How did you "BREAK IN" your Prius?

I'm not really sure you need to do anything special for the Prius. These days, most cars don't really need any particular type of breaking in. The only thing the manuals recommend is to simply vary your driving, in other words, don't pick up your car and then drive 1000 miles on the interstate at the same speed. A normal mix of city and highway driving is all that is necessary.

 

I drove it normally for the most part. Never really stomped on the "gas" until after 1000 miles.

 

Drive it just like any other car.

 

For the first 1000 miles, I avoided going more than 65 mph, and varied the speed with the cruise control when I was on the highway. I avoided jack rabbit starts. I don't know if that all counts as babying?

 

My first 2000 miles, I avoided going more than 60 mph, and avoided the cruise control until I was on the highway. No hard 'to the floor' starts, and was easy on the brakes. I also varied the speed but did not 'speed' o rcorner very fast.

Oh, and verify the tire pressures even from day one from the dealer; whether you stay with the factory numbers or increase them as I and some have done, I noted right away that the dealer=delivered pressures were wrong. (thanks to this forum for that 'heads-up')

 

Back then, I heard that driving it for a few hours burned off some shipping-protection gunk on exhaust parts that might trigger a warning light, so when I picked it up I drove about 160 miles at 65-70MPH. No problems.

Must be they don't use that much gunk now, because the old stories don't come up anymore...

 

bought the car and drove down to the Trans Canada Hiway and took it up to 114Km. set the cruise control and 2 1/2 days and 1830Km later I was home. Just drive it, even at 114 km per hour the ICE will go from 1340 RPM to approx 3000 RPM depending on the road conditions. Car uses no oil in the 8000km intervals between changes.

 

Yes, the CVT does make the Prius the exception to the cruise control rule, but it's still good to do with other cars.

 

The owners manual says what to do. I don't have it in front of me but I think it was first 500 miles don't drive hard and no jackrabbit starts. Also don't break hard (unless of course you have to).

 

Very controversial subject:
http://www.mototuneusa.com/break_in_secrets.htm
I can say this: the one new car (Honda Civic) that I bought new and drove it ~500 highway miles right after I left the dealership, and 2 other engines I rebuilt and pampered them for the first 1000 miles or more- NONE of them ever had decent compression and used oil. All 3 engines always had more blowby than they should have. I'm going to try the link above on the rebuild I'm doing right now. Seeing as I'm batting 0 for 3, I figure I can't lose trying something different this time. :blink:

 

Per aka's post:

It does say no hard acceleration and hard breaking the first 600 miles. It also mentions no driving at high speeds. What does Toyota consider high speed?

The dealer had told me don't drive it over 80mph the first 1000 miles and that was it.

Traditionally, I was told to vary the RPMs on a new car. I kinda did that for the first 200 miles but then stopped doing it thinking that I didn't need to do it for a CVT.

I'm at 550 and basically just drove it 65-73 mph on the freeways.

 

My first drive was from Carson to Irvine and then from Irvine to San Diego the next day. I don't remember if I used the cruise control or not, but the normal traffic kept me from going at a constant speed at any rate.

 

I bought it in Moses Lake, Washington as I found one available in my color and package 04' silver #6. Just back in the country and setting up for my family's coming arrival I found a number on these boards. After 500$ CC deposit, My pops and I flew out there from Austin and drove it back to Texas on a winding tour of the West. We hit several national parks and historical points. Think it was around 3800 miles before all was said and done. I loved the green leaf & MPG battles that I had with my dad, though nothing touched the 30 minutes descent from the Grand Canyon o the North side, Alt 89 East. Nothing but coast . Great times and a neat chance do hang with you father for a week and a half. Pruis made it all the better in many ways. I averaged 55 mpg, adding 6 fills of gas plus the one from the dealer.

 

My dealership told me to "just drive the car", but to not go crazy. They did say that if I needed to punch it to get onto the freeway to do it.

 

meh. i just drove it. dh took it out and played with it a couple times, i'm sure he hit 85+ on the highway. i still get good mileage, don't burn oil, etc. 'course, we only have 8500 miles on the odo.

 

I'm still breaking it in...odometer just passed 200miles. I have not gone over 68mph, and do both highway and local driving.

 

my dealer was very specific....i also read it in the manual..........i was told to sorta baby the car for the 1st 1000 miles for the break in period..........meaning=no jack rabbit starts, no hard breaking, and (the hardest) no using the cruise control! it was hard to do .....but its finally over & now i'm able to "drive it like a pri!" i'm now at 1700 miles & still going strong!

 

Still trying to talk the wife into helping me "Break in" the Prius. Best I got was first base.