until this moment.