We just rented a Toyota sienna hybrid. Was incredibly roomy and easy to drive. It wasn’t as good handling in the snowy roads (slipped a bit) but we have to assume the SLC hertz had all weather tires on it! We had a 7 seater reserved , the car they gave us was incredibly small (Kia sorento) and there is no way it would have held all of us and the luggage and ski gear. We upgraded to the minivan (note- they don’t even offer a minivan as a choice when we reserved the car). It’s been pretty cold here (fortunately we got snow and conditions improved) but we had no trouble starting the car. We didn’t drive in every day, and occasionally only to do a drop off at the slopes. That all said, the maintenance notice came on. It’s probably something routine.
Same thing happened with a Toyota Camry hybrid rental we had in Atlanta. Some warning light came on. Nothing was wrong…so we just drove, and then dropped the car off.
If you need a jump start, etc, at an airport there is most likely a service on site to assist. Thats how it is at BWI near me.
“If you need assistance with your car upon your return (dead battery, flat tire, etc), please call airport parking contractor SP+ at 410-859-9230.”
My 2018 prius prime has no spare tire, only stuff you spray onto or into tire so you can get somewhere to replace. I’ve never had any issues. When the dealer original tires rotted due to age and UV, I replaced them. I’m now on the 1st set I installed and finally drive far enough for Costco to rotate and balance them.
My friend in LA who drives a lot more than I only wanted to consider vehicles that had spare tires, not the kit to spray your tire until it could be serviced (she drives to/from Sacramento & San Diego and didn’t want to be stuck). She ended up with a Rav4, I think.
Yep. Same here. It just a a 2024 car so maybe due for something.
FYI - If you have a Toyota/Lexus hybrid, we’ve heard it is important to remember to change the battery fan air filter. I assume this is done at regular maintenance but something to be aware of (new to us).
One example tutorial
Some Newer Cars Are Missing a Spare Tire - Consumer Reports says that about 40% of new cars do not come with a spare tire, so this presumably includes a decent number of non-hybrid ICEVs as well as hybrids and EVs.
Cars without spare tires may have:
- Sealant kits, though they may not work for large or sidewall damage. A tire with sealant sprayed in it may be rather messy for the tire shop when it is replaced.
- Self-sealing tires. These have built-in sealant on the inside so that small punctures are sealed.
- Run-flat tires. However, they are only supposed to get you to a tire shop where they are supposed to be replaced after being run while flat.
- None of the above.
Cars without spare tires may or may not have dedicated spare tire storage spaces. If attempting to carry a spare tire in a car without a dedicated spare tire storage space, it must be secured somehow to avoid it becoming a flying object in a crash.
Run-flat tires and self-sealing tires have the problem of limited choices of replacement tire when they wear out or are damaged, if you want the replacement to have the run-flat or self-sealing feature.
Recommended tire pressure of 43 psi? No thanks. 
We just keep a tire inflator in our X for those little tire under inflated emergencies.
With a floor pump, your body weight helps with the pumping. I found that it takes about 10 pumps for 1 psi in a car tire, which is no big deal for topping up tires in the autumn as temperatures fall. But it may be less convenient for a large SUV or truck tire.
Some of the small portable 12V air compressors are very slow and seem to make a lot of noise and heat while pumping small amounts of air into the tire.
Most cars sold in the US come with all season tires (with an “M+S” marking), which have some minimum level of snow capability (i.e. they are not summer tires that have no snow capability), but generally not as good as what a dedicated winter tire, or a winter-biased all season tire with the 3-peak-mountain-snowflake marking would have. Probably the rental van had whatever all season tires came with it when new.
If your car does not come with a spare tire, what you can add:
- Nothing, just rely on roadside assistance if you get a flat tire. For slow leaks, add air at fuel stations as needed to get to the tire shop.
- A pump, so that you can handle the slow leak situation without needing to find a fuel station.
- A pump, tire plug kit, and tire removal and installation tools (jack that fits your car’s jack points, wrench that fits your car’s lug nuts/bolts, torque wrench with socket for your car’s lug nuts/bolts) to be able to make a plug repair if there is a puncture in the tread.
- A pump with sealant kit to be able to try to seal a puncture in the tread.
- A spare tire and tire removal and installation tools. If there is no dedicated spare tire storage space, finding a way to store it securely and safely is necessary.
As a recap. We have three vehicles.
- ICE Toyota Highlander
- ICE Diesel F 350
- Tesla X
So, Toyota is all packed up and ready to meet kids at the snow cabin. And, it doesn’t start. Sounds like a dead battery. Okay…Let’s suck it up and use the F350 (I don’t like the way it rides) And what the Heck…also a dead battery. (it has a known problem vampire drain and hadn’t been started in a few weeks)
We both stare at the Tesla…um NOPE. No charger within 30 miles of our cabin. And, it is currently only charged to 80% so we’d need to make two stops. One to top it off and the second to fill it before leaving the final charger - 30+ miles from our end destination. Calculate a drop in mileage due to cold weather and hauling a bunch of stuff. We don’t have a Tesla charger installed at the cabin so it would be a trickle from the 220V dryer plug…Which would necessitate a very long cable. And, the amount of additional milage over night is very low on a 220V plug. Too much of a hassle.
Got the Toyota started…off to car store, bad battery test. Replaced with a new one…and off we went.
Yes, we could have planned the trip around charging as close to 100% as possible before leaving the last charger behind on our way to cabin. BUT, if the Tesla charger station is busy you can only charge to 80%. Even if not busy…the last 20% goes at a slower rate.
We are up in snow country…there is always a chance power will go out…sometimes for a few days! OOOPS…then what?? Requires more trips to the store due to less in home cooking and needing to entertain kids!
So, again, IMO…an EV is nice if you have a planned out life. Love THIS car and every mile I drive it. LOVE the update every holiday which continues to add features - even to cars that are 5+ years old. But…would I ever want it to be my only choice. Nope.
Depends on the car. Our EV was parked for 18 days and lost only a few %. But some drain faster.
A 240V dryer receptacle is typically a 30A receptacle on which you can do 24A EV charging on. However, the Model X is less efficient than the S, 3, or Y, so it would only add an estimated 14 rated miles per hour (so about 112 rated miles for an 8 hour overnight charge). But actual miles may be less if you use the cabin heater a lot or otherwise consume more energy than rated.
Rated miles = EPA estimates for ICE.
So…pretty much useless in real life calculations 
Point being…my ICE Toyota is a mile away from a full tank…and fillable since the station has a back up generator in case of power failures.
Except when my daughter is home from school, we are EV-only now (two EVs though). In this situation as described, I would rather rent an ICE car than take an EV. I agree that the planning aspect would make me uncomfortable.
We do take the EV several times a year to a variety of places. I’m willing to be far from a charger if I’m familiar with the lodging layout, and comfortable with my wall charging option. (Example: we take an annual December trip to a barrier island six hours from home in the EV, the closest fast charger is 65 miles from the rental. Since we stay in the same rental every year, we know we can pull in at night on Friday, plug into the wall charger. We do not need the car while we’re there, so we’re good to go by the time we leave on Sunday afternoon.)
But for a trip to someplace unfamiliar, I will pick my lodging based on proximity to a fast charger. In deitz199’s example, that cabin is not close enough to the charger, and it doesn’t sound like there was enough advance time for planning out the charging (you have plan to arrive with enough charge already to be able to use the wall charger to get you out of there). I would most likely rent an ICE car.
The Craftsmen tire pump that I posted above inflated all 4 tires of a car that I had in storage in 10 +/- minutes. And the tires were very low, about 5-10 psi range. The noise and heat (of the pump) aren’t bad at all, but of course it is an air compressor.
To each his or her own.
H and I have acute range anxiety and opt for ICE rentals when we rent. We own a plug in hybrid and H put in a deposit for a Camary hybrid with the 360 camera. That one doesn’t plug in and is just fine with us. I don’t like worrying whether I have enough range—it makes me and H too anxious. I don’t want to have to re-charge EVs we rent either.
Rental car in an unfamiliar area is one of the worse cases for EV use.
This probably explains why Hertz’ big EV buy a few years back (during the car shortage when all car prices were high) was a failure, and now they are selling off the EVs. That does mean that if you do want to buy an ex-Hertz EV, there may be some good deals:
IMO one of the reasons the hertz ev rental didn’t work is that renters don’t have the app and some of the easy connectivity may have been challenging, as voice commands would not be active, I would think, and having to type in nav commands would be cumbersome. Also, not sure how charging would work if one doesn’t have an account with a credit card. If the charge went to hertz who knows what the markup would be… This is just a guess, but there is also a bit of a learning curve to the car, and renting without someone to point out some of the resources might be uncomfortable.