EV Question

no it wouldnt. sooner or later, you would need the ICE to recharge the traction battery and its simply not as efficient as just driving the car moderately since losses do occur in the conversion process.

 

It would probably not recharge between average lights, at least not around here, but try it that is how we learn and let everyone know how it comes out particularly me since I am the nay sayer. The best use I have found is at the end of a trip when you know you are going to park for a while and the system will cool off. The ICE will have to run to heat up the system and you can take advantage of additional charging. Now that it is colder and I am getting a few more green bars I will use it to use the additional energy to get down to the blue then kick it out of EV mode.

 

I thought this thread was about something else given the title.

But there's no reason to engage EV mode. In the way you're thinking, it's already on because the gas engine cannot provide the torque to move the car at that speed from stop. Only the electric motors have the torque.

The reason the gas-engine comes on is as an assist to the electric-motors, and to charge the batteries. It also means you're accelerating faster than the protocols dictate for normal electric-only mode.

Meantime, how I was reading this topic was has anybody tried to floor the pedal when you're in EV mode and rolling along at maybe 5mph? I was only doing it to kick on the engine before I got to the stop sign.

When I did it rolling away from the hydrogen prius meet, my prius felt like it had slammed on the brakes in rougher fashion than I remember for just TRAC.

So, I'm wondering if anybody has dyno'd the car in just EV mode, or maybe I should just get grippier tires.

 

there are a few reasons to engage EV mode. i work at a place that employs 600+ people in a building that 100 parking spots. so overflow is across the street at the FAR end of a pretty large parking lot that supplies a half dozen other buildings.

there are times that if i have the chance i might move my car over to the building if space is available, (i used to work 10 hour shifts) since i showed up early and left late, it was sometimes nice to not have to walk a long way in the rain at night, etc...blah blah...

in those cases, it would suck to start up the ICE to drive a quarter mile for two minutes and shut back down. then EV comes in handy.

there are other uses too

 

Sorry, but you're not seeing the whole picture. EV mode just allows you to dig deeper into the battery before it kicks in the ICE. This is only really useful if you're coming to the end of a trip, just reparking the car, or something where you're going to recharge the batts soon.

It's actually quite inefficient MPG-wise to run going from gas to battery to wheels because of the energy losses incurred of getting energy in and then out of the battery.

This is one of the reasons hybrid mode doesn't let you accelerate as hard. You're also assuming you're doing something better the Toyota engineers haven't already considered over the 8-9 year history of the Prius.

Hybrid mode doesn't kick in the ICE until you're over 42mph or you're accelerating harder than moderate. You can look it up at john1701a.com, and it's called stealth mode. Also, 42mph is much better than the 30 in EV mode. It's all in your skill to keep the lead off, if you want to drive this way.

The saying is to "just drive it". All cars have terrible instantaneous MPH readings, because it just that tiny part of your overall driving graph. This is NOT where your MPG comes from.

The pulse-n-glide technique is all about accelerating harder/faster to get your engine RPMs into the more efficient range (which then has bad instantaneous numbers), but then glide for a long time so the average MPG stays high. This is where you should be focusing on.

 

http://john1701a.com/prius/prius-stealth.htm

42mph.

Stand still while I kick you in the teeth a few times for resorting to personal attacks. :angry: Don't attack me just because you can't deal with your own disappointment over something we've been telling you since day one.

You can also let the car glide down to below 42mph, gently press the accelerator to maintain speed, and again hybrid EV mode.

Get the lead out of your ankle muscles.

 

I guess I have trouble accelerating to anywhere near 42 also. The only way to do it would be to accelerate at a walker's pace, and you can't do that even if you are on a road by yourself. You would just look too silly. Sure, I can maintain speed at 42, but no way I can accelerate there.

I think John's reference is in relation to a software-imposed limit. I.E. -- you can engage EV below 42, and you can maintain speed up to 42 without ICE, but the EV "acceleration limit" gets more sensitive the faster you go, and kicks in long before the absolute speed limit does... Even if you are gentle on the pedal.

 

Yep, read it, but it appeared there was still confusion...

Also, I believe that 42 is for hybrid EV, correct? My Coastal paperwork says pure EV is 34.