HV using EV capacity

Every time I think I understand my PIP it surprises me again. I was driving in a very hilly area and had 2.5 miles of EV charge left, or so the battery estimator showed. I was going down a hill and coasting when the car changed to HV! Then it stayed in HV mode until the ICE heated up. At this point I drove the car harder and my battery charge went up, it showed 3.5 miles left. Next I see the PIP is back in EV mode with more range then before. At the end of my trip I still had 1.6 miles left on the read out. Why it dropped out of EV mode going down a hill is a mystery. The speed was under the threshold, there was still adequate battery charge, and no heat was being called for. Too bad the read out isn’t state of charge rather then an estimate of what the computer thinks you should get. Always interesting and versatile, I love my PIP

 

I'd just charge it when needed, and enjoy your PIP. In the long run the battery will probably last just as long with your lite use. I drive the same way, and some days I charge it twice a day, and others I top it with only half a charge before I go. That's why I got a 220 V level 2 unit, it's fast 45 to 90 minute charging time.

 

I wonder it that's in anticipation of 'warmup' . . . since the ICE has to run a limited amount of time at start up anyways - maybe the 17%-18% space gives an efficient place to dump the juice created during warmup / ICE spinning.

 

Thanks 9G,
Sorry I didn't include the extra info. I began driving with a fair amount of EV range, but I think I depleted it by the time I got on the freeway. By 'leaving it in EV mode', I meant I toggled to EV and it showed on the display, but I never toggled it off nor toggled 'ECO' or anything else on. The EV did of course go away on the display. So yes, I let it switch to whatever mode it wanted as we drove. (I assume 'eco' is the same as HV?). I drove ~70 mph on the freeway.

So from the posts after yours, I get the impression that if I left some electrons in the EV 'battery', I could switch back to EV mode when I got off the freeway. And that it would charge if I kept a low speed (?).

It's starting to make sense....
Tom Farr

 

understood... believe me, i understand, i also own a leaf. but i do have a scangauge hooked up and while i did not take notes, i'm relatively sure the SOC went up.

it does sound like john has discovered that the PIP does seek a certain battery level while in HV mode and my experience would at least correlate with that. i've only done the experiment once and it sounds like i happened to intentionally switch to HV mode right near the SOC level the car likes.

 

I totally agree...sure wish Toyota would make it an option...

 

when bayleafs had the big engineering visit from the leaf design team, the idea of a SOC meter came up. the engineers were very concerned with exposing this information to the driver because 1) the SOC is just an estimate until the car is power-cycled (SOC can only be determined when the battery is open circuit) and 2) they observed some SOC variations (characterized as 'mystery' variations) and they were afraid to present this raw data to the customer because it could alarm them.

i don't know if toyota has a similar rationale, but i'm sure they realize that 99% of their customers would probably be confused by this information rather than informed

i wonder if the SOC on the scangauge has been conditioned or not? i have not watched it carefully enough to see if it monotonically decreases or increases, but it sure seems that way.

 

Your PiP did what was expected on your trip. You used up your EV range, it automatically switched to HV mode and stayed there. In HV it seeks a certain SOC (state of charge) and basically maintains it, for the rest of your trip.
Then you at some point would recharge your PiP with the plug, and have EV range again. And it would start off in EV mode, and begin the process again.
That's the basic way the PiP works.
Now if you want to get creative you can begin to strategically switch into and out of EV & HV modes. That will allow strategic use of EV range, and even strategic regen to increase EV range.
Thats what the experienced guys are experimenting with and discovering now in these posts.
Have fun!

Ok, ECO.....
This is one seriously confusing thing in a GenIII Prius and PiP.
The ECO indicator above the HSI is an indication of being in HV mode. So is the centerline in the HSI. The indicator is simply a visual feedback of low to moderated ICE demand. A little reward for a light foot.
Not to be mistaken for ECO mode, which is selected by the ECO switch and controls how sensitive your gas pedal responses are.

 

Not ever owning a prius, and waiting for mine at port, my head was spinning from this thread. 9Gman pretty much summed it all up.
I guess ill be able to come up with my own methods once I get the car.

Thanks to all, this is a great thread...

Paradox, wish you would chime in, you seem to have mastered the regen on the EV battery from empty to full....

-Mike

 

Yesterday, Tuesday, was a normal trip to and from work.
Based on John's suggestion, today, Wednesday, I used HV early in my trip to and from work. I used the GPS and switched back to EV when the miles to Destination was less than the miles left in the Battery.

Here is the data for the 2 days.



Do you see ANY advantage of Today over Yesterday?

 

Having pushed the EV/HV switch one last time, put you in what selected mode? If it was HV, then what you experienced was not unlike how a post-warm-up works. Giving back EV capacity that it takes.

And what are your conclusions now about how the PiP works? Is there something going on with selected HV vs. default HV?

 

Do you think it had anything to do with manually selecting HV mode? Or, not exausting your EV range completely in the beginning?
Amazing, but it's gonna be really hard to communicate driving techniques now.


But you know, in alot of ways it runs like a regular Prius with a bigger battery. Just like you'd expect it would. Just like a regular Prius, using up all your EV range in the beginning may not be so good.

On another note...
Every time the PiP is criticized for its "11 mile range", my response is ..... so what? a regular Prius has a 1 mile EV range, and look at what it can do, the success it is.

Think of what 10~14 times that EV capacity will do. It's not about the 11 miles! The Pip is genious.

 

To paraphrase a saying about dogs and persons,

I wish I could be the driver my Prius thinks I am.

 

Regular Prius will use regeneration opportunities to increase (HV) efficiency.
Does this means that invoking HV mode prior to reaching depletion point will stack EV miles you gain in this HV mode for later use on the account of HV efficiency? (as compared to the efficiency you could have if you were not manually toggled to HV for the same drive?)

 

Ken, this is interesting data. How bad is the agony that you lack about 3.5 miles of EV range to make it all the way to work?

If I read this correctly, on Day 1, you fully depleted EV miles, while on Day 2, you had the sum total of 4.2 EV miles left over due to switching over quickly to HV when starting out and switching to EV later. Day 2 shows lower MPG. I'm having a hard time reading your Day 1 MPG, but it looks like 189? While Day 2 is 116? This seems clear, that having 4.2 EV miles not get spent cost you almost another 0.1 gallon of gas.