Uncomfortable Middle Back Seat

I own a 2013 V wagon but have never been inside the 2012 wagon. But I can tell you that the middle back seat is very uncomfortable. I don't see a regular sized adult sitting in the middle comfortably. Also, I've seen more than one thread here in priuschat stating the differences between the 2012 and 2013 wagons.
The only differences are:

1. A softer material on the steering wheel of the high end version only.
2. The availability of the Sea Glass Pearl color. (Sparkly Light Green)

 

I do not remember the V's insides but is there a flip-down cup-holder thing in the middle? Those are more uncomfortable then just a bench.

 

my 2012 v has the flip down cup thingy... actually no cup - just arm rest...
the cup is in the floor console...

 

The middle seat has the support structure for the armrests which come down. That had to be relatively hard and so is the middle seat as comfortable as in a full size sedan? No But at 6' and 69 years old can I sit there for a 10 minute drive? Yes, no problem.

Am I pleased with my '12 V Three? I got what I expected and zero problems in 800 miles. I have the option to take it on a 250 mile one way trip or take the wife's Avalon, I'll advocate for the Prius.

 

It seems the middle back seat is the seat for the youngest child or least favorite child. Seems fitting to be the least comfortable. I am a youngest of 3 and speak from experience.

 

I can see it being uncomfy although i never tried the middle part of the back seat having a wide toddler seat on one side that eats up the middle space partially. However, coming from an '08, man! The '12v's front seats are comfy! Even more comfy than my '12 bmw 3 series. Imho.

 

Extremely happy with my 2013 Prius V Two. But today marks 1 week since I took it home so my opinion does not carry much weight. Still some things I haven't figured out like the two displays on the center console the relate to "history" and the other one with bar graphs. Just today I was finally able to find the car seat latches.

Most pleasant surprise:
1. Due to living in the tropics and having an all city commute, I can easily get 50-55 MPG on my commute. (I actually recorded a 57MPG one way.) All values are from the Prius display.

Things that have let me down:
1. This is hard to beleive, but apparently on the V Two model, the only way to unlock the rear "trunk" is by pressing the "unlock all" button on the driver's arm rest. Pressing the unlock button on the keychain does not work for me. Talk about an inconvenience.

2. Though this is my first Hybrid, I've read up on the pulse and glide technique and on the V there is no indication that you are on the sweet spot on the pedal when gliding. I do feel a very slight increase in speed when I press the pedal lightly on a glide and get 1-3 green bars on the hybrid display. But... The EV light turns on and the energy display shows the battery is powering the motor. Instantaneous MPG goes to 99.9 but that doesn't say much because that also happens anytime you are on EV mode, even if cimbing a light incline. So I don't know if a "decoupled" glide is possible on the V. The instrumentation says it isn't, but I don't know if the instrumentation is telling the truth as to what is really happening. Of course, this type of detail is not important to 99.9% of V owners. It is very possible that I myself will not care about such details once I get into a regular routine and my "Prius fever" subsides into normal levels.

Also, I would like to know if 3 charge bars on the hybrid display represents the friction braking. Because if that is the case, one needs to start breaking reeaaally ahead of time to enable regenerative braking. Just like the sweet spot issue, this conundrum owes to the fact that the hybrid display on the V has less resolution than on the Liftback. And all the hypermiling tutorials I've seen were done the the liftback's uglier, but better resolution display.

All in all I am absolutely in love with the driver and family comfort of the V (except the trunk thing), and the extra cargo space.(This replaced a 1998, 233,000 mile-driven Camry). I'm still on my first tank, but the V is well on its way to exceeding my MPG expectations, but bear in mind my commute has ideal conditions. Anyway I still have some kinks to figure out and tests to perform. Thanks for reading!

 

Hope the car brings you good luck and good fortune.

 

1. Try pressing the unlock on fob twice in quickly.
2. One green or white bar is a glide in my book. I've checked the amps going in or out of the traction battery (with ScanGuage) under thoses conditions and it is very similar to our Gen II with no arrows on the energy display. You never decouple the hybryd synergy drive (HSD).
"Also, I would like to know if 3 charge bars on the hybrid display represents the friction braking". Any white bars mean you are regenerating brake energy. I have watched the friction brake pressure guage (on ScanGuage) and I see the friction brakes get used not when 3 white bars first light up, but after they light up and I press the brake more. I assume the amps going into the battery system are maxed out and it starts to blend in friction braking.

Hope this helps you enjoy your vehicle even more.

 

I've got about 12k miles on my v2 since purchasing in july... one thing not mentioned that you might try ...
put the car in park, with it on, hit "setup" on the radio display, and go through the options. There is one that can be set - to unlock all doors with one push of the button or just the driver ... and a "double-tap" opens the rest. mine is set to single push of the button - then my back hatch is unlocked with the rest of the car.

As for coasting -- use eco mode. it makes the gas pedal less responsive, and so it's easier to maintain that fine area between regen and using power. and yes, with the low rolling resistant tires - these cars coast quite a ways... so regen soon....don't get in a rush - and mileage will climb.

 

The one with the bar graphs shows mileage/regen history since you started the car (and for the first 15 minutes it shows the bars from before you started the car in a different color). The right-most bar after the break is the current instantaneous MPG - you can see it go up and down as you move the gas pedal (but there is a delay). The remaining bars show the average MPG over each 1-minute increment with regen superimposed on the bars with little squares, each full square representing 10Wh or something (it says at the top of the display). I keep this display up most of the time because it lets me have both instantaneous and average MPG available together with average on the dash, instant on the touch screen.

The "history" one...when you press "Update" it records your current average MPG as the rightmost bar on the graph and pushes the existing ones to the left. It also resets the average MPG back to 0. The oldest gets deleted. A lot of people press update when they fill up to track per-tank mileage, but it could also be used in other ways (e.g. update it daily or after your commute). I don't find this screen to be all that useful.