I sat in one yesterday, first thoughts.

This was explained to you incorrectly. The car will stop charging on its own. The timer is simply to program a start time when you want to charge (for example, if its cheaper to do so at night). The Advanced models can start, stop, and set charging times from a smartphone.

Yes, only through 2014 (expires 1/1/15). But what other way could you get a HOV sticker that lasts longer at this point? Even the white sticker expires on 1/1/2015.

 

They extended the old stickers, didn't they? I know they finally expired last June/July, but they'd been extended, hadn't they?

 

The yellow ones were extended, but they finally expired on 7/1/2011 (see here: Eligible Vehicles - Single Occupant Carpool Lane Use Stickers).

 

My take is that the WHITE stickers will be extended. The GREEN ones will be allowed to expire on 12/31/2014.

 

No way. You're forgetting that Sacramento is more than 100 miles from everywhere, so the State Legislators will buy Volt and Prius, not Leaf. Therefore...

 

I agree...particularly depending on how quickly the green stickers are given out. They may also say that it makes sense to extend the program using the argument that it didn't even really start until mid-March and then it took until mid/late 2012 until enough production of eligible vehicles was available in CA... here's hoping!!

 

No transponder associated with the green stickers though you need one to get the carpool lane benefit at bridges (1/2 price)

There were initially about 60k yellow stickers that then went up to 80k. But remember that all Priuses (is that the plural?) and Honda Insights going back to the beginning hybrid days ('01?) were eligible, so a lot more qualifying cars were already on the road on day one of that sticker program.

 

The original pool of stickers was 75,000 when the law was enacted in August of 2005. I got my stickers in April of 2006 and I was number 68xxx. An additional 10,000 stickers were made available starting in January 2007 (and quickly sold out).

 

Well we can always hope ...

 

Depends on your situation. The PiP will save me about 45-60 minutes of commuting each day. And I won't have to pay for any portion of my trip that would have otherwise been toll roads. I don't take bridges much, but I'd save $2.50 each toll there too. So YMMV.

 

AND Less $1500 CA rebate and $2500 Fed Tax credit...another $4,000 off...

 

The last time I had a tire problem -- It was a sidewall blow-out, 50 miles from nowhere. A can of sealant and a pump would have been useless. I will never, ever buy a car without a spare tire & jack.

Thanks for the observations.

Keith

P.S Maybe Toyota should include a large fold-up orange & black sign in the emergency kit that reads "Got a Spare, Spare ???"

 

IIRC, those little space-saver blow-up spares weren't that big... and if you already have the compressor in there, you COULD just get a blow-up spare and take up some cargo room with it, yes? Maybe get a bag for it and just keep it in the back corner of the trunk...

So the question is: what does the 2012 Prius (non-plug-in) have for a spare? (Couldn't tell from the site). And if it's a space-saver, would it have the same bolt pattern to fit a PiP?

 

I keep reading people say $8K premium. In CA with $1500 CA Rebate and $2500 Rebate, the car is $32500 - $2500 - $1500 = $28,500. Isn't the Prius PIP equivalent of a Prius IV which is also about the same price or am I wrong?

 

The base PiP is a cross between a regular Prius III and a Prius IV. You end up paying about 2 to 3 grand for the option of plugging in after you factor in the tax credit and rebates available. For me that's a small price to pay to be able to get back into the HOV lanes in California.

http://priuschat.com/forums/toyota-...ice-plugin-vs-non-plugin-w-same-features.html was the thread that discussed this.

 

I was offered $24k(Invoice) for the regular Prius and $29.5 for the Plug-in(after tax rebate) $5.5k is well work the difference. Compared to the Volt which has the Cruse ~$18k and the Volt @ $32.5(40-7.5) for a $14.5k difference.