Pricing: FAIL, for one!

I've been reading this forum carefully for several weeks. The 2010 Prius wasn't my first choice, but the Insight II left too much lacking.

I was pretty much set on a IV, despite the waste on a "satellite radio" and other nonessential items. I'd give up the V's 17" rims for a sunroof, with-or-without a solar array. (You know these will be 19.95 at Pep Boys in 6 months, and aftermarket rims/rubber always beat OEM choices.)

BUT... one thing I absolutely demand, have to have, and all that, is good lighting. I was concerned to see HIDs go away and LED fronts brought in.

Well... based on the MSRP packages we're seeing today, it looks like it'll be smarter to go back to the 5-year old solution we put on an '04 Acura TSX and add two pairs of Bosch Compact 100 lights: one set amber 55w fogs, and a pair of 10-degree spot driving lights, to supplement the stock 55w halogens. Toyota's LED fronts + "fog lamps" only come on the V trim level, and constitute a major premium over the IV. [Sure, they say these LEDs will last 15 years. But they're already so cheap that it doesn't matter.]

Better lighting, leather seats, and a sunroof were major reasons we considered the 2010 Prius -- more important than MPG or power considerations (because, let's face it, we're only dealing with 4-bangers here.) But at this point it seems we're committed to major customizations, no matter whether we get the Prius or an Insight.

So ... I'm calling this a FAIL for this particular buyer, because the option array just isn't working for me.



[[[ PS -- Info on the lights at www-dot-boschlightsandmore -dot-com / products_fog_driving_lights-dot-htm -- I can post pix of them installed on our old TSX but it's kinda OT. When we had the TSX's HIDs, halogen high beams, Bosch fogs and spots all working at the same time, you could cook the toupee right off that Camry driver hogging the passing lane. ]]]

 

LOL! I have a pair of French-made fogs with "soda glass", whatever that is (the glass is about an inch thick, and the pair weighs >15#) never installed on my Yukon (because I couldn't find a front rack I liked). I always read owner forums to see what people are trying to do to fix the lighting problem. (The halogens on a GMC Yukon were as weak as the brakes, which is to say, not adequate to the design purpose.)

What most people don't realize is that car electric circuits can almost always handle another 55-watt circuit or 2 -- they have a significant safety margin to allow for leakage, aging batteries, generator age, etc. Here in coastal NJ, there are way too many deer running around after dark that you need that extra second or 2 of reaction time that better lights can give. But the key is to get _good_ lights: OEM fog lights, often a $300-600 option, are commonly useless in fog conditions. And the USA aftermarket seems to have ignored the value of narrow-cone "spot" driving lights, except in professional racing circuits.

If we have the ear of the Toyota product team in this forum, I'd urge more attention be given to the issue of lights to see by. Toyotas seem to accrue to a slightly older demographic, and past the age of 50, you look for reasonable mechanical augmentations. :rockon:

 

Well, one of the tragedies we often see on the NJ Turnpike is kids w/ 8000-degree Kelvin lamps doing the zoom-zoom. Bright blue lights not only create instant headaches for other drivers, but actually work to lessen driving visibility in most road conditions. (Because blue light scatters more -- so in fog conditions, blueish headlights make an opaque wall in front of you, whereas amber fogs with low cutoff give a much better chance of actually seeing the road surface. Safety!)

Beyond that, aftermarket bulbs don't help if they go in a lens housing that's wrong for the bulb. HID kits that re-use a manufacturer's halogen housing, for example, are universally WRONG. HIDs need a different lens/reflector combination. Whereas halogens don't have sharp "cutoffs", these are absolutely essential to safe and proper HID lamp display. I haven't studied the optics of LEDs for front lights yet, but doubt much has changed regarding the laws of physics.

How important are headlights? If you are a cash customer willing to stand by your criteria, they can be a model-disqualifier, like absence of VSA (vehicle stability assist). Lease customers might look at it differently, since they don't own a car, and think they can get by for 3 years or so. But there's a world of difference in headlights between good and legally adequate.

 

I know that bulb replacement cost on Acuras is just under $100, which is not bad (though you should replace as pairs, so the color temperature stays the same).

If "labor" means you have to pull a lot of things apart to get to where you can unplug the bad bulb, that's not a good thing. But our experiences with HIDs on several cars (Honda and Nissan) have been positive to the point that when I get in the Yukon at night, I often recheck to see if I'm only using DRLs.

Back to the Prius, these pricing tiers mean you have to go "all in" on trim levels to get the latest and best lights. Meanwhile, dropping the other models (I - IV) back to 55w halogens might have helped keep the selling price down on the car... but that's like leaving seat belts out of the rear because most people don't carry passengers all the time. (It's not where I would have chosen to cut, IOW.)

 

What it means, in the context of this thread, is that at least one Prius probably won't be sold because of the initial option package/pricing array. It seems many people are having similar problems with current Prius marketing decisions. Six months from now, when the correct set of options are available, we may no longer be in the market.

Incidentally, trying to hijack the thread to talk about process instead of what everyone else is talking about is a little young.:focus: