Prius is Gutless?

Having driven through the 70's and 80's, I've driven "gutless cars". With that as background, I can say with certainty, the Prius is NOT gutless! Gutless was an old air cooled VW Beetle ((I had a 67. Fun, but it took an awful long time to get to cruising speed and on 70 mph turnpikes...a steep downhill or tail wind to maintain speed.) My wife had a 72 Chevy Vega; with an anemic 4 cylinder coupled to two speed Powerglide trans, about as gutless a car as, ever, has been manufactured. I had a 77 Ford Grenada which we loved for it's comfort/style but boy, if you wanted to pass, you marked your plans to do so, and timed it on a calendar. Most any car sold during the last half of the 70's through the 80's truly was "gutless". The Prius, certainly is NOT! It may not be as quick as many cars on the road, but it'll do the job better than most sold throughout two full recent decades. I don't need, or even want any more than is available here; at least, not if doing so means a corresponding loss of fuel economy.

 

It is relative! "Gutless" is a subjective term..

 

Yea! I'm gutless! My car has fast enough acceleration, not a problem.

 

We had one of those! Our favorite "feature" was the passenger seat that didn't slide forward or back. For my 6'2" husband, that was a problem. It was also a problem when getting a baby out of the carseat in the back.

When we were dating, he had a Rambler. When it rained, he'd have to slap the windshield wiper, so it would go back down. The wipers only went up.

DH and I were talking about the Prius this weekend. He always insisted on driving his truck everywhere we went, because he hated my previous car. Now we take the Prius everywhere. It's the first car we've ever had that is getting OVER the EPA estimated mileage. We debated between the Ford C-Max and this, and ultimately went with the Prius (because of the Ford's "real world" mileage). The Prius has plenty of pick-up and plenty of room.

 

Oh! Rambler, didn't all the seats lay flat?

 

Yes, they did. But I only slept in it alone, at a remote survey job site.

 

I had a Cosworth Vega. Totally different animal with that engine.

 

I had a Rambler American station wagon, that I put a piece of 2" foam in the back with swag carpet on top. It was great for the drive-in movie theater.

Then later a Rambler classic sedan that my buddy dropped a 350 short block into. It was too light of a car frame. I was never able to wind out the engine, as the car would be air-borne too much.

 

My 2008 Prius 2nd Gen Touring is only as "gutless" as I make it when driving. I bought it primarily to cut my fuel bills and get some great MPG. While I do balk at being a doddering old snail on urban roads, I do generally avoid sports car style lift offs and heavy breaking. I don't floor my accelerator pedal when going up hills. However, I am aware of the "turbo-boost" capabilities of this amazing car. On rare occasions when I've needed to pass some relatively dangerous and inattentive (talking, playing with his stereo, engaged in a deep mobile phone conversation while wandering aimlessly all over the road) driver in front of me - I've put my foot down and been rewarded with a smooth burst of speed (I've jokingly dubbed "electric turbo-boost") that instantly has the car leap forward like a rocket. This car will happily power up inclines IF I put my foot down. The only penalty might be MPG in single figures - but when I've rarely needed the extra power, it's never let me down. Indeed, I remain delighted and astounded at how quickly it accelerates when I need it to. Something to do with the instant torque from THAT 67hp electric traction motor?

 

I think you bring up a good point. We take for granted that a hybrid drives like a "normal" car. But in reality there is a lot of activity going on with making two motor/generators along with the ICE work in "synergy". I am an Electrical Engineer with over 30 years of experience in the electronics field. Designing a 3 phase inverter to power an AC motor is fairly straightforward. Now make that AC motor switch to being a generator on the fly adds a layer of complexity. Now blend in power from the ICE, another layer. Then add in the second motor generator. Now transfer power from one motor/generator to the other. Then make that all happen while rolling down the road and make it seemless enough that driver and passengers have no idea how complex a system like this is. Yes there are many manufacturers building hybrid vehicles these days, but to assume that they have all figured out how to make such a complex system work seemlessly day in day out, mile after mile may be a mistake.

 

On my '93 Escort I was tempted to label the A/C button ABS, Auxilary Braking System. To try to pass with the A/C on was almost impossible. The engine would almost die when sitting at a stop light and the A/C would come on. You could actually hear the tone of the engine change each time the turn signal would go from on to off because of the change in load on the alternator. Now those are some signs of an under powered vehicle. But even with it being under powered I still drove over 350,000 miles behind the two '93 Escorts I had. I guess I will just have to suffer a while longer behind the wheel of my under powered Prius, lol. Oh but wait, it came with a PWR button, not an "ABS" button.

 

Coming from a 335i to a Prius was a performance shock, but I now know how to maneuver and get my Prius to do what I need it to do when I need it to do it. I also realize it's not a Sport Sedan. It's grown on me and so we added a Prius c, and when I need to haul a$$, that's what the 4.0L 4Runner is for lol...

 

That is probably the best description of why I bought my Prius. Toyota put all this technology together....and it WORKS... better than any other!

 

Before I bought my Prius, I rented a new 2013 Prius two from Avis. I had no problem keeping speed up. In fact, I was going up the famous steep grapevine pass in Southern California going 80 mph (since I was running late). The Prius had no problems doing that and I think I still got about 40mpg during that 10 minute stretch of highway.

SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 ? 2

 

There are other fundamental issues with cars that aren't "gutless"
1. Is the powertrain balanced? In otherwords is the transmission heavy duty enough to handle the power from the engine? Does the cooling system have the capacity to keep the engine and transmission from overheating? As the cars ages will the little tricks they use like reducing engine power when shifting gear be timed right? I have seen this little trick "fail" as cars get older. The pressure in the transmission and the clutches get worn so the shift time increases. But the fixed pre determined time the computer allowes for the shift to happen doesn't change. So after about 100,000 miles you wonder why the shifts get rough. Or flip side, the engine power doesn't come back as expected and there is hesitation so mid upshift the computer thinks it needs to downshift again. I had cars that did both.
2. The temptation of a "powerful" car leads to bad driving habits that lead to both inefficient and possibly unsafe driving. Not every one rolls a car 5 times end over end without a seat belt on and is able walk away. At some point you either learn all that power serves no purpose or you won't be around to learn that lesson.
3. You end up paying more for insurance even if you don't give into the temptations of the extra power because others with the same type of car do. I used to drive V8 rear wheel drive Thunderbirds instead of Mustangs because the insurance rate was less.
4. Can you really get all that power to the road when you need it? I remember going up an on ramp with my 1983 Thunderbird in the rain. I had floored it at the bottom of the ramp. When it upshifted at 60 MPH the back tires broke loose and began to spin. Sure newer cars have traction control but all that means is the power is only as good as the car's ability to put power to the ground. So what good is 300+ horsepower when tranction control never lets you use it? I was in heavy city traffic yesterday with my Prius and had PWR mode active. At one point I was doing 20 MPH and punched it, but didn't floor it. Both front tires squawked on bare dry pavement as the car took off. Anymore power I would have just been watching the traction control light coming on.
So, is my Prius gutless? Nope, it has all the guts I need to do what I ask of it when I ask it to do it. And, I think Toyota did a good job balancing the Prius power train system to allowing me to keep asking the Prius to do what I ask for a long time.

 

Yes I think it is gutless, so much so that over the last three years I've learned to seriously dislike the car. Now don't get me wrong, on a nice flat straight road the acceleration is decent. If you quickly need to overtake someone and you are in sports button mode the reaction is there quick enough and again you can overtake. However, I like in a hilly area and trying to go up and down the hills constantly the engine is revving like mad to keep up with traffic, and even with the foot to the floor I'm shouting at it "come on, come on, you can do it" but the noise and the engine revving, it is a joke. So to me it feels gutless, give me the low down torque of a diesel anyway where you can easily go up those hill at a lowly 1800rpm in a nice and quiet car...

PS. I've grown to dislike ours so much that perhaps I've gone overboard, I'm replacing it in October with a new Mercedes GL class

 

Sounds to me like you have been feeding yours too much E10. Go find some gas without ethanol.

 

??? No idea what you mean...I just fill up at Shell, BP, Texaco and the only choice is unleaded. Every other car is fine on standard unleaded petrol...

 

Prius is about the quickest car I have owned. Driving in city traffic you don't need any more. On the highway it is either 110 or 100 km/hr limit so you don't need it there either.
I love the way it responds, like yesterday needed to merge and a gap opened up about half a car length in front as that lane started to accelerate away, punch the accelerator and the response was more than you would expect, a bit frightening because of it. Almost like the system responds to the rapid opening of the throttle and gives you a little more. The brakes work in a similar way. The drone climbing a long hill can be a bit wearing because it is not what other cars do. Don't question it, just relish the good news at the service station when you fill up