[HN Gopher] The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry
___________________________________________________________________
The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry
Author : pseudolus
Score : 136 points
Date : 2025-01-18 12:38 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (spectrum.ieee.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (spectrum.ieee.org)
| epolanski wrote:
| Probably the most influential vehicle in the last century along
| the Model S.
| actionfromafar wrote:
| Last sliding window century?
| cmcconomy wrote:
| the definition of century would have have to include the
| release date of the prius and the model s, hope this helps
| epolanski wrote:
| Yes, otherwise none can match the Model T under some "most
| influential" umbrella.
|
| I agree it was somewhat confusing taking a "sliding" century
| as to mean century, should've said something else.
| hedora wrote:
| Also, the minvan (suv), and probably other body styles. When
| were pickup trucks introduced?
| rascul wrote:
| Early 1900s
| hedora wrote:
| Did ones with modern body style arrive before or after 1925
| though?
| blackoil wrote:
| Hope Toyota get their mojo back for EVs.
| Cumpiler69 wrote:
| Kinda doubt it. They also suffer from large company inertia
| where their hybrid powertrains gave them a market leadership,
| similar to German cars and diesel engines, making difficult to
| pivot to a market where there's much stronger competition and
| they don't have the crown anymore.
| hedora wrote:
| My German EV was introduced a decade ago, and it's still
| great!
|
| I think a better comparison is to the Italians.
|
| Stellantis bought up a bunch of iconic brands when they got
| Chrysler and then integrated a bunch of new technology from
| Fiat. Since then, they've focused on creature comforts and
| margin expansion, but neglected everything else.
|
| They recently realized their sales projections are headed for
| a cliff and unceremoniously fired their CEO.
| jfim wrote:
| What EV model would that be, out of curiosity? I wasn't
| aware the Germans were making EVs back then.
| cowsandmilk wrote:
| BMW i3 came on market in 2013
| ncruces wrote:
| Or an e-Golf.
| kla-s wrote:
| Yeah its a mixed bag in germany in my eyes. All of the big
| brands have a real electric platform minus BMW. 800V isnt
| pioneered with them either.
|
| VDA is pressuring for HVO100 bs. Mercedes just pulled back
| on the electric only strategy. I guess they figured that
| most of the added value is with the batteries and being
| deeply integrated there and thats not really their cup of
| tea, so far at least.
|
| There where Taycans for 30k$ which was a real great deal if
| your the second buyer and not the first.
|
| On the other hand the id family looks ok, facelift good.
| The a6 is pricey at 100k but is the first really capable
| german highway ev, not as premature as the eqs...
| hedora wrote:
| What's wrong with BMW's platform?
|
| The technology (e.g. heat pump, carbon fiber/aluminum
| body), user interface and fuel economy (not range) of my
| old i3 are all competitive with the 2022-2024 EVs I've
| driven.
|
| Unless they somehow regressed 10 years, the only obvious
| problem with the new BMW EVs is that none offer a third
| row.
| germinalphrase wrote:
| An off lease A6 in a couple years will probably be a
| great deal.
| pfdietz wrote:
| Maybe if their solid state batteries work out? How has that
| Hail Mary move been going?
| CharlieDigital wrote:
| I'm kinda OK with them just dominating hybrids; especially
| plugins.
|
| I own a 2024 Prius Prime (PHEV) and the setup works great. No
| range anxiety, no special charging infra (I just plug in on a
| normal 120v overnight). I got the car in Feb 24 and maybe
| pumped gas a total of 8 times? If I didn't make two longer
| trips, it would have been 6.
|
| But also, the power output is pretty great and an upgrade over
| the hybrid only model.
|
| It feels like the sweet spot for most Americans and doesn't
| require any real lifestyle change.
|
| Big shame is that dealers aren't necessarily charging them on
| the lot. So if you test drive one, you might only feel the
| hybrid and not the EV mode.
| inciampati wrote:
| A regular EV also requires no special infrastructure. Just
| your regular house electrical system (e.g. 120v wall outlet
| in the US). Only on long trips do you need fast chargers or
| does range anxiety kick in. If you do a lot of long drives I
| can see that being a problem. But if not I'd be willing to
| bet you'd lose less time charging than taking your vehicle to
| the mechanic for maintenance and repairs. Because the EV,
| when built well, requires a frighteningly low amount of
| maintenance.
| CharlieDigital wrote:
| Problem is that because it's a full EV, it might leave me
| at a deficit charging only on 120v.
|
| On the other hand, two days a week I make a drive that's
| just beyond EV range and the hybrid just kicks in
| afterwards.
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| Based on the limited info you've shared, you don't seem
| to drive enough to be at a deficit. Maybe it will take
| the night to charge the 10-20% you've used during the
| day, but you have a big buffer.
|
| You can't pick a car with a small battery though as that
| will cause problems on long trips. Something around 80
| kWh should be enough for most people.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| >> If you do a lot of long drives
|
| >> the EV, when built well
|
| Home charging at 120v for an EV is only practical for the
| most minimal & predictable use. And I'll add "as long as
| you don't want to sell it used..."
| wat10000 wrote:
| You'll typically add 50 miles of range overnight, which
| is more than the average person drives in a day. That's
| not minimal. Unpredictability is buffered by the large
| battery. You can drive 200 miles one day then slowly fill
| it back up. Fast chargers can be a backup for the
| occasional times it's not enough.
|
| Why would there be an issue with selling it used when
| doing this?
| sobriquet9 wrote:
| Nobody is interested in used EVs, therefore resale values
| are very low.
| wat10000 wrote:
| As written here, it's presented as a specific
| disadvantage of charging from a 120V outlet, so that's
| not it.
| Toutouxc wrote:
| I've been hearing that for years now, and for years I've
| had an eye on the used EV market, and I don't really see
| that happening here in Europe.
| wat10000 wrote:
| I think it was true, at least in the US, back then the
| Leaf was the most common EV. Their battery longevity was
| trash, they had poor range to start with, and tax credits
| pushed down the effective new price a lot.
| isignal wrote:
| Resale values are lower in US because they factor in the
| 7.5k USD tax credit and the state tax credit mostly,
| there is plenty of demand for used teslas for example.
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| Similar in other countries but sometimes not as direct.
|
| Various regulations set targets which gives manufacturers
| incentives to hit sales targets. This leads to discounts
| or great lease deals just before certain dates if targets
| aren't met through standard prices.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| The resale values are only low compared to the inflated
| COVID prices. A 3 year old Tesla 3 goes for about $25k.
| Which is painful if you paid $70k for the 3. However, the
| buyer is comparing to a new 3 which you can get for $35k
| after tax credit.
|
| The opposite will occur when Trump cancels the credit.
| recursive wrote:
| Resale values are low compared to new prices. Tell me,
| why does your logic not apply to new prices?
| jajko wrote:
| Not really. Living in Switzerland, colleague has Model S,
| and over whole night plugged in his house he can charge
| only around 9km/h. That basically covers his commute but he
| can't build up charge for the weekend if he started week
| empty. Not even going into the fact that most folks here
| live in apartments and not standalone houses, and charging
| situation there is usually terrible and overhead of owning
| electric car is significant.
|
| That sucks tremendously (on top of other tesla-related suck
| like extremely expensive OEM replacement parts that nobody
| else can service), and considering we talk about
| Switzerland here (and expensive well developed part of it),
| other countries are not that better off if at all.
|
| As a backup, non-critical second car, why not if you feel
| like an early adopter and paying >40k for a function a used
| 5k car can perform even better. Main family car? No thank
| you, maybe for half the cost but probably even that's too
| much in this decade.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Is it that expensive to get an electric car charger
| installed?
|
| I just got two installed for $800, and the charger itself
| is $420 each. Even if a circuit panel had to be upgraded
| and some wire needed to be run, surely it is only a
| couple thousand extra at most.
| orev wrote:
| Seems like you might have a case of SV myopia. The idea
| that $1640 plus "a few thousand extra" to be able to
| drive a very expensive vehicle would be not "that
| expensive" is pretty out of touch.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Electric vehicles are not "very" expensive, even in
| Europe, and it's a capital expense. That charger is going
| to be useful for decades to come.
|
| And if electric vehicles pencil out in the US to equal
| cost of gas cars including oil changes and all that, then
| surely they do in Europe with their higher gas costs.
| bosie wrote:
| Can you put numbers to not very expensive? Looking at vw
| for their ev equivalents, for me personally, it qualifies
| as very expensive (without subsidies)
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I tried to find new gas vs electric car sale prices in a
| couple European countries, but I couldn't easily find a
| reputable source.
|
| With how active European governments are on legislation
| to curb carbon emissions, I assumed the proposition of a
| new electric vehicle to a new gas vehicle would be at
| least as good as the US (over the lifetime of the car,
| higher initial cost for EV, but lower maintenance costs).
|
| https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-
| transportation/europe...
|
| Of course, this only applies to people with a home with a
| space to park and charge their car, and whose everyday
| destinations are mostly within an hour.
|
| Edit: looks like small diesel cars are still available in
| Europe, so taking those as the base option, I can see how
| an EV would be expensive. This option doesn't exist in
| the US, though.
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/germany/comments/1bfhpnl/does_it
| _ma...
| gWPVhyxPHqvk wrote:
| Not OP but my power company gave me $1500, I only had to
| pay like $300 in total. There's currently (or, was, as
| may be the case in a few days) a ton of
| credits/assistance.
| ctchocula wrote:
| A new 200A electrical panel costs $5000-6000 to be
| installed with a permit in SV. If you want to run 50A
| wire for an L2 charger that might be $1000-2000 more.
| Getting close to $10000, so I'd say it is fairly
| expensive.
| Epa095 wrote:
| If the numbers I find online for tesla power usage is
| correct, that would indicate that she charges with around
| 1.8 kW. But most homes should have little problem
| supplying the double (16 ampere with 230v = 3.680kW). But
| maybe she is stuck with 10 ampere?
|
| But even with 9km/h I am surprised that's not enough,
| does she really drive more than 108km a day?
|
| (this is not to take away from her experience, I am just
| surprised)
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Europe has higher voltage, 230, so should go faster than
| charging from 120V.
| thaw13579 wrote:
| For many people in cities, it's hard to secure parking with
| reliable access to an electrical outlet.
| c5karl wrote:
| Not just in cities. In the U.S. at least, a lot of people
| live in suburban townhouse complexes that have shared
| parking lots. It's going to take a lot of investment to
| make charging easy for everyone.
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| Something that makes it easier to own EVs here in London
| (UK) are these chargers on lampposts, there are probably
| thousands of them at this point:
| https://i.imgur.com/1YdeVwf.png
|
| They're slow (3-7kW), can't be installed everywhere,
| there are not enough if everyone wants to charge at the
| same time, and some areas still don't have them, but plug
| it in when you arrive and you should be fine to go in the
| morning. It's a good idea and more places should adopt
| it.
| idontwantthis wrote:
| That wouldn't be a problem for the op with the phev
| because they are already charging at home and only
| driving less than 30 miles each day except 8 times in the
| past year. I still don't get why phevs are a thing.
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| The downside of plugins is that it has both systems (more
| things that can go wrong, added cost, weight) and they're not
| amazing at being an ICE car (small fuel tank) or electric car
| (small battery).
|
| In your case it seems that a pure EV would be fine? Maybe not
| one with a small battery, but 300-400 miles of range isn't
| that uncommon these days.
|
| In any case, the important thing is that it works well for
| you.
| boutell wrote:
| It's also not great that people sometimes buy them because
| of breaks on price and then keep them where they can't plug
| them in, which is the worst of both worlds. But a properly
| used plug-in hybrid can be a good thing for some yeah
| nullhole wrote:
| Re: being a gas-powered car: they seem fine in terms of
| tank size, 11 litres for a prius prime vs 13 litres for a
| gas corolla from the 2010s. You get better fuel efficiency,
| too, so your effective range is likely at least as good as
| a regular gasoline car.
|
| The added complexity / part count is definitely a downside,
| though.
|
| Edit: er, now I'm not sure about my second statement:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42748610
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| Regarding the complexity, I believe Toyota has been ahead
| of the (hybrid) competition for many years, but a PHEV
| still has two different systems. Everything that can go
| bad on a pure EV (battery, electric motors, charging
| system) is there and even if the ICE part is simpler,
| it's still something that can break.
|
| With this said, other reports of batteries going bad on
| old Prius, I haven't read much about them being
| unreliable, so it should be fine while the car is fairly
| new.
| gadiyar wrote:
| I think you meant gallons and not litres. At least the
| Prius prime seems to have a 10.6 gallon tank.
| arwhatever wrote:
| Also importantly, it's now quite good-looking, too.
| CharlieDigital wrote:
| And as much power as an early 2000's V6 Maxima. Great daily
| driver; seats are just so-so though.
| tzs wrote:
| How well do Prius Primes (or other PHEVs) handle long periods
| where one's daily mileage is well under the EV mode range and
| one is able to charge at home every night? I think it has
| been 5+ years since I've driven more than 25 miles in a day
| and even longer since I was away from home overnight.
|
| I've read ICEs can have problems if you go too long without
| running them. Will the Prime's software automatically run the
| ICE on occasion to keep it in good shape?
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| The VW PHEV's will run the combustion engine regularly,
| mainly to avoid the fuel going stale. I assume the Toyota
| does the same.
| Forbo wrote:
| My friend's Jeep will give them a notice that it needs to
| switch to gas when it hasn't been used for a while, so it
| seems like a pretty common thing across manufacturers.
| CharlieDigital wrote:
| The engine still kicks on once in a while. Notably now in
| winter, it kicks on if I have multiple seat heaters and the
| steering wheel heater on. But my use case also has two days
| where it's over the battery range so I know it'll kick on.
|
| You can manually control it if you want and I do it once in
| a while when I need more acceleration since max power is
| delivered with both drivetrains.
| mplanchard wrote:
| We had this situation when we lived in a big city, before
| we moved somewhere that we drive longer distances
| regularly. We'd often go over a year without filling up.
| The engine runs occasionally to keep the gas from going
| stale, and in the winter the engine will kick on for the
| defroster. We never had any issues with it, and still have
| the car now.
| saltcured wrote:
| Also, have they sorted out the 12V battery management for
| this low use scenario?
|
| Our family has an older Hybrid Camry from around 2010 and
| it will destroy 12V batteries with too much local driving
| and parking. A typical regular ICE does better in the same
| conditions.
|
| From the behavior, I assume it's because they only charged
| the 12V via a weak alternator when the ICE runs, rather
| than also keeping it charged via DC-DC conversion from the
| larger electric traction power system.
| CharlieDigital wrote:
| They haven't solved it.
|
| I just returned from a 21 day trip and my 12v was dead
| because I left the Prius off the charger. It's fine as
| long as it's on the charger (my guess is it trickle
| charges it), but if you leave it off the charger, the
| traction battery doesn't maintain the 12v.
| goosejuice wrote:
| I was planning on buying the highest trim '24 Prius prime but
| availability and dealership markup made it unreasonable even
| in a large city. The lower trims didn't seem worth it.
| Instead I bought a used '23 model 3 long range with every
| upgrade (accel & fsd) and still saved money. Car had a few
| thousand miles.
|
| I'm super happy I didn't get the Prius. Spec wise the Tesla
| is superior. Driving our other ice car is less enjoyable for
| me now. I use 120v but I work from home so it works. I still
| like the Prius/RAV4 prime but at its price point and limited
| availability I just don't see the value over Tesla.
| CharlieDigital wrote:
| The trick with the Prius Prime (and all PHEVs) is to lease
| and buy out the lease. That's a $7500 discount.
| rsanheim wrote:
| The Sienna is a great hybrid if you are wanting something
| larger for families or hauling stuff. Tons of space, really
| nice cabin, and far more practical for 90% of uses than a huge
| pickup or any of the large SUVs. I can haul groceries and my
| large dog in the back cargo area w/ the 3rd row down, or put
| the row up for seating seven.
|
| Oh, and mileage is 30-34 mpg, at least when its not the middle
| of midwest winter.
|
| I do wish they'd release their PHEV vans over here
| (https://global.toyota/en/newsroom/toyota/41970489.html), which
| also look like something out of Blade Runner.
| alephnerd wrote:
| The Alphard and Vellfires are the equivalent of an Escalade
| in Japan and ASEAN. I don't think that PMF would translate in
| the US. Sucks becuase the seats are really comfy.
|
| Ironically, if you're looking forward to an Electric SUV,
| you're more likely to find that in India where macho SUV
| culture is massive.
| duxup wrote:
| I wish the Sienna had a plug in option. I'm ready for a new
| van.
| DoneWithAllThat wrote:
| "Hope <the number two by sales in the US vehicle manufacturer>
| gets their mojo back" is certainly a take.
| warner25 wrote:
| I feel the same way as the parent comment. They're number two
| for now, but seem screwed in a world that's moving towards
| outlawing gasoline-powered cars. Their bets on hydrogen fuel
| cells haven't yielded anything, and now they're a decade
| behind on developing EV experience and expertise.
|
| I've owned three Toyotas because they've always seemed to be
| the lowest total-cost-of-ownership option, being especially
| good in the compact and midsize segments. American
| manufacturers are trying as hard as possible to abandon those
| segments. So what will we be left with? I don't want a giant,
| luxury sports car that costs $50k+.
| philwelch wrote:
| > They're number two for now, but seem screwed in a world
| that's moving towards outlawing gasoline-powered cars.
|
| I wouldn't worry about that anymore.
| warner25 wrote:
| For the next 2-4 years, sure, but this seems like a
| longer-term trend towards something that's going to
| happen eventually.
| numpad0 wrote:
| Kind of tangential TIL: Toyota sells 3x more bZ4X in US(18k/yr)
| than all Tesla models combined in Japan(6k/yr), before counting
| in Subaru Solterra.
| coffeebeqn wrote:
| I recently bought the 2012 Prius and at least in Europe it has
| features that not many 2024 cars have here. HUD, backup camera,
| regen breaking, automatic transmission, multiple digital
| displays, Bluetooth, stop-start at lights, EV drive mode on the
| tiny battery for a few minutes..
| jonathantf2 wrote:
| Absolutely love my 2014 PHEV Prius, will do about 7 miles on
| battery which will get me to the shops and back. Never had a
| problem with it, about to hit 200k miles and still pretty much
| perfect
| gcanyon wrote:
| The new Prius is really good-looking (to my eye at least),
| especially in person: I don't think the photos (I've seen) do it
| justice. Fun comparisons to the car Burt Reynolds drove in Smokey
| and the Bandit: Compared to the 1977 Pontiac Trans Am:
| - The Prius is as fast 0-60 (~7 seconds) - The Prius has
| nearly the same top speed (~115 mph) - The Prius is 4x(!)
| as fuel-efficient (57mpg vs. 12-16mpg) - The Prius has all
| the modern stuff: air conditioning, antilock brakes, airbags,
| crumple zones, information display screen, backup camera,
| proximity alerts, etc. etc. - Adjusted for inflation, the
| Prius costs almost exactly the same
| alephnerd wrote:
| I'll toast a Coors Banquet to that!
|
| ---------
|
| Amen to that though! I agree that the new gen Prius looks
| really sleek! I tried EVs but the range and lack of after-
| market parts was really limiting, so I've been fairly happy
| with the Prius Prime.
| Alex3917 wrote:
| The problems with the Prius are basically: -
| Terrible in snow and ice - No way to defrost your
| windshield, unless you're already driving - Poor rear
| window visibility
|
| If not for those things it would be great, but unfortunately
| they've made zero progress on fixing any of the core issues for
| the last 25 years. The new models definitely do look cooler,
| and I appreciate that they accelerate faster, but I personally
| care much more about the stuff that could potentially kill me
| when I'm driving.
| dtgriscom wrote:
| > Terrible in snow and ice
|
| Are they worse than most front-drive cars? (And what about
| compared with a Trans Am?)
|
| > No way to defrost your windshield, unless you're already
| driving
|
| I've wondered about that. The Prius still gets its cabin
| heating from the ICE?
|
| > Poor rear window visibility
|
| Agree completely.
| janetmissed wrote:
| My experience with a prius in the north east was that it
| wasn't particularly bad in ice and snow and the few times I
| got caught in snowstorms it handled about as well as any
| front wheel drive car. I certainly wouldn't go out into a
| snowstorm with it if I had the choice, but thats true of
| almost any non-awd drive. The windshield defrosting
| situation was also a non issue for me.
|
| Man I miss my prius, I sold it when gas was under $2...
| warner25 wrote:
| Agreed. I still have a 2008, and it has gotten me through
| a couple nor'easters. Even with the original Goodyear
| Integrity tires. One of them was on the rolling hills of
| I-90 and I-84 through western Massachusetts and
| Connecticut. On every uphill portion I'd pass people who
| had gotten stuck, until I finally reached a place to stop
| for the night and wait out the storm. The front wheel
| drive seems to make it better than a lot of other cars
| out there. Put some CrossClimate2 tires on it, and it
| would be even better.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Cabin heating is done by heat pump but the gas engine kicks
| on for the front defrost. I don't know what parent is
| referring to wrt not being able to run defroster.
| rssoconnor wrote:
| > - No way to defrost your windshield, unless you're already
| driving
|
| I have a 2022 Prius Prime, and I am moderately sure with the
| car on and in park I can press the front window defrost
| button, and the ICE will turn on and start blowing hot air on
| the front window.
|
| Also, while parked and plugged in at home, I can use the
| remote A/C button to start heating the cabin and front
| windshield while clearing off snow and clearing the driveway,
| and will be powered from my house. I'm not sure if this also
| works without being plugged in.
| blacksmith_tb wrote:
| Can confirm, I have a 2017 Prius Prime, I keep it set to
| prefer all-EV driving, but I just got in and turned on the
| defroster to melt some frost off the windshield, it
| switches on the ICE engine. My only complaint is that it is
| not terribly smart about turning it back off during the
| same session of driving, if I turn off the defrost. I think
| in theory the heat pump would be able to provide the heat
| to do the job, but it'd use the charge in the traction
| battery up quickly...
| rssoconnor wrote:
| It has been my experience that if the ICE engine in the
| Prius Prime switches on for the first time for any
| reason, it prefers to remain on for several minutes at a
| minimum, no matter what. I have a theory for why this
| happens, but it is purely speculation on my part.
| ilamont wrote:
| > Terrible in snow and ice
|
| New Englander here. I've owned two Priuses (2004 and 2010)
| and both have been surprisingly able to handle winter weather
| quite well. Not as good as my Outback, but in light to medium
| conditions and driven by an experienced winter driver they
| performed admirably.
|
| The older one made it through a major blizzard in rural road
| and interstate driving across 4 states, albeit at a reduced
| rate of speed (45 mph, which drove up the MPG to 52, a record
| for that car).
|
| We still drive the 2010 model. I'm hoping that Subaru will
| get its act together on hybrid by the time we have to retire
| the Prius, but I would definitely get another Toyoya hybrid.
| Mistletoe wrote:
| I haven't found any of the Prius I've owned to be terrible in
| snow and ice. They are front wheel drive and have traction
| control and it works fine.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > - Terrible in snow and ice
|
| I don't know what gave you that idea, unless this is a
| complaint about FWD vs AWD. They do fine around here in snow
| and ice.
|
| Snow and ice performance is primarily (by a wide margin)
| about the tires. Next is the diffs and/or traction control
| for keeping both wheels moving when one starts slipping.
|
| A Prius on snow tires does about as well as any other common
| FWD car.
| singron wrote:
| Ours with snow tires does great. Most people probably don't
| have snow tires though, and they may have tires that
| perform worse-than-normal like LRR tires or full summer
| tires.
|
| Snow tires are great on all FWD and are probably way
| cheaper than buying a new AWD car.
| timbit42 wrote:
| I expect they are referring to the traction control system.
| On ice, it's really hard to get started moving when it's
| constantly kicking in. If you're trying to get across one
| or more lanes of traffic to turn left (driving on right),
| then you can be in danger of getting hit unless you leave a
| lot more time to get across.
| Lammy wrote:
| There's a hidden procedure to disable it. I keep it saved
| in a note in my phone and have needed to use it one (1)
| time ever.
|
| - Press Start button twice.
|
| - Push accelerator to the floor twice.
|
| - Push and hold brake pedal and shift into Neutral then
| release brake pedal.
|
| - Push accelerator to the floor twice.
|
| - Push and hold brake pedal and shift into Park then
| release brake pedal.
|
| - Push accelerator to the floor twice.
|
| - Start car.
|
| You should see the Traction Control warning light stay on
| to signal it's deactivated. It will automatically
| reactivate when the car is restarted.
| kreyenborgi wrote:
| If you move the stick Down, R, Up, L, and hit Y, B you
| get mega turbo
| argulane wrote:
| I own a 2024 Toyota Corolla Hybrid (similar drive train to
| Prius) and it defrost the window way faster than my previous
| Volkswagen Passat. Ice and snow handling has been pretty
| similar here in North Europe compared to my previous car,
| studded winter tires are the key. Visibility is also quite
| comprareble.
| mplanchard wrote:
| I own a Prius and live in Vermont. It does just fine with
| snow and ice. As others have pointed out, proper snow tires
| make a huge difference, way more than any car tech. I also
| think the newer models have AWD as an option.
|
| To defrost, you can just turn the car on, switch out of EV
| mode, and turn on the defroster. It works like every other
| car.
|
| The rear window visibility is not the best. I do agree there.
| airstrike wrote:
| I rode in one when I called an Uber once and was uber amazed...
| it's so spacious too! Pics really don't do it justice
| MarkusWandel wrote:
| I wanted to like the 2024+ Prius, I really did. I was in the
| market for a new car anyway, so I went and test drove one (not
| that I could have got one right away, at the time).
| Takeaways...
|
| - it drives really nice with plenty of power
|
| - the "gearshift" (not that it is one, but that part of the UI)
| is nonintuitive
|
| - the interior looks smaller than it is, due to massive
| A-pillars and little to no rearward visibility
|
| - it looks _much_ better than past Priuses, but the rear door
| handles single-handedly put back the "dork factor"
|
| None of that would have mattered that much, but the
| dealbreaker: Trunk space. I mean, space to load stuff when
| there are already 4 people in the car so you can't just fold
| down the back seat. That trunk floor is high. Folded it up and
| what's underneath? A styrofoam spacer matrix! WTF? Why not a
| spare tire instead (you don't get one)? I can imagine an ugly
| hack, tearing all that out, just to get a bit more trunk space
| but really? My only guess is that the Prius Prime's extra
| battery goes here, and they don't want to have it have less
| trunk space than the regular Prius.
|
| We are (by choice) a one-car family and we have two kids. When
| we travel we need a certain amount of trunk space, and the
| Prius doesn't have it. Aside from that, the Prime would have
| been lovely - enough battery to do your around-town driving
| entirely electrically! I never even thought of the "no heat"
| angle.
| hedgehog wrote:
| Was the RAV4 bigger than you wanted? Solves the space issue
| and the footprint is not much more than the Prius.
| rssoconnor wrote:
| > None of that would have mattered that much, but the
| dealbreaker: Trunk space.
|
| I hear you. I got a 2022 Prius Prime and I was disappointed
| with the smaller trunk space compared with the 2010(ish)
| Prius I had before, but I still went with it. However, my
| understanding is that the newer models somehow have even
| smaller trunk space space. At least that space under the
| trunk floor is filled with batteries in my case.
|
| While I'm happy enough with my purchase, I suspect I won't be
| getting a Prius in the future. If I want a PHEV, I might look
| at the Rav4 Prime, but I think I'm more likely to look for a
| full EV when the time comes.
| SweetLlamaMyth wrote:
| Oh wow, the 2024 Prius Prime has a full 3 seats in back. When
| we were Prius shopping in 2018, we were disappointed to learn
| that getting plug-in capability cost an extra $10K and
| removed the rear center seat. We ultimately just bought a
| "regular" Prius. I'm sure we _would have_ figured it how to
| install a car seat in such a tight space, but I don't regret
| missing that frustration.
| silverlake wrote:
| The new Prius looks good, but I love my old Prius's spacious
| hatchback. With the backseat down we can stick 3 giant dogs
| back there. I don't know if there's a hybrid with similar
| internal space.
| timbit42 wrote:
| I got my 65" TV in the back of mine, although it was a tight
| fit.
| bityard wrote:
| I fit a fully assembled entertainment center in mine. Only
| an inch or two to spare in every dimension but it fit!
| ariwilson wrote:
| RAV4
| hammock wrote:
| Doesn't sound as cool though. Maybe the Mustang team was onto
| something when they were playing supplementary fake engine
| sounds in the cabin speakers
| recursive wrote:
| Will people always think vroom vroom sounds cool? As far as
| I'm concerned, we can't get rid of it soon enough. When I
| rent an ICE car, I'm always annoyed by the engine revving
| sounds.
| smitelli wrote:
| I mean, I'm not really a fan of the spaceship whine that
| the newest Honda CR-V models put out in electric mode. It's
| going to be hard to please everybody on this planet.
| dgfitz wrote:
| I'd much prefer to hear a car coming than not, personally.
| wtallis wrote:
| The fake engine sounds played through the cabin speakers
| don't help with that.
| mitthrowaway2 wrote:
| Could you imagine if the Ford Model T had coconuts installed
| to mimic the sound of a horse's feet?
| cyberax wrote:
| Or a pile of manure in the trunk to simulate the smell.
| 01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote:
| Dank smells save lives
| rssoconnor wrote:
| I'd much prefer to smell a car coming than not,
| personally.
| likeabatterycar wrote:
| The Trans Am also had simple analogue controls - including for
| the heat & AC - while the new Prius has evidently succumbed to
| the overcomplicated "let's take away buttons" phenomenon.
|
| Also, you're not getting a bride to leave her husband at the
| altar if you pull up alongside in a Prius. Just sayin'.
| miohtama wrote:
| But
|
| - Does not look as cool
| fortran77 wrote:
| I hated the original Prius. It had no right to call itself a
| "hybrid". It had one source of power: gasoline. This seriously
| confused the market and the press when the Volt -- a true Hybrid
| with electric and gas -- came out. I wish regulators defined the
| word "Hybrid" and limitied its use in marketing.
|
| Family Guy got the meaning of "Prius--and the type of self-
| righteous person who drove it--exactly right.
| philistine wrote:
| Let's pretend regenerative braking doesn't exist.
| fortran77 wrote:
| It has one source of energy, gasoline.
| snypher wrote:
| It seems strange to die on a semantic hill while calling
| others self-righteous.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Negative ghostwriter, gasoline may be the only input, but
| stored inertia is energy too, and it's a hybrid because it
| has two kinds of motors that work in tandem to increase
| efficiency, who said hybrid meant two types of fuel?
| selimthegrim wrote:
| fortran77 never has a second cup of gasoline at home.
| IX-103 wrote:
| So does everything. Everything runs off of entropic decay
| of the universe.
|
| Almost all the power we use is solar (stored energy from
| the sun). Nuclear is an exception, in that the energy
| didn't come from Sol, but some other star that went Nova in
| the ancient past.
|
| Anyway, a Prius was a "hybrid" in the same sense as
| previous gas-electric cars and is the same nomenclature
| used for diesel trains with electric drive.
| Toutouxc wrote:
| Huh? It's a hybrid, by definition, always has been. What is it
| exactly that you think confused the market?
| fortran77 wrote:
| It is fueled 100% by gasoline.
| Toutouxc wrote:
| Yes, the word "hybrid" itself doesn't say anything about
| the power source. Maybe you're thinking of "plug-in
| hybrid"?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-in_hybrid
| wpm wrote:
| You have repeatedly stated this without explanation as to
| how it supports your position.
|
| A BEV can be charged entirely by a gasoline powered
| generator, does that mean it simply ceases to be a BEV?
| tasty_freeze wrote:
| I got my a prius in jan 2001. It was $18K and got 45-ish mpg
| despite that I didn't do anything to try to maximize my
| mileage. My previous car was a manual Sentra SE-R two door.
| Despite being a smaller car, it got about 24 mpg and was a
| similar price (time adjusted). But according to you, those
| things were not why I bought it, it was because I was self
| righteous.
|
| Let's say you are right: nobody really cares about the Prius
| price or technical specs and bought it to be seen. Now imagine
| someone buying something other than a Prius, say a BMW, or a
| Lexus, or even a lower end car like a Corolla who might dither
| over the color or trim package. How much ire do you have for
| those people being vain in caring what impression their car
| makes?
|
| If you don't don't care about the non-prius scenario, it means
| you don't really care about the vanity aspect of car purchasing
| decision. Inspect what is really driving your resentment.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > It had no right to call itself a "hybrid". It had one source
| of power: gasoline.
|
| That's the definition of a hybrid.
|
| We have a separate phrase for a hybrid that you can plug in.
| It's called a "plug in hybrid".
|
| I don't think it seriously confused the market at all.
| gnkyfrg wrote:
| The other source of energy is kinetic energy. It converts the
| potential energy of gravity mgh, into electrical energy, back
| into kinetic energy, 1/2*mv^2.
|
| You only put one energy in, the other source is gravity and
| recycled kinetic.
|
| Besides hybrid means two motors gas and electric. Not two
| inputs.
| jgilias wrote:
| I sometimes chuckle that most of the cool Lexuses are now Priuses
| under the hood!
|
| But that's a good thing. I own a Toyota Corolla hybrid myself,
| and hybrids are one of those things that I can say I've
| completely changed my mind about. I used to dislike the idea of
| hybrids, because I assumed that the overall system complexity
| must be higher than either an ICE, or an EV. And I'm a sucker for
| simple systems, so I thought it's either EV, or nothing.
|
| Then I looked into how hybrids work. Specifically Toyota hybrids.
| And came away totally amazed. It's an amazing system, and much
| simpler than a traditional ICE car. It doesn't really have a
| gearbox, or a clutch, or a starter. The engine is a normal
| atmospheric engine, so no turbines, overcompression, and the
| issues that come with it. Furthermore, the engine is typically
| configured to use the Atkinson cycle, which puts less stress on
| it. And, the engine has a chain drive, so no belts to change, and
| by design gets stressed a lot less than in a traditional ICE,
| because the stop-start load is carried by the electric motor.
| Also, it can't really have trouble starting in cold weather, much
| like an EV. All of that boils down to crazy reliability.
|
| I'm at a point where if I'm looking for a car that uses fuel,
| it's only cars that use the Toyota hybrid tech (or similar) that
| I'm looking at. At the moment it's just Toyota, Lexus, most Ford
| hybrids (but not all).
|
| Other companies have hybrids that are liable to my original
| concerns about massively increased complexity. As an example, VW
| hybrids have an electric motor within their DSG gearbox. So you
| have all the complexity of their modern ICEs (turbines, DSG,
| whatnot) plus additional hybrid related complexity.
| Tade0 wrote:
| For the reason you stated in the last paragraph I eventually
| opted against getting a Hyundai Ioniq in favour of a Toyota.
|
| The Hyundai felt like driving a regular automatic, so it would
| occasionally lunge awkwardly and spin the engine in situations
| where Toyotas switch to EV mode.
|
| Sure it had better fuel economy, but I can't stand having a car
| not react immediately to my input or make noise when it
| shouldn't.
| jgilias wrote:
| To be fair, it did take some time for me to get used to how a
| hybrid sounds. It's fine when not driving aggressively. When
| you floor it though, it does feel weird when the engine jumps
| to the highest safe revs and stays there. That's a small
| price to pay for reliability and smooth power delivery
| though.
| z3dd wrote:
| check out civic 11 gen, they are almost indistinguishable
| from regular ice cars when sitting inside
| jgilias wrote:
| Does it have a power split device? E.g., a planetary
| gearbox?
| Toutouxc wrote:
| No, it's a different system than what Toyota uses:
| https://global.honda/en/tech/Honda_eHEV_next_generation/
| jgilias wrote:
| Thanks!
| 01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote:
| Looks like a series hybrid with a clutch that bypasses
| the generator for a high-efficiency overdrive gear. It's
| simpler than the planetary gear system in a Prius, but
| they must have made the drive motor (equivalent to MG2 in
| Prius diagrams) bigger if they never combine power from
| both MG2 and the ICE. Or, that's not shown in the
| diagram.
| esalman wrote:
| Are you talking about how the CVT transmission sounds?
| jgilias wrote:
| Not sure exactly what you mean. As in, hybrids don't have
| a CVT transmission, one with belts and the thing that
| changes diameter to achieve variability. Haven't had one,
| but heard only bad things about those.
|
| But yes, in that the power transmission is variable
| (e-CVT, right?), and that sounds a bit weird. You've
| spent so much time hearing how the engine gets louder
| with acceleration that it feels weird when the engine
| behaves slightly differently.
|
| But again, that doesn't bother me enough to buy a less
| reliable system.
| 01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote:
| My ICE CVT is like that, and hybrid systems behave sort
| of like CVTs.
|
| The computer has an idea of "At this low RPM the engine
| is most efficient, at this high RPM it produces maximum
| horsepower". So if you floor it, the computer in either a
| CVT or a hybrid will bring the engine to full power and
| it will just sit there as the car accelerates.
|
| The engine is getting loaded up and putting out more
| torque, and the throttle is opening, but it isn't really
| revving. In mine it does slowly climb from maybe 4,000 to
| 5,000 RPM, but it doesn't do the "rrrrRRRRRR...
| rrrrrrrRRRRR..." like a transmission with fixed gear
| ratios.
| Tade0 wrote:
| I actually prefer that over the usual revs going up and
| down depending on speed. I'm not American so my default
| before hybrids was driving stick. Never liked this
| steampunk-esque drama of moving from a standstill in such a
| car
|
| Anyway revs do go up over a certain speed, but you need to
| be on the Autobahn to legally test it.
| dkarl wrote:
| > I can't stand having a car not react immediately to my
| input
|
| I'm spoiled from years of Priuses now, and driving gas cars,
| even fancy and expensive ones, feels bizarrely primitive. The
| lag between the pedal and the response, and the complex
| relationship between the input and the response, feels
| antiquated and arcane.
| bardak wrote:
| I had a loaner Ford Bronco Sport when I was having some
| maintenance on my hybrid. It had a 8 speed transmission and
| a turbo. Going from the super smooth eCTV to a vehicle that
| would jerk from shift changes/turbo when you just thought
| about touching the gas pedal has has put me off buying a
| vehicle with a normal transmission
| Tade0 wrote:
| A while ago I rented a regular car and what bugged me was
| all the additional vibration associated with parts grinding
| and rolling against each other.
|
| Also at least once I almost went "woah, horsie" as the car
| lunged forward because I tapped the accelerator a moment
| after it shifted to a lower gear without me noticing.
|
| It used to be even worse. I had an opportunity to drive a
| 2005 BMW 7 series in a city where the speed limit was
| 30km/h. Unfortunately the gearbox was from a time way
| before traffic calming etc. went mainstream, so it couldn't
| decide which gear to pick. I ended up switching to manual
| gear selection mode.
| 01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote:
| > it couldn't decide which gear to pick.
|
| I haven't felt that since I've been driving my CVT ICE
| for so long.
|
| Then again, a coworker told me the CVT is likely to break
| before 100,000 miles. So.... thinking of buying a Prius.
| I love Priuses.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Honda CVT is supposed to be pretty solid if that's what
| you have. Other CVTs are less solid, or so I hear.
| dtgriscom wrote:
| Not a challenge, but a plea: where's your source(s) for this?
| I'm about where you were, but would love to know more about the
| internals so I can make an informed choice when my current
| (ICE) car dies.
| jgilias wrote:
| Take a look at this:
|
| http://eahart.com/prius/psd/
|
| Also, YouTube helps. Search for "Power Split Device" or
| "e-CVT".
|
| Regarding other hybrid tech, it's a bit of a crapshoot. I
| basically use ChatGPT with search enabled to have sources,
| and then ask how the system works. It's never in the
| marketing materials, I guess most don't care.
| MindSpunk wrote:
| The wikipedia page is quite in depth [0] but is quite dense
| and took me a few goes to understand. They're fascinating to
| understand, and they really are _mechanically_ simpler than a
| standard ICE + gearbox drive line. I got nerd sniped one day
| figuring out how my Toyota Crown "gearbox" worked only to
| discover it doesn't really have one. They don't even have a
| real neutral gear, the wheels are always mechanically linked
| to the engine.
|
| They require much more active computer control to work though
| so they aren't logically simpler in my opinion, but
| mechanical simplicity is what makes the biggest difference.
|
| There are certainly better more approachable sources though
| so I leave this as an option as the info is there, but can
| take a moment to understand.
|
| [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_Synergy_Drive
| jgilias wrote:
| I'm with you in general. Though, with the amount of
| electronics and "computer-complexity" that modern ICE cars
| have, I'm not sure there's a meaningful difference!
| jessekv wrote:
| An accessible video that builds up the design intuitively
| from first-principals using a 3d model.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_xCssR8qQI
| bloudermilk wrote:
| This video is my favorite on the topic: https://m.youtube.com
| /watch?v=O61WihMRdjM&pp=ygUKV2ViZXIgcmF...
| eurekin wrote:
| This video cleared up my confusion and corrected my
| misconceptions, giving me enough knowledge to hold a one-
| hour discussion with an actual Toyota mechanic.
|
| Highly recommended!
| hedgehog wrote:
| That's really good, I watched one of their older videos to
| understand what I was getting into before I bought a Toyota
| a few years back. For those reading, the video is from
| Weber State University, they have a series of hourish long
| detailed videos on various automotive components including
| different versions of the Toyota electric transaxle and
| rear electric drive unit (mechanically separate but present
| in the AWD vehicles).
|
| My takeaway was the same as some of the other posters here,
| the system is an engineering tour de force. Simpler than
| the gas version, proven reliability, and efficiency not too
| far off the theoretical limit of gas-burning drive trains.
| jval43 wrote:
| That video is what made me get a Toyota hybrid.
|
| Seeing how simple the whole mechanism is, I totally get why
| the empirical reliability is so good.
|
| Not to mention that the lecturer shows and explains things
| very clearly.
| jolan wrote:
| This is a great series by a Toyota mechanic:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeFzfl0Q8rQUOHwFNOMTu.
| ..
|
| He goes into the practicalities of
| owning/maintaining/repairing as well as the engineering.
| DiggyJohnson wrote:
| Respectfully, why are you asking for sources on an already
| high effort subjective post instead of verifying the info
| yourself? Wikipedia is a great place to start with car spec
| stuff.
| lwhsiao wrote:
| Naive question: aren't belts lower maintenance than chains, and
| don't let last longer? Why doesn't a engine with a chain drive
| require equal or more replacements?
| jgilias wrote:
| Umm.. No and no. Belts need to be changed at some service
| interval, usually 100k SI units. If you don't do it, a ripped
| belt wreaks havoc on the engine. Chains are typically
| installed for the life of the engine, and need to be changed
| only if it's a problem.
|
| A caveat though. I used to have a Skoda Fabia with a chain
| drive, and I did end up changing it, as it started making the
| tell-tale sound when stop-go.
|
| In the context of hybrids though, I fully expect that chain
| to last the lifetime of the engine. The engine is under
| significantly less load than in a traditional ICE, so less
| stress on the chain. Also, for 100k mileage, the motor-hours
| that the engine has worked are less than in an ICE due to the
| engine regularly being off.
| analog31 wrote:
| Amusingly, my 1995 Saturn had a timing chain, and the chain
| skipped a tooth on its last day, at roughly 60k miles. Now,
| there wasn't necessarily anything wrong with the chain _per
| se_ but it was the end of a sequence of failures involving
| the engine design.
|
| On all of our other cars (Toyota), the belts needed to be
| serviced at X miles, but it was actually a cheap and quick
| procedure.
| frosted-flakes wrote:
| Unlike most bicycle chains, timung chains are permanently
| lubricated with filtered oil. Belts are not.
| bityard wrote:
| Ford and a few other makers have been using oil-immersed
| timing belts lately. They quite reliably fail after the
| car's warranty is up but well before the rest of the car is
| junk.
| hollywood_court wrote:
| No. Chains are better.
|
| My Land Cruiser has a timing belt. I replace it every 90k
| miles per Toyota's specifications. My Tundra has the same
| engine, except that it has a timing chain. I've never
| bothered to replace the timing chain.
|
| A timing chain is preferable as long as it isn't something
| like a Jaguar/Land Rover. The chain in those doesn't matter
| because they use plastic tensioners that eventually become
| brittle at crack/fail.
| saturn8601 wrote:
| >I'm at a point where if I'm looking for a car that uses fuel,
| it's only cars that use the Toyota hybrid tech (or similar)
| that I'm looking at. At the moment it's just Toyota, Lexus,
| most Ford hybrids (but not all).
|
| Don't forget the Mazda CX-50 Hybrid that was just released.
| Using the Toyota Hybrid from the RAV4 with the elegance and
| beauty of Mazda design.
| loeg wrote:
| I wish Toyota would make enough Siennas to satisfy demand.
| Instead, there's are long wait lists at dealers.
| jgilias wrote:
| I wish they just sold Siennas in Europe...
|
| :hide_the_pain:
| epolanski wrote:
| We don't even get Camry in Italy, it's just Yaris, Corolla,
| Aygo and suvs
| usrusr wrote:
| I would not call a CVT "not a gearbox". Were Audis equipped
| with their multitronic option (not in any way related to hybrid
| or BEV) "cars without a gearbox"?
| cyberax wrote:
| A traditional CVT is a different beast. Prius is more
| accurately described as having a power-split gearbox that can
| dynamically split the power between the gasoline engine and
| the electric motor.
| jgilias wrote:
| Yeah, I'd say "not a gearbox". A gearbox to me is something
| where there are actual gears engaging and disengaging leading
| to wear and tear. Doesn't matter what kind of fancy
| electronics are then used to hide the mechanical operation
| from me.
|
| A mechanical CVT with belts and pulleys with changing
| diameters is even worse.
|
| What the hybrids (e-CVT ones) have though is basically a
| planetary gear set, where the gears are put together at the
| factory, and stay there for the life of the car.
|
| To me that's not a gearbox. At least not in the traditional
| sense. Transmission sure.
| numpad0 wrote:
| Prius system is considered "CVT" for bureaucratic reasons
| only, it's slightly fancier EV style reduction gear.
| philwelch wrote:
| I used to drive a Prius until the hybrid battery system died,
| and the quote to replace it was a significant fraction of the
| value of the entire vehicle. I've driven ICE ever since.
|
| My goal is usually to drive my vehicle all the way into the
| ground, and I guess that's what happened to my Prius except it
| happened around if not before 150,000 miles.
| syndicatedjelly wrote:
| So when your engine eventually fails in your ICE car and
| costs many thousands to replace, will you return to EVs?
| philwelch wrote:
| Depends on how many miles are on it.
| timbit42 wrote:
| When my Prius's hybrid battery died, I swapped out the two
| bad cells (out of 28) for good ones. Cost of parts and
| labour: $300.
| jgilias wrote:
| Did you do it at a dealership, at a non-affiliated garage,
| or yourself?
|
| I could see how there could be situations when someone
| tries to sell you into changing all the cells, even when
| that's not necessary.
| bityard wrote:
| How long did that last?
|
| I have a Prius that's at 100k right now. Repairing the
| battery is within my abilities but I'm concerned that if
| one or two cells fail, more will be right behind it.
| akount45 wrote:
| Knew a dude that was asked several grands for replacing his
| hybrid Yaris batteries. He couldn't afford it, so he drove
| everywhere with the old battery. Because of the extra weight,
| he ended up consuming more fuel than the purely ICE Yaris.
| jgilias wrote:
| That shouldn't work. In a Toyota hybrid it's the electric
| motor that effectively starts driving, and is also
| responsible for starting the ICE. So the car doesn't really
| work with the drive battery not working.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| The Prius system is an excellent design, but as someone that
| loves driving, it just feels and drives awful- little tactile
| or audible feedback on any of the controls, and really
| unresponsive to inputs- arguably dangerously so. My regular
| daily driver is an old Porsche Boxster, and by comparison the
| Prius feels like I'm driving a dishwasher or playing a cheap
| arcade game- it will get you there reliably but it's just not
| any fun. Life is too short for me not to enjoy the time I have
| to spend driving. My sister has an Audi A3 e-tron hybrid
| (basically an upscale VW Golf) that is extremely fun to drive,
| but also a very complex drivetrain and engine.
|
| I think a pure EV with a small range extender not connected to
| the drivetrain mechanically- like the BMW i3 REX is the way to
| go. It's even simpler and lighter than the Prius system,
| allowing for a much larger battery and more powerful electric
| motor.
| epolanski wrote:
| It's fine to demand more from a car, but to most of us it has
| to move us from point a to b.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| I honestly never quite understood this perspective or why
| it's so popular... in general I try to always find ways to
| do normal life things a little weird, or make it a little
| more challenging, fun, and memorable- and try to break up
| the routine drudgery. Even just getting groceries can be a
| fun adventure with my kid if we put the top down on the
| Porsche, play some music we love, and maybe go to a weird
| store that targets a different culture, or has weird
| surplus/unsold items.
|
| Doing things 'weird' usually makes them cheaper and less
| crowded/faster as well- as a result of less demand.
| pandemic_region wrote:
| Where do you put the groceries in a Porsche?
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| The Boxster is mid-engined so there is no back seat, but
| a usable trunk at each end. The front trunk is takes up
| the entire space of a normal engine bay, and is
| surprisingly massive for how small the car is, because it
| is very deep.
|
| Overall the Boxster is a surprisingly practical car- it
| was very cheap (cheaper than an old Prius of the same
| age) but now appreciating in value with age, can use a 3+
| carpool lane with 2 people, is tiny so easy to park
| anywhere, and it is actually very reliable and low
| maintenance. Consumer Reports consistently labeled the
| first gen Boxster as one of the most reliable and low
| maintenance cars ever made.
| jgilias wrote:
| What if you have another kid and a wife?
|
| At a certain level of utility/space, cars just stop being
| that fun. Well, until you get to the vans, those are fun
| in their own weird way.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| I do have a wife, not planning on more kids. I'm a bit of
| a car nerd and have a bunch of older cars I maintain
| myself- including several that fit the whole family- all
| of them together costing less than a newer economy car.
| There are plenty of large cars that are still fun to
| drive. A Porsche Cayenne can tow as much as a full sized
| truck, seat 5 in comfort, offroad as well as almost
| anything, and post sports car worthy track lap times- and
| you can get them for 5 grand on Craigslist nowadays.
|
| There are some fun weird vans! I've always loved the
| Toyota HiAce, Mitsubishi Delica, and other strange
| Japanese minvans with weird features like built in
| karaoke machines, beverage coolers, tiny diesel engines,
| and real truck 4x4 systems. Also love the old VW
| vanagons.
|
| They used to run (tongue in cheek) ads for the Boxster
| with the slogan "The more kids you have, the more
| practical it becomes" and that it fits "Two child seats.
| Up front." There's some truth to that- if you have a
| large family you will likely have multiple cars, it can
| still make sense for one of them to just take two people
| for 1 on 1 activities.
| loloquwowndueo wrote:
| > Life is too short for me not to enjoy the time I have to
| spend driving.
|
| Or, you could reengineer your too-short life so you waste
| less time driving.
|
| It's fine if you like driving and want to have a nice car -
| connoisseurs abound in all fields. But for 99% of people it's
| not an issue worth optimizing for.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| That's actually part of it for me- I often work from home
| and have very little required driving- so I do mostly see
| driving as a recreational activity. If I'm going to visit a
| remote beach or mountain lake for fun on the weekend, I
| want the drive down a long winding road to be fun also.
| 01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote:
| > a pure EV with a small range extender not connected to the
| drivetrain mechanically
|
| That is, a series hybrid, like a diesel locomotive?
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Yes, a range extender EV like the BMW i3 REx is technically
| a series hybrid, but it is designed to operate most of the
| time on electricity only and be plugged in to charge- with
| a large EV size battery and a very small lightweight moped
| engine in the extender.
|
| The range extender basically gives you protection from
| range anxiety, but isn't used at all in normal use of the
| vehicle. On the i3, it only starts the engine when the
| battery is nearly empty, but some people do software mods
| to be able to use the vehicle as a true series hybrid, and
| run the engine continuously for doing long distance freeway
| driving without stopping to charge.
| sonofhans wrote:
| To be fair, you are contrasting an econobox with one of the
| all-time great driver's cars :) I bet I have enough fingers
| to count cars more fun to drive than a Boxster.
|
| I do agree about the Prius, though. It feels like driving a
| dishwasher.
| numpad0 wrote:
| Can't agree more, I can't understand why any car person would
| not be excited about THS II system anymore ever since its
| executive summary finally clicked, other than because that
| Prius as a product used to be so badly designed until Tesla
| started seriously threatening Toyota.
|
| If only Toyota made bunch of toy models for THS and built
| couple 2-door hybrids so that more people would get it. I
| suppose it's a case of innovator's dilemma, but it's so
| unfortunate.
| bison3 wrote:
| I love my Prius. What amazes me about the car is how "idiot-
| proof" or "smart" it is. I try my best to hypermile and squeeze
| out every last MPG, while my wife doesn't make any effort to baby
| it--and yet, we both consistently get about 57 MPG combined. The
| car adapts to how you drive it, which is really impressive.
|
| I think Toyota deserves as much credit as Apple for its "it just
| works" ethos. The way they design the technology to be seamless
| and work so well behind the scenes is remarkable. Additionally,
| many Toyota mechanics consider the Prius to be the most reliable
| car Toyota makes. This often surprises people because of the
| perceived complexity of hybrids, but in reality, they are
| elegantly engineered and surprisingly simple.
| j_bum wrote:
| I love to hypermile my accord hybrid, but when my wife pulls
| the exact same mileage without doing anything special, it makes
| me feel so goofy.
|
| I'll continue to hypermile for fun anyway lol
| quanto wrote:
| I would go even further and say comparing Apple to Toyota is a
| high praise for Apple. Toyota, one of the world's largest
| manufacturers of any product, created its own management and
| engineering style (e.g. TPS) that continue to edify engineers
| to this day. Toyota survived and thrived this long in a highly
| competitive field, especially on a global stage -- a rare
| instance for a Japanese company. Steve Jobs in his peak had
| great admiration for Japanese manufacturers like Toyota and
| wanted to emulate them.
| jessekv wrote:
| My aunt bought one of the first ones. It was the first time I
| experienced a car driving fully silent, creeping up the driveway.
| Was pretty surreal at the time.
| gnkyfrg wrote:
| Toyota explicitly stated that the hybrid strategy spreads the
| lithium out to more cars, increasing fuel economy across the
| fleet.
|
| Tesla's 800hp super cars aren't green and never were. They
| consume lithium to such a degree that they are, maybe even worse
| in the long run.
|
| Using 800 horses to transport one human never could be efficient,
| no matter the technology.
| sandoze wrote:
| I know all cars can't be perfect but as a 2010 Prius owner (I
| probably shouldn't complain given it's 15 years old) it has had
| several well documented issues that never prompted a recall.
|
| I was hit with a bad oil gasket that causes the engine to burn
| oil. It's so much work to replace their solution is to replace
| the entire engine. My solution is to keep putting oil in it. I
| was told by the dealer this is common over 70k miles.
|
| The steering controls (heat, volume, cruise) stopped working
| pretty early on. It was well over $1k to fix, mostly labor.
| Apparently the connection they use is prone to failure.
|
| Leaves me wondering if my next car will be a Toyota. Maybe if
| they adopted Apple CarPlay.
|
| That being said, batteries are still good and I've been pretty
| impressed how low the maintenance has been.
| fy20 wrote:
| Another 2010 owner here. I'm at 280,000km, and other than
| burning some oil everything still works fine. Usually by this
| age cars here are pretty rusty, but so far my Prius has held up
| well. There's a few spots of surface rust in places, but
| nothing serious.
|
| We had to replace the inverter a few years ago (apparently
| there was a software update to prevent this failure, but we
| didn't have it), but even when that broke the car was still
| driveable, just the ICE engine was running all the time.
|
| The biggest issue I've had is with brakes. Three times now the
| rear pads have got rusty and I've had to replace both the pads
| and rotors. My theory is that as they are hardly used, they
| don't get hot enough to dry out any moisture. Last year I
| rebuild the rear calipers, so let's see if that fairs any
| better.
| mplanchard wrote:
| FWIW they have adopted carplay. I have a 2019 prius prime,
| which was I think the last year before they swapped over. My
| neighbor has a 2024 model, and it has resolved my two main
| complaints about my car, in that it has carplay and they have
| three seats in the back now instead of two.
| brianbest101 wrote:
| Good news! They have CarPlay on all their vehicles now
| philwelch wrote:
| My 2024 Corolla supports Apple CarPlay.
| ezfe wrote:
| All Toyotas have CarPlay for years now
| daft_pink wrote:
| Honestly, I think it's actually the second generation Prius that
| transformed the auto industry. The first generation was quirky,
| had poor crash test ratings, and was full of compromises.
|
| The second generation showed that they could produce a sedan with
| high reliability, a decent sized passenger cabin, high crash test
| ratings, and very little compromises over a regular car except
| speed and sell it at a massive scale with incredible gas mileage,
| lower maintenance costs and great reliability.
|
| I think it also showed that you could build a smaller car, throw
| in all the technology features and young people would buy it
| where previously, manufacturers would only put the latest and
| greatest features on their largest vehicles. For example, if you
| wanted the latest and greatest features from Mercedes, you would
| have to buy the S class, so even if you wanted a smaller more
| efficient car, if you were an early adopter, you had to buy the
| largest model. I think the Prius was a point where people
| realized that the youngest people wanted these tech features but
| they didn't want a giant car.
| haunter wrote:
| I'm almost 40 and never had a car in my life. But recently I'm
| thinking about buying one and probably it will be a Toyota hybrid
| (Lexus if I get a windfall lol)
| timbit42 wrote:
| > A driver not employing such techniques still can expect fuel
| economy as high as 4.06 L per 100 km from the latest generation
| of Prius models.
|
| I think they meant "as low as".
| quanto wrote:
| It's difficult to overstate how ground breaking Prius was when it
| came out; arguably more surprising than Tesla's success and
| paradigm shift. Before Prius came out, people questioned whether
| it was even _physically_ possible to have a any working hybrid
| system in a commercial car, let alone a non-serial hybrid system.
| At least Tesla had seen working prior art in commercial EVs
| (albeit far less famed than Tesla).
|
| Toyota was mocked in recent years for not going head-first into
| EVs. As the EVs are becoming less popular and the geopolitics of
| battery and raw materials escalates, Toyota is having the last
| laugh.
| JeremyNT wrote:
| Plug in hybrids really remain the sweet spot for usability.
|
| If you can cover the 50 mile typical commute round trip range
| on grid electric and then switch to the ICE for longer trips,
| that's a lot more practical. It's like having the best of both
| worlds.
|
| Yes, you sacrifice in weight and complexity, but Toyota has
| absolutely mastered this design and their reliability is great.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-01-18 23:01 UTC)