Hot rod Prius at the push of a button?

The only performance enhancement that I would like to see is a plug-in. If we're gonna beat big oil, you need to use LESS. Oh, and this pretty Blue Marble we're all on is the only one for many miles around.

 

I'd like to see a plug in option AND a performance button on the dash. I do like speed as much as I like fuel efficiency, and if I have the option to have one or the other at the push of a button then yes, I want it! I'd leave it on economy for daily driving and switch to performance only occasionally.

 

i want to see less performance en even better mpg

 

I'd pay $100 for such a button, assuming that in performance mode it acted in a fashion consistent with CAFE requirements.

 

When someone says a car is tuned for economy rather than performance they aren't talking about something you can change on the fly necessarily. They are talking things like valve size, duration and lift, cam timing (the inlet cam timing is variable not the exhaust timing), manifold size and length, compression ratio, crankshaft offset(in Atkinson cycle engine), exhaust pipe and mufflers. The things that can be changed are ignition timing, mixture, and inlet timing. Lexus hybrids are equipped for performance but still get better economy than equivalent conventionally powered vehicles with bigger valves, more lift, shorter more open inlet manifold and exhaust primaries, more open mufflers etc.

 

You want LESS performance?

... Brad

 

Hear! hear! -- or is it -- here! here!

Not to mention the Spectra blue marbles ...

 

yes
less HP to me means less fuel
and irl i don't use a lot of the current power of the prius
is more than fast enough for mee.. More then fast enough

 

I just want to have a button to eliminate the stupid pseudo-autotranny creep and drag. I would love to be able to sit at a stop light without having to mash the brake pedal to keep the car from trying to creep forward. I would love to accelerate up to speed, take my foot off the go-pedal, and glide until tire and air resistance slowed me. I don't want more performance, I want better performance to get more fuel efficiency.

 

I think what you meant to say was that you'll sacrifice performance in terms of power for performance in terms of better fuel economy. I think a lot of us appreciate that thought. However, all else being equal, I'm assuming that you'd take more power. In other words, you'd prefer an auto with 150hp that gets 50mpg over an auto with 50hp that gets the same 50mpg. Right?

More power just for safety reasons makes a lot of sense to me. Just like better brakes/handling/airbags/crumple zones/etc for safety reasons makes sense to me.

... Brad

 

yes

 

Personally, I want to see an official Toyota "plug-in" Prius, with even faster electrical motors. (Or using them more. Or whatever.) And then also with a more powerful ICE. The heavy use of a large plug-in battery would still leave a much better "gas" fuel economy than our existing Prius design. And, of course, we'd get a heck of a lot more vrooooom.

Still, all of this does no good so long as Toyota continues to use such crappy tires on the Prius. All vroom and no stick just makes squealing and smoke.

 

More MPG's PLEASE ! reggers:

 

the car already has 300 ft lbs of torque! That is the same as my old Expedition V8 for crying out loud! If you romp it the Pri is a race car now! But the mpg drop like a rock!

Nope. More mpg no more performance needed. plug ins desired.

 

i wouldn't mind a button that would torque out the electric motors for a short amount of time.. or depending on soc.

 

If you want a performance car get a Tesla..Prius was never meant, and will never be a performance car.

 

Ah, but the Prius is a performer, with the right equipment. There's some of us who'd like to squeeze every bit of potential out of this hatchback. There's already a bunch of handling mods to rip the Prius around a corner a lot faster. The low-end torque helps greatly with the exit speeds through the apex, and the VSC helps keeps the Prius on the road when driven near the edge of its grip. I'm all-in for a toggle that would give more power at the cost of fuel ecomony.

 

With CVT and that big electric low-end torque, clearly electric is the way to go for race cars in the near distant future. But the Prius is not a race car. It's plenty quick for a passenger car, more like a V6 that gets 50 mpg.
That won't prevent the marketing wonks at Toyota from coming up with a performance model at some point. Everything seems to evolve bigger and more powerful--but within carbon/mpg limits now.