Forgive me for prob asking a dumb question, but.... I just purchased a 2012 Prius and love it, but the last couple of times I turned it on, it has almost immediately fired up the gas engine too. At first I thought it was due to me having the inside temp set higher than the outside temp so maybe it was something to do with the heater, but today when I left work it fired it up and it was 90 degrees outside. I'd understand if my battery was low but it was only 2 bars down from full. What causes this to happen? Just curious.
http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii...-discussion/76501-gen3-warming-up-stages.html Supposedly, the initial warmup is to get the catalyst up to operating temperature to reduce emissions and (also likely) to get the ICE there too.
I have noticed that it really has a mind of its own. Meaning its pretty smart. It does what it needs to do with no input from the driver. Seems the engineers got the 50MPG down to a science.
