Question about Toyota Hybrid - Doc?

[Gurm]

Here's the question that came up amongst a few of us today:

If the Prius, for example, is using the gas engine on the highway and NOT the electric (literature says it'll just be charging the electric at this point), how much BETTER would its mileage be if it didn't have to lug around hundreds of pounds of batteries?

Or is there something going on that I'm unaware of? I know that it gets better "around town" mileage because it relies more heavily on the battery around town and for stops/starts, and the regenerative braking puts power back into the cells... but on the highway would it run MORE efficiently without that battery weight?

We were just curious. Clearly the overall compromise requires that it have batteries, that's a given. But if, hypothetically, you could jettison them at highway speed, would the car suddenly get 55+mpg on the highway instead of the 45+ it gets now?

[cjolley]

Two situations.

1, no hills at all: weight hardly matters, it's all aerodynamics and engine efficiency on the highway.

2, the real world. the hybrid system captures energy going down a hill and helps the engine going up the next.
That is really obvious driving our Civic hybrid which gets 41mpg loaded to the max and driving 75-80mph and running the AC.


PS It's not hard at all to get the mpg up over 50 on the highway. Just slow down to 55 and don't carry anything and don't run the AC.
Our car usage combined with Oklahoma's weather make that practical about three driving hours per year.

[Brian Ellis]

Firstly, there are not hundreds of pounds of batteries, just a few tens of pounds. On my car, the drive battery is no bigger than a briefcase. Secondly, it charges the battery ONLY if it needs to, rarely for more than a few minutes at a time. You cannot keep pumping juice through a fully charged battery without buggering it up. The income/expenditure of the state of the battery is controlled by some very sophisticated electronics.

The Prius is not a car over-suited for long-distance highway driving anyway, unlike the Honda Civic Hybrid, because the battery is never used on the highway. The HCH, OTOH, uses the battery on the highway when accelerating and going uphill, which gives it longer legs than the Prius. However, for urban driving, the HCH's legs are shorter than a dachshund's, compared with the Prius. Two entirely different concepts.

See http://www.cypenv.info/hybrid for more info.

[Nowhere]

cjolley (and many from US), I wonder sometimes when will you stop to admire those mpg numbers so much...

For example, 9 years old (so a little beaten up already and not with latest engine) Megane gets typically around 6L/100km on the "highway" (not many true highways here, you have to slow down to ~60km/h every dozen kilometers or so). Google tells me that's 40 mpg.

And my cousine has Megane diesel, which gets to a little over 4L/100km - somewhere around 55 mpg. Without any hybrid tricks...

(btw, I think that's the reason why hybrids aren't very popular here - roughly the same in mpg, but...~1,5-2 times more expensive than conmparable normal car)

[Brian Ellis]

You can hardly compare a Megane with a Prius or HCH, which are mid-sized cars, not compacts. And they are made by Renault!

The most economical of the petrol Meganes has

CO2 (g/km) 165
Combined - mpg (litres/100km) 44.8(6.3)
Extra Urban - mpg (litres/100km) 50.4(5.6)
Urban - mpg (litres/100km) 30.7(9.2)
(manufacturer's figures, copied/pasted from UK website. note the mpg figures are in UK gallons: multiply by 0.844 for US gals)

Mine, in practice, are respectively 110, 5.5-5.7, 4.8-5.2, 5.7-6.5 for a car which is considerably larger and the best part of 300 kg heavier.

If you wish to make comparisons, compare like with like.

[Nowhere]

Uhmm...Civic and Megane ARE in the same size class; compact. It's clear enough when you see them both frequently... (sure, I'd be surprised if they would have exact same dimensions...but still, both are compacts).

@consumption figures - yup, hybrids fare better in urban traffic, that's not news/I wasn't disputing that.

PS. I don't think there's anything wrong with Renault nowadays...but anyway, it was picked by me simply because I'm familiar with one of their cars; any modern compact would do.

[Brian Ellis]

By what criteria? Others don't agree with you.

Link :

Mid sized cars: Honda - Civic Hybrid - 1000km Road Test

Link

Honda hits hard on price and then pampers like few other mid-sized cars can around the $20,000 mark

Link

A consumer satisfaction survey conducted in China shows that the mid-sized Honda Civic was rated the best.

[Nowhere]

Wiki would be better when it comes to general feel among population about such not strictly determined terms...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-size_car - there's one Honda as an example...Honda Accord

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_family_car / http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_car - has both Civic and Megane as main examples

Also - notice how your links are from completelly different area of the world than ours; it is to be expected that small differences in classification exist.

And c'mon...just compare Civic and Megane parked next to each other, it can't be that uncommon... (however...remembering that, IMHO, current civic does have shape that makes it look more stubby/dumpy (direct translation of termsn from my language, not sure if it makes sense))

PS. I'm starting to wonder from where this non-issue comes...perhaps because every group in car sizes got bigger over the years, and you're more used to what "mid-sized" meant in the past? (apparently also associating Megane with its predecessor? Because yeah, Renault 19 was shitty...and smaller )

[Gurm]

The Megane is a tiny-ass box not suitable to transport more than me and my backpack to work.

The Honda Accord is a reasonable sized car that moves four people and a few bags in relative comfort.

The Civic is ALSO tiny, but Honda has made great strides in making it seem less tiny.

[JTD]

The Megane is a tiny-ass box not suitable to transport more than me and my backpack to work.

The Honda Accord is a reasonable sized car that moves four people and a few bags in relative comfort.

The Civic is ALSO tiny, but Honda has made great strides in making it seem less tiny.

Have you actually driven a Megane or a similar sized car?
You can easily move four people and a few bags in a Megane sized car.

I must agree with Nowhere on this. Why pay way more for a hybrid car, when you can buy a similar sized car with a very economical diesel engine for less?

[cjolley]

I must agree with Nowhere on this. Why pay way more for a hybrid car, when you can buy a similar sized car with a very economical diesel engine for less?

In addition to the 40mpg we get on the highway we get 39mpg in the city
And practically all of our driving is city so a hybrid was a pretty obvious choice for us.

Plus, what the hell is a Megane?



PS There are no Renault dealers in OKC anyway.

[JTD]

In addition to the 40mpg we get on the highway we get 39mpg in the city
And practically all of our driving is city so a hybrid was a pretty obvious choice for us.

Plus, what the hell is a Megane?



PS There are no Renault dealers in OKC anyway.

Well, if your major driving is in a city, an electrical or hybrid car is more economical, but if you most of the time drive outside the city (highway or motorway) i'll bet a diesel car is the better choice.

This is a Megane:


it's the same size as a VW Golf.

and wit 1,5 l diesel engine it does an average of 22,2 km/l, while a Toyota Prius does 23,3 kml but at a much higher price (at last here in Denmark).

[rylan]

One other thing... diesel isn't much of a choice for cars in the US. Almost all autos are gasoline, and diesel also costs $1/gal more than gasoline.

[JTD]

One other thing... diesel isn't much of a choice for cars in the US. Almost all autos are gasoline, and diesel also costs $1/gal more than gasoline.

didn't know about the price difference. Here in europe diesel is generally cheaper than petrol (though in some countries it's the other way around).

[Gurm]

it's the same size as a VW Golf.

I rest my case. The VW Golf is ... I dunno HALF the size of my car? 'Course I drive a Volvo...