Why doesn't this car show when brakes are engaged?

You are suppose to watch the road not a screen

 

Probably the same reason why the prius doesn't have a coolant temp gauge: to keep it simple so idiots can drive it without getting too distracted or confused.

 

My seat of the pants gauge tells me that you have to be on the brakes pretty hard to get the friction pads going. But, my gauge has been wrong before...

 

Recharging continues down to 7 mph and then the mechanical brakes kick in. Or the mechanical brakes kick in in a panic stop at any speed. Other than that i don't see a point to watching when this happens. Especially when you need to stop!

 

Well, there is an idiot light that appears when it overheats.

 

Doesn't the HSI do that? Regen up to the limit of the "charging" bar, with any excess over that or braking under 8 mph being discs?

 

In the display that shows the bar and when you're in ECO mode or Power, on the far left it shows how much the battery is charging. It doesn't specifically show when it changes but perhaps it will help you to see when friction braking kicks in by the charging level change?

 

The chrg bar DOES give you the ability to see when you are wasting energy toward mechanical brakes. Any time the chrg bar hits its max, you are wasting any additional stopping power towards heat from the brake pads. If the chrg meter is not at it's max, you have no control of when the mechanical brakes hit, so you are effectively recovering all of what you can recover.

In other words, make longer stops so you don't have to go beyond the chrg bar's max. That will give you the ability to recover the most energy. If the mechanical brakes kick in when the crg bar is not at it's max, then there is really nothing you can do about it anyway, so there is no need to see when that happens.

 

Are you sure? I've been wondering if the "charge bar" is a cartoon or really an indication of when regen transitions over to friction braking. My brakes squeak a little and the squeaking doesn't seem to start until well after the "charge bar" is saturated. Do any of you experts monitor the charge current on the traction battery and can correlate this with the "charge bar" cartoon? I've really been meaning to ask this question. Thanks for bringing it up!

 

In Europe, all the Prius have HUD.

 

The answer to both of your questions is that Toyota is attempting to capture some of the "normal" market with the Gen III. The Gen II Prius was all about new technology, and was designed to appeal to early adopters. Toyota pretty much saturated that market, so when they moved on to the Gen III it was important that it would have appeal to normal car buyers.

Many of the controls were moved back to standard locations. Likewise the user interface has been kept simple for cost reasons and to keep from confusing non-technical drivers. Many of us on PC would appreciate much more technical information - the more the better.

Tom

 

It exists, it's called a Scangauge.
.
_H*

 

Is it possible to show when the mechanical brakes activate on the scanguage.. can it read brake voltages or somthing ?

 

If you truly want this level of detail, buy a scanguage and google xgauge for the 2010 prius. People have figured out how to read value corresponding to the amount of regen and friction braking. However, as a scanguage owner, I usually keep mine in the trunk in case I really need it because I find it distracting. I'm certain others will disagree, but I think having more readouts like that increases the probability of a distraction causing an accident.

 

No, the Scangauge can't show when the friction brakes go into operation. You would have to monitor brake line pressure and interpret that. Technically, the friction brakes are -always- working when you are braking, but if you are fairly gentle with the pedal, the pads are -just- touching the rotors. You could use the Scangauge to monitor current, and watch regeneration to interpret when the friction brakes start, but that would not be very accurate because the Prius does both at the same time. So you would need a device that monitored brake line pressure and regeneration and had smarts built in to interpret what it saw to figure out when friction braking begins.
Except in "panic mode", when it is just friction braking (with brake assist).