Self-Charging in the Prime

yes and no. when the prime runs out of wall charge, it behaves just like your prius, keeping the hybrid portion of the battery in it's happy place during normal drive. if you have some extended downhill, it will keep charging the battery.

while there is wall charge available, it will keep charging like your car, until the battery is 'full'.

there are several modes on the prime that you don't have: hv is similar, ev is available as long as you have wall charge, and ev auto decides for you when to ev and when to hv.

a fourth mode, charge mode, will allow you to recharge the battery with the engine while driving, up to '80%'.

all this is discussed in detail in the many prime threads. someone else in maine just got $4,000. off, it might be the best deal in the country. all the best with your decision!

 

In Hv mode, it acts like a regular Prius. If you want it to charge the battery, you have to put it in Charge Mode where it will keep the engine running even in Park and will charge the battery up to about 80% of the level you'd get from a full charge from a wall outlet, obviously consuming gasoline to do so.

 

Here's some State-Of-Charge specifics for Prius PHV... the ranges for Prius Prime will likely be similar:

0 - 16 % = never used, avoided to promote battery longevity

17 - 23 % = HV operation (just like the regular Prius)

24 - 85 % = EV & EV-BOOST (pure electric & blended)

86 - 100 % = never used, avoided to promote battery longevity

 

I will disagreeWhen power demand is sensed it will switch to wheels with hybrid battery assist

Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
Power sense is seen in this scenarioEngine act as generator with battery assistOr full power to wheels with battery assist

 

let me reiterate.

 

One correction, ~23% is 6 bars on the PiP HV battery icon, HV operation is up to 8 bars or ~27%.











Merged. Use multi quote.

I think the manual says that in case of high demand from the ICE, charging rate will be reduced and even temporarily cancelled.

 

27% isn't the cutover. My OBD-II readers show 23%. More would be regen used for electric-only in HV later. Here's video from a recent capture showing that, for those wanting detail:

 

Your video just confirms what I said!
At ~3:00 min - a changeover from EV mode to HV mod at 23% and 6 bars on the icon.
Prior to that, at ~2:50 min while still in EV, battery icon changes to HV icon at 27% and 8 bars.
at ~4:17 min, road and driving conditions charged to 25% and 7 bars while in HV mode.

Once in HV mode, battery can go from 2 bars (about 17%) to 8 bars (about 27%) with 6 bars (23%) as the target to be in the long run. If charging opportunity is larger, then battery icon switches to EV icon and estimated miles appear then (and not before that) you can choose EV mode if desired.

 

It doesn't really matter, since HV can push well into EV anyway. Watch what happens when going down a mountain.

 

Yes, but only a little bit. at about 28-29% SOC the car switches automatically to EV mode.
Your stages above are correct for depleting the battery (although you have started at 0% and up instead of 100% and down).
The thread is about self-charging, and in this situation HV mode is up to 27% SOC.

 

Pilot, in summary, after the battery is discharged, the Prime will be like an ordinary Prius, except better due to the larger battery that'll take more charge on a long downhill and return more EV operation on a long uphill. I've found no practical use for the Charge Mode running the engine to recharge the propulsion battery. Just drive. Plug in when you get the opportunity.

 

It defaults to Ev mode, until the Ev mode range is depleted. Then it switches to Hv.

 

Long trips with no opportunity to plug in would be the exception, which is out of ordinary driving needed... like when you are on vacation traveling highways for many hours.

 

But even on long trips with no opportunity to plug in, wouldn't it be more fuel efficient to avoid Charge Mode, and just run in HV mode with the battery partially charged?

 

Probably, but only assuming you can sustain that little bit of pre-charged Ev for the whole trip.

I just last year went on a 3,000 mile trip where we stopped in eight cities. Many of those stops included several very short trips (under five miles each, round trip). However, all together they added up to a lot more than 25 miles. So preserving Ev mode range until I needed it (for the short trips) would have only taken me about 1/4 of the way through the whole trip. But those long stretches between cities would have been the perfect time to use charge mode because the engine was warm anyway. That would have provided me Ev range to avoid around 10 engine warm up cycles every time I charged up (average in-city short trips were around 2 miles).

I don't think I had any opportunities to charge from the grid on that trip. Possibly one, but that wouldn't have changed the above discussion.

 

if you only use hv mode, it retains most of the wall charge. you have to use ev or ev auto if you want to use the wall charge.
when the wall charge is depleted, it switches to hv mode.
but it defaults to ev mode when started, so you have to change modes manually if you want something else.

 

I've wondered about this. Would it really make sense to keep all the percentages the same, even though the traction battery is twice the size ?