Featured Hyundai IONIQ - Prius competitor?

agreed, even more interesting will be fully in a year or two.

 

From the Hyundai USA Ioniq web site:

On the safety side, you’ll find some of the industry’s most innovative and popular features are available, including Automatic Emergency Braking with Pedestrian Detection, Lane Departure Warning and Blind Spot Detection. And when it comes to technology and convenience there’s available Smart Cruise Control, smartphone integration and wireless charging. There’s even a handy holder for your tablet between the front seats.

"Available", of course, does not necessarily mean on all trim levels

Also available is my requirement, Driver's power seat memory. I hope this gets Toyota to include it in the Prius mid cycle update. My wife and I have very different seating positions. I won't buy a new car without it (don't need a new one for a while anyway).

 

In the Netherlands the lowest trim level has all of these, except Blind Spot Detection and wireless charging (of your phone). For this reason I took this lowest trim level.

By the way, it has more than just Lane Departure Warning. You can also set that so-called Lane Keeping Assistance System (LKAS) in an active mode, and then it does the steering between the lines itself, also when the road is bending. It can be combined with the Adaptive Cruise Control. This is a bit similar to Tesla's Autopilot, but in this case the aim is not that the car drives autonomously, but together with you, in a kind of mixed initiative interaction. The car is doing the steering, but it should feel from time to time that you also do some movement, otherwise it will beep after a while. It is a very special (in in some sense even rather intimate) experience if you feel this type of cooperation between you and the car, as if you do the steering together with another person. You can imagine how that would feel. For example, when the road is bending, sometimes the car is reacting first, sometimes you are earlier. It will always give more resistance when you want to steer in a direction that the car does not want, so it is easy to feel where the car wants to go, and to follow that. When you do a test drive don't forget to try it (but you need a bit of time to get accustomed to it). For me personally, I like this, and I consider this mixed initiative type of driving philosophy as more realistic than the autonomous driving philosophy, for example, suggested by the name Autopilot.

 

yep the LKAS is interesting has 3 setting

1st - lane departure warning mode, it just beeps as you touch a white line (but the beep comes from the speaker of the side you touch the white line)
2nd - std LKAS, will only nudge you as you approach the white line
3rd - active LKAS, the provides more steering input to actively keep you in the centre of the lane

the Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) has 3 settings as well, "Early", "Normal" and "Late" which is how quick it will notifiy and intervene

the smart cruise is also adjustable, you have 4 steps for the distance to follow the vehicle in front, and also 3 settings as to how fast it will accelerate to get back to cruising speed once the slower vehicle is no longer in the way

 

There are so many displays and settings options in this car, it will take me half a year before I know 90% of them!

 

prime too, overload?

 

You don't need to see and consider all of them. But when you want to know what is possible, it is good to read at fora what others have found out.

 

I have two new types of experiences, one with a higher temperature than before and one with higher speed:

• 10 °C (50 °F), no heater on, speed from 50 to 70 km/h, average around 65 km/h (41 mi/h):
efficiency 10.6 kWh/100km (17.0 kWh/100mi), implied range around 264 km (164 mile)

• 4 °C (39 °F), heater/AC on, speed from 80 to 100 km/h, average around 83 km/h (52 mi/h), car filled with 5 grown up persons (1/3 of a football team) and some sport luggage for them:
efficiency 14.2 kWh/100km (22.7 kWh/100mi), implied range around 197 km (123 mile)

 

Whilst appreciating the statistics, skill and effort you put into your uploads, I can't help feeling that your country is all relatively flat. That is, with no major hills and valleys such as others (like me) would have to contend with on a regular basis. However, don't be disheartened, because I really enjoy your posts.

 

Yes, that is true. There are areas that are more hilly, in the South-East part of our country but not in the flat North-West region where I live. Those reporting from the UK or Norway will have more hills in their trips. In Ioniq specific forums you can find some.

 

thank you for the excellent writeup on the lka which is one of my priorities, lka looks a lot better then the prine's lka, i will have to think about buying the ioniq instead of the prine.

 

You have 6-7 weeks to think about it because unlike the Prime, it is not for sale in the USA until April. But it won't be a hard wait as I had to fly to Rhode Island to get mine and drive it 1,200 miles back. There may not be any in your area.

So which one of the three, not yet for sale, Ioniq?

The plug-in hybrid Prime has both EV and hybrid drive train in one vehicle. The three Ioniq are either EV or hybrid, not both like the Prime.

In the old Beta-ware days, broke programs were given away and written about to suppress sales of real products. So you have time to decide which future Ioniq to buy instead of the real Prius Prime Plus parked outside where I am texting.

Bob Wilson

 

To be fair, Hyundai has announced a PHEV Ioniq, which is both a short-range BEV and a hybrid, just like the Prius Prime.

However, the PHEV Ioniq only has a 45 kW motor, compared to the 68 kW power output capability of the Prime. So, at least on paper, the Ioniq is a worse BEV - either it'll act as more of a blended hybrid like the PiP (at 38 kW from its battery), or it'll have absolutely dreadful performance in EV mode (this may also be configurable, like the Prime's ability to switch between EV and EV Auto, or the Ford PHEVs' ability to switch between EV Now and EV Auto). If you're looking for an EV driving experience, I'd say the Ioniq PHEV isn't where to find it - while you do take a power hit in non-blended EV mode in the Prime, it's at least much closer to its HV mode performance.

 

And how long will @Old Smokey get to contemplate buying that one? <GRINS>

Oh well, it looks like January sales:

• Ioniq - steady sales from December
• Ioniq blue - double December sales
• Ioniq EV - half December sales
• Kia Niro - 75 times the December sales (or was that MPG?)

Looks like Godot is still on the way.

Bob Wilson

 

ROFL

 

Here's an interesting review: New Hyundai Ioniq Tastes Mediocre In First European Review

I would say the guy doesn't love the Prius, but still thinks its better...and thinks the Ioniq is a bit slugish with its automatic transmission. He also tested lower than suggested figures.

 

thanks for the words of wisdon Bob,my 2010 prius is still working really really good with only 63k miles on it,the only reason i an thinking of trading is because of all the saftey features lka is my priority,if it only saves my life once it's woth it,i was thinking of test driving the ioniq plugin due to be available in the fall.

 

I sold the 2010 with 73k miles to get a 2017 Prius Prime Plus in December for that $4.5k tax credit. I then drove it 1,200 miles with one fuel stop at 600 miles. The dynamic cruise control and lane keep assist are fully worth the cost. It made a long distance drive into sitting in a comfy chair and listening to my tunes.

One interesting section in the Poconos, they were high enough to be in the clouds, fog, yet my fellow drivers didn't slack off one bit. I really appreciated the radar in the cruise control that hopefully would have detected 'bad news' before I got there. Well that is what I told myself but I was also following big trucks.

Bob Wilson

 

You used your big magnet again? You need to update your avatar to show the Prime with the magnet rather than the Gen 1 Prius

 

Bigger magnet needed.