First Road Trip Prius Prime

gorgeous! great write up, thanks! how did you feel about hatch storage vs your previous prius for a road trip?

 

Sharp looking. Silver?

 

Not many people fall into that kind of luck.

 

That's the color combo I've got on order.

 

I found dynamic cruise control in our BMW i3-REx really helps on long distance travel. It isn't obvious until you experience it. The constant attention to speed control is fatiguing. Offload the driver and the drive becomes more 'sit in a comfy chair' and enjoy the music.

Bob Wilson

 

correct, if auto climate is set to off you should not see any pulses coming from the battery to the fan icon, I could be wrong but with no pulses your EV range is at the highest range.

 

We picked up our Prime in Buffalo and drove the 750 miles back to STL on New Years Eve. I must agree with your comments. Superb road handling. Of course we had a 25 MPH head-wind all the way due to storms so we didn't get stunning gas milage, but good still.

One of the fun messages is the coffee cup with "Isn't it time to take a break?" I guess its sway warning, but cannot find it in the manual... anywhere.

I notice in the manual that for extended highway driving they recommend turning off the EV setting and running HV. Seems to make some sense. Why run the battery down in the first 25 miles? ... but we didn't see that until we were home.

Also note that you can get the engine to charge the battery by press/hold the EV/HV switch for about 2 seconds. Manual says that this uses more gas. Still, if you are on a long incline and gas engine running already, then might make sense?

 

Does anyone know if you purposely turn on the ICE by pressing the EV/HV switch for 2 seconds how long will the ICE run?
Does the ICE continue to run until the driver pushes the EV or EV Auto button?

I am hoping that the driver has control over keeping the ICE running, since if the ICE turns on for the first time during any day and I only have a short distance remaining to drive, I would prefer the ICE to be able to continue to run to properly warm the ICE and not get water condensing in the oil due to the short run time.

 

Until the battery is at 80%.

 

Whenever the ICE comes on for the first time in a day, it will go through a warm up cycle. There is also an oil maintenance cycle that will use the ICE if the car has gone 200 miles since the last ICE use.

 

gas maintenance cycle?

 

Or more precisely: "Would you like to Take Rest?" Which my wife and I now say to each other. Reminds me of an old Sony (pro) videotape machine error message: "Reproduced timecode reads not correctly."

take rest? by jcburns posted Jan 16, 2017 at 5:16 PM

 

I'm not sure what Toyota calls it, or if they have different cycles.
I know the Volt has an engine maintenance mode to circulate the oil and boil off moisture, and a separate fuel maintenance mode for when the car has gone a year without getting a fill.