Going to A Prius v (lowercase v for the Prius v wagon, not an uppercase v - only 2010 use uppercase

Hi everyone. Thanks for your replies. Well, I went to the dealership today and I pulled the plug on the v (lowercase v for the Prius v wagon, not an uppercase v. only 2010 Prius used uppercase roman numerals for model designation)I was sad to see the Lexus go. However, it really came down to my fear of the unknown with it and my fear of being stranded on the expressway, (that I take on my daily school car pool, with kids in the car and other cars whizzing by high speeds.) I know that is probably just being overly cautious on my part and I also know it's probably likely that I would have gotten more years out of the lexus. But, I just didn't want to roll the dice. If I was the only one driving it without the kid and the expressway equation, I probably would have held out longer. On long trips or anything where comfort or room is essential, we will take my husband's ML350. On the plus side, I actually was very pleasantly surprised by the I drove my husband's prius hatchback this morning to school and thought to myself "OK, it's small, but it's honestly not too bad." I expected the only to be slightly bigger, but it definitely FEELS bigger than the prius hatchback and yes, with the seat and steering wheel raised, it does feel like a small SUV. As people said, the seats will take some getting used to. The lexus seats were great and they will be missed. However, I don't feel nearly as cramped as I thought I might. And I was amazed by the cargo room. Also, I picked up my son today and I got 49mpg. I actually don't take the expressway to the school because I hate driving toward downtown on the expressway. Too crowded and just too many accidents. So I take the long way with a lot of red lights to school and then I take the expressway heading away from downtown. On that route, I got 53 mpg. Then when I took the expressway back, it went down to 49mpg. I am sure that it will go down more tomorrow, but that's much more than I expected. So I'm pretty content. I do want to put leather seat covers on it because I know that the cloth will get trashed if I don't. Has anyone on here put leather seat covers on the / Again, thanks for everyone's input. It helped to know that others have successfully gone from a much larger vehicle. As sad as it is, I no longer have two kids at home. I no longer have hockey gear or strollers or all of the other things that mandated an SUV or van. But if I need one, there's always my husband's mercedes SUV, which has far fewer miles than the lexus and although not a hybrid, made more since to keep since the milage on it is still pretty low. Thanks again!

 

I definitely wondered about the arm rest. It really is just cloth there and of course both passenger and driver are going to rest their arm there all of the time. I'll ask the dealer about softex. I have to head there this weekend because the spare key they gave me doesn't work at all.

 

You are right!! The V seats lower trim are very uncomfortable. You do not notice it right away. I did not notice on the test drive, but over a few days, I began to get very sore. Like you, I began to have regrets. I tried many different wedges. I even bought foam and tried to mold a different car seat. I was considering either trying a different seat, taking the car to an upholstery shop or trading it back in. Because despite trying different positions, it was causing me serious pain. I went to relax the back (which was a two hour drive) and got the McCarty's sacro ease (read about it on this forum.) It has completely transformed the seat. For me, the problem was the tilt - which you can not change - and the fact that the seat makes you sink into it and you fight to sit up straight. The sacro ease makes the bucket seat have an L shape so that you can sit up straight easily. Plus it buffers all the bumps and vibration you feel in the prius. Just thought I would mention it if you still feeling discomfort. I was in severe pain at the back store and then I had to drive back two hours. I was anticipating horrible pain, but with the seat, I was okay. The seat isn't cheap - was 300 bucks - but better than trading in the car or replacing the seat. I am going to buy one for the passenger's seat too. They do bend the seat to the shape of your back in the store, but I think you could do this manually if you had to get it online. Just my two cents. I think that for some people, no amount of seat adjustment is going to work. The seats are hard and then force you to tilt and sink down so you're constantly having to fight gravity, at least if you are short, like I am. I have no affiliation whatsoever with McCarty's. But I'm very grateful for it because other than the seats, I do like the car. But the seats were a big issue because I was in constant pain, but feel a lot better now. Just thought I'd share for people who have discomfort with the seat. I don't think that I was ever going to get used to it.