How many Charge every time?

it is an unknown. toyota recommends not leaving the battery fully charged for long periods of time, and we know that lithium ion prefers to be in a discharged state.
for those two reasons, i work hard to figure my driving patterns, leave the pip battery discharged as much as possible, and keep it half charged when i'm not sure, so i only need 30 minutes on my L2 for a 90% charge.

 

I don't think it matters how often you charge. So, yes, I'm always chagrining, unless I know I'm not going anywhere until the next day, when I delay the charging until 1:00 am to ~6:00 am. I depart for work around 6:55 am.

 

I'll take a swing at answering your question, but only in a strictly NON-technical manner:

For the first several months of Prime ownership (from last August to March or so), I would typically charge ONLY after the car switched from EV to HV on its own... when the traction battery was too low for EV (only) use. I did that MOSTLY in an effort to determine the "total" EV range (*) in my particular circumstances and driving "patterns" (retired / no daily commute / strive to consolidate errands / etc).

(*) "Total" EV range for PIPPIN on a full charge has been as low as 18.4 miles when really cold outside and as high as 36.3 miles.

But as spring / warmer weather arrived, I started to re-charge at the end of any planned driving for any given day IF the car was down to, say, less than 10 or 12 miles of estimated / remaining EV range... OR whenever I thought the next day's driving *might* exceed the car's EV range. I do it that way now MOSTLY to absolutely minimize how much - if any! - gasoline PIPPPIN burns in strictly LOCAL / in-town driving.

As an aside (?)... my current strategy seems to be "working". I've driven a total of about 485 miles since last filling up the tank and, INCLUDING a roughly 145 mile trip to-and-from Indy, the fuel gauge shows MORE than 3/4 of a tank remaining, and PIPPPIN (a Premium) "thinks" he's "maxed-out" in MPG... showing 199.9 mpg for the tank.

 

I would not charge the battery if it's 80% or higher unless you know you will use up all the battery right away. It will lead to greater degradation but I don't have any data to back that up.

Some reading material on lithium ion batteries which may or may not apply to EV:
How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries - Battery University

 

I thought that the battery is a 8 kilowatts. But it only charges up to 6.6 kilowatts. Am I assuming that the battery turns on the ICE when it depleted the 6.6 kilowatt. So you really not charging the battery to a full state. My math is not that good but I'm thinking that you'll only charging the battery 85% or 80% not sure. Because the battery has a 1.4 Reserve to use for the hybrid system when the 6.6 kilowatt is used up.

Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.

 

I do multiple trips per day, so I do plan on charging each time I'm at home.

Unfortunately, there is no charger at work and my total commute is ~35 kms both ways, meaning that I *should* be able to go all EV mode on most days. Fingers crossed!

 

Just to point out something I didn't see mentioned. It's better for the battery's long term health to charge it before you leave rather than when you return. And to answer the original question, I charge every chance I get. I run about 95% EV.

 

Totally agree with charging for when you leave. I also charge (for departure) whenever I need to. In my current situation and with the current temps, I get 4 commutes and 1 shopping trip on 1 charge. Right now I'm about 99% EV.

 

Whenever our Prime is at home, it's plugged-in. Entune will send us a text message, if it's not:

Our systems indicate that your Bear-Mobile is near your primary or secondary charging location and was not plugged into a power source.​

Entune also sends a message when the car has completed charging.

We've owned the Prime for two years this month and set up the Entune system about after owning the Prime for about a week. My email log shows 1257 messages from Entune over this period, with the vast majority being charge completion notifications.

The fact that Entune sends an alert if the Prime is at home and not plugged-in suggests that Toyota intends that the Prime be plugged in whenever possible. Because I do not use a charging schedule, my Prime begins charging upon plug-in and ceases when fully charged.

 

Thank you for this. This is exactly what we intend to do: charge it as soon as it's parked in the garage and leave it plugged-in. This also allows us flexibility and certainty that the vehicle will be as charged-up as possible, as I do drive in the evening to pick-up / drop-off kids to their various activities.

My goal is to use the EV mode as much as possible and to keep diligent track of KWH consumed. Yes, I'm a nerd. LOL.

 

I bought the car to take advantage of the EV range. As such, I plug-in as often as possible and will continue to do so. I have ~700 miles on the car and all but ~10 miles are electric. The fuel gauge is still reading full on the original tank of gas from the dealer.

 

I have mine "scheduled" to be fully charged when I leave in the a.m. When I get home i plug it in to the metered 120V but it doesn't start charging until ~1am.

If i plan on going back out after coming home or it's the weekend, I'll "charge now" and plug it in the 240V outlet.

Once it's fully charged, i unplug it, especially if there's a storm brewing. Had my place stuck by lightning before and had 1/2 my electronics fried, so I get nervous about leaving high value things plugged in

 

I don't think it matters how often you charge. So, yes, I'm always chagrining, unless I know I'm not going anywhere until the next day, I have a Ram truck also which i use for Long Distance Towing services, so when i go for a drive so keep that for charging.

 

I charge ALL the time, when our Prime arrives home at the end of the day there might be ~2 or ~3 miles left in it. We go out more often than not, so having a fully charged Prime is better for us, I don't like driving on the ICE if I don't have to. We use the 120v OE charger at 240v for fast 2 1/2 hour charging.


Rob43

 

I charge all the time there are options too.

The kids like to help “fill the car up”.

 

We are both retired, so there are few “hard” departure times. The Prime has about 10 miles remaining on the Guess-O-Meter tonight. Let’s say the wife says in the morning “let’s go to the mall” and I need an additional 10 miles range (9ish miles each way). NO PROBLEM, because she will require an hour to get ready, and that would give enough time to add an additional 15 miles. I admit that I don’t like to leave it with less than about 5 miles Incase we have to make an emergency trip to pickup a pizza

 

Old thread, but new user here and I'm reading as much as I can.
I agree with this statement. My Prime is a week old, and the tank has been barely touched.
Especially with these days of Ethanol gas, I feel that it would be a good idea to run the engine every now and then, and probably rotate the tank every couple of months at most.

My work commute to work is only a few miles; I can get there and back in 14% of EV usage...with the A/C running. So even with a little more in-town driving, that tank isn't going to be hit very often. And I don't forecast that changing anytime soon. I'll take any gas usage as a good thing! (can't believe I actually said that!)