My son has a metabolic disorder that leaves him highly heat sensitive. We live half an hour from the hospital where he gets his treatment, but my car's AC is not strong enough to handle the 100+ degree heat and grueling sunshine of the central valley. I had planned to buy a Prius before we got his diagnosis. But I've been warned that a car that is optimized for fuel economy may not be optimized for AC strength. The strength of the AC system now trumps any other criterion for choosing a car. Are there any Prius owners here from REALLY hot parts of the country who can advise me? Can I buy a Prius?
I live in L.A., and I find it works for me on those really HOT days. However if A/C performance is a critical factor, and having heard some folk mention, here on the chat, that the A/C is sometimes not as effective as they would like. Search A/C, read some threads. I am sure others will come along and give an idea or two. Interesting, yet sad problem. Hope you come to a workable solution!
My experience here in AZ with the AC is that it will eventually pull the car down to your set temp, but may take 5 minutes or so to get there. It blows cool to cold air but I've had cars that did better. So, if you could pre-cool the car before your son gets in, you should be fine.
Are you familiar with cool collars? You soak them in water, beads inside swell making the collar cool. I live in upstate NY, hate the heat; these are wonderful! You can refrigerate them, but just water makes them cool. It is the same material used for cut flowers. There are also cool seat cushions. I don't know how I survived without them!
It sounds like you may be an ideal candidate for the 2010 Prius coming out this summer. With the solar roof option it will help cool the car before you even get in. Our AC has been fine, but we are not in your climate. Tinting the windows would likely help as well. PA P
The 2010 (available in April/May) has the solar roof option. It doesn't really "cool" the car, it circulates outside air into the car when the car is off, -reducing- the greenhouse effect inside the car. Yes, the end result is the interior is cooler than it would otherwise be. However, the 2010 also has a "pre-cool" option, where you press the remote and it starts up the A/C to pre-cool the interior. As I recall this runs for about five minutes. If you can wait a few months before taking delivery, that may be a good option for you. I'd also get some good window tinting done to help out the cooling. Uber Optik is one good tint to consider.
I live in the Sac area (+100°F in June, July, August). The Prius has the best AC of any vehicle I have owned. I suggest buying a light color (mine is white).
The Central Valley? We're from all over the country and probably don't know the local regional locale names. I would suggest a few things to help mitigate heat in your car: -Tint your windows with a quality film installed by a professional tinter -Park in the garage or in shade -Get a front window shade and use it religiously -Start a trip with the windows down a bit and with the AC on vent (fresh) mode. This helps flush hot air out of the cabin. When the air from the AC is cool, roll up the windows and leave the air on vent. Once the air is cold, turn it to recirculate.
Solar roof??? I hadn't heard about that. There are some good deals on 07-08 Priuses in our area right now so I've only been looking at used. In fact I was thinking the main advantage of the new model year would be to further lower prices of the old models. But a solar roof looks wonderful! Does anyone know how much extra this will add to the price of the car? Last summer I never parked with my windows closed - I couldn't afford any extra heat buildup. The thought of locking my car is a luxury I hadn't imagined. And though we'd hoped to save some money, I'd be willing to rearrange the budget for a pre-cooled car. This is very, very exciting news. How long can this roof run the AC with the car engine off? I'm wondering if we can use the car as a temporary cool down station when we're out on a summer day. Linda
I don't think the solar panel runs the AC. It runs a fan to keep air circulating, so I doubt that it will actually cool the car that much.
For the 2010 model the solar panel/sunroof option is listed on the Toyota.com site. Last I heard it was around $1200, but check there for the final word. It is probably bundled with other options, so the cost isn't really listable separately. As I posted above, it doesn't operate the A/C, it operates a fan to blow hot interior air outside, trying to keep the car interior at outside temps. This can be 60F cooler in the hot southwest sun. But you can also get the "pre-cool" A/C option as I mentioned above. This DOES operate the A/C -before- you enter/unlock the car. You can leave the Prius on (in "READY") for as long as you like. The engine will cycle on and off as needed to keep the main battery charged. The A/C operates off the main battery, not the engine. In reasonable conditions the Prius uses about 1 l/hr of fuel in this state. YMMV. You will have to manually lock the drivers door in this state of leaving it on with nobody inside with the key/FOB. Note that the new car has a slightly different "smart key" function which hasn't been fully explored yet by the user community. So we can't be sure of what steps you would have to take (Danny, did you play with this?). Note that even the current car can be left on when parked, with the A/C running. You just can't remotely start the A/C as with the 2010. So a 2006-2009 might be ok for you after all.
I live in El Paso and we have several months of high heat in the summer, I have never had a problem with the car not cooling to a comfortable level. It will lower the gas mileage some if i put it to 65 degrees for say a hour trip but health is above gas mileage. It does take a little while to get going really cold some times but if you start the car five minutes before you want to leave you should be in perfect shape. Go take a test drive and tell the salesman about your son, I'm sure he would let you take a test drive with the A/C very cold to see how it handles.
Look into a cool vest. My wife, who has MS, can't deal w/ heat well either (we're in AZ for the dry climate). The compound within the cool packs melts at a comfortable 60F and isn't too cool to the touch unlike ice packs. https://www.coolvest.com/index.shtml
I live in Naples Florida and today the temp was 91 after sitting in the sun. Absolutely NO PROBLEMS with th A/C. If fact I just measured the temp of the air coming out of the outlets at 47 degrees. Greeeeat!
We've got one, thanks. He hasn't used it yet. I actually joined an MS online board to get advice about managing heat intolerance, since my son's condition is too rare to support much of a community. It's a great group.
Drove mine in 48 degrees C and didn't even know it was hot. That is about 118f. The good thing about the Prius over other car is the AC is electric, it runs as hard as it needs to to cool the car to the preset temperature unlike an engine driven AC which can only work as hard at the engine revs allow. This means a conventional car AC works poorly at idle (like at traffic lights) but too well at speed, on the highway, Prius is better than that. If you can you would still be better off parking in shade than relying on the solar roof but that isn't always posible. The best thing about the solar roof is you can turn on the AC remotely to precool the car. The AC runs off the battery for up to 3 minutes proir to opening the door. If you are sitting in the car with the AC on the petrol engine will cycle on and off to maintain a minimum charge in the battery but the AC will run to maintain the cabin temperature constantly as needed. Invest in window sunshades from the Prius Shop to keep interior temps low when parked. Yep, it's a bit of messing about but worth it. Also saves the upholstery and darkens the inside of the car making it feel cooler.
Mine works fine in Dallas. If you don't have covered parking start the car five minutes early with the A/C on MAX COOL. You should be able to get an excellent price on a new '09 now.
Is the pre-cool option a separate feature from the solar roof? Can I get a car without a sunroof that will still operate the AC before I unlock the car? Thanks
The Solar roof option only runs a fan to ventilate the car. It does not run the A/C. The only way to run the A/C (without quickly draining the big high-voltage traction battery, which would be bad) is to start the car (that is, put it in the "Ready" state, as though you were about to drive it away) and leave it in "Park" with the parking brake set. In that condition you can leave the car with everything running and lock it if desired using the mechanical key which is stored inside the fob. The car doesn't need any special options to do this. In other words if ventilating alone is not enough and you really need to run the A/C a 2010 has essentially no advantage over a 2009. Of course don't leave the car running the car inside a totally enclosed garage; open the garage door to allow exhaust to escape. And before leaving the car be certain that the A/C system is set on recirculate so that it doesn't draw any exhaust into the cabin. Recirculate also allows the A/C to keep the car as cool as possible after the initial cool-down, so in your situation I expect you'd want to keep it in recirculate pretty much all the time.
