How bad for the battery to be depleted into HV range without charging for an extended period

Toyota designed the system to prevent the battery from degrading due to undercharge. The bottom of the HV range is still fine. Don't be concerned.

 

congrats and welcome! what he said^^^, we have lots of members who never charge.
the only warning in the o/m is to not leave the battery fully charged for long periods of time, and if you will not be using it for awhile, deplete it to hv mode. so, kind of the opposite of what you have read.
all the best with your new pip!

 

How many mpg's do you get with the plug-in if you never plug it in? Equivalent to the standard hybrid?

XT1254 ?

 

a little better i think, due to the nature of the battery. of course, everyone's is different, based on their driving, weather, topography, and etc. you can find a decent sample in the pip forum spreadsheet sticky.
i'm usually between 60 and 70 mpg, but drive like an old lady.

 

Right about there.. I just reviewed one of my old logs and my engine first kicked on at 23.1% after depleting the EV range. On this particular drive, the SOC dipped down to 22.35% before recovering to 23.1% at which time the engine was sufficiently warmed up and shut off. For the remainder of my drive in HV, the SOC never dipped below 22.35%.

These numbers were from when my car was about 1 month old.

 

I just drove to the airport and back on a battery that had less than 1 mile left in EV. I got an indicated 62 mpg over the 40 miles of 50-60 mph driving with lots of contrary traffic lights. (Return trip was actually 64 mpg.) This thing does so well in HV mode that I'm tempted to try a whole tank that way. But I doubt that I will until I take a long trip. It's too cool to be able to plug it in.

I get about the same. Engine kicks on at around 23% SOC.

 

Not sure how you purchased, but welcome. If you did get it from a dealer, go back and make them give you a charging cable because it should have come with it. Even if they won't give you one, then perhaps one at cost.

 

Toyota has some of the best battery management and safety overhead. Like Bisco said your fine. You can get way nerdy on it. and it is good to know about your car if you want too. After you dig in you will be relieved. I suspect PiP owners will have the longest lived Prius traction batteries along with the Prime.

 

Congrats and welcome to the forum!

Don't know which charger you're going to get - best to get the OEM one, but here's a deal:

L-ion batteries like to stay charged. In the absence of a charger and you're trying to do it by regen braking, do this by switching to EV as you're stopping the car. Preferably when you're stopping from high speed, with a long runway and depress the brake enough to fill about 60%-80% as estimated on that regen gauge.

 

If the dealer won't make it right, there are relatively inexpensive (compared to the OEM) evse cables on Amazon and EBay. You don't HAVE to plug it in, but you'll burn less gas the more you plug in.

 

You do not have to switch anything.. braking and coasting regen to the battery. The hybrid battery and EV battery are the same on the PiP.. it is just diffrent SOC are used to determine what shows on your display Also lithium ion is not so keen on always staying charged. This is why Toyota has charge limits and discharge limits. The gas motor will always kick in to charge the traction battery to the needed SOC. Lithium prefers shallow charge and discharge.

 

True. In fact, the manual recommends not leaving the battery fully charged for long periods of time.

 

not sure what you mean. if you had wall charge, you could drive in ev only, up to about 65mph.
without wall charge, it's not going to happen unless you're going downhill.
with wall charge, when you hot the mph cut off point, the car goes into hv mode: engine/battery.

 

I can't figure out what you mean here. The car is supposed to come with an EVSE cable. It has a sort of longish box near the end you plug into the normal wall outlet, same as plugging in a fan or a toaster. The other end connects to the charging connector on your car. Nothing else is needed. Here's a picture I found on line that looks like mine, which is Toyota's OEM cable.



Max speed for EV mode with my car is 62 mph. If I go to 63, the gas engine (ICE) starts. If I press the gas pedal so hard as to demand more acceleration than the battery can provide alone, the ICE starts. If I'm driving along and the EV range on the display goes below 0.1 miles (ie. hits 0, but there is no "0" so it just goes blank), the ICE starts. If I push the button next to the shift lever to switch from EV to HV mode, the ICE starts if it is needed.

All this is in the manual. No secrets here. If you don't have one, they are on line, but I don't have the link for European models. It's a good idea to spend some quality time with that book. No need to read it all at once, or even to read every page, but it's very helpful for getting acquainted with your amazing new car.

 

Interesting! I didn't know the power light could be red. If there is a ground fault, at least on the US model, the red triangle with exclamation mark under the power light will light up. Did you try hitting the reset button on the EVSE? Either that or it's the wrong model for your voltage.

 

yes, the battery will assist the engine above 62mph when necessary.