Solved : Transistion to S4 without idle check.

Try it with a bit longer delay 2009Prius. This is pretty weird because I've been doing it now for several months so I know it definitely works. I've done it dozens of times and it hasn't failed me once.

After you power off, make sure you wait until all the lights go off on the instrument panel (one to two seconds) then just hit he button again and wait for the ready "beep" (another two seconds).

I don't have any way to measure the coolant temperature so I just do it after I notice that I'm in stage 3 (engine continues to run if gliding from below 55 km/h).


Maybe the Australian Prius is different????

Maybe the 2004 to 2006 models are different???

Has anyone else tried it, let me know if it works.

 

Yes it doesn't need to be fully stopped to do the idle check but it does need to be going very slow (about walking speed in my case). In general driving the only time that I ever go that slow is when I'm stopping so it really makes no difference. Even if I could arrange the opportunity to drive at that speed at some point where I don't need to stop then the momentum "saved" would be negligible and the inconvenience of slowing to 5MPH in a situation where I didn't need to stop considerable.

What I'm saying is it's a good strategy if you actually have some point in your trip where you really have to go 5MPG without stopping, but otherwise not so useful.

Ok I'm not fully understanding either. When you start a glide from over 55 km/h then yeah you cant tell if you're in stage 2 or stage 3 or stage 4 because they all behave the same. Basically I just know I'm in stage 3 after I've driven long enough for the engine to be fully warm and if I haven't done the idle check yet.

 

I should also point out one other thing that I've been overlooking in this discussion. In Australia UK Canada and most of Europe the Prius measures the instantaneous fuel consumption in L per 100 km. This actually makes it very easy to tell if the engine is still running when you're gliding.

You see 100 MPG (US) is only about 2.4 L/100km, so that means in the US model you cant detect fuel injection if it's less than a rate equivalent to 2.4 L/100km. This means that if you're trying to glide but are in stage 3 with the engine idling, you may not notice it because the MPG's will probably stay pegged at 100 unless you're going really slow. With the Liters per 100 km units however we can see fuel injection basically all the way down to zero. So yeah I've kind of been overlooking that fact that not everyone can tell so easily if they are in stage 3 or stage 4, but trust me it is very easy if your Prius displays fuel consumption in L/100km.

 

Ok I just tested this again and paid close attention to exactly what I'm doing (I've been doing it so much lately that it's like second nature). I particularly paid close attention to how long I wait before restarting.

When you come to a stop and hit the button to turn off, the speed and fuel gauge displays go off really quickly (about a second) but the gear selection display ( R-N-D-B ) hangs around for about another second and a half after that. So I'm actual waiting for all of the instrument lights (including the gear select display) to go out before I try to turn it back on. Maybe this is what you did differently 2009?

 

Thanks for taking the time to test it thoroughly 2009. That's a bit disappointing. It looks like the US model is different in this regard. I know that only the North American models have the coolant storage thermos, that seems to complicate the issue somewhat.

I see above that "reeed" had no problems replicating the results in Singapore. I think that they have pretty much the same specifications as we do in Australia. I'm guessing that the UK and European Priuses would also be similar but we'd have to get some feedback from them to know for sure. So far we only know for sure that it works in Japan, Australia and Singapore.

If anyone from UK/Europe or Canada can test this please let us know.

 

Yes I know about that technique spinkao, that's an old one. I used that before, but again it was frustrating because sometimes as soon as I'd kick the engine on the traffic would start to move and I'd have to drive off before the 10 seconds was up.

This new method is faster and bypasses the idling altogether. I get more opportunities where I can reliably use this method than any other.

Anyway it looks like it doesn't work for the US models. It looks like their startup/shutdown logic is different because of the thermos. Can you please test if this off/on method works on your Czech/European Prius.