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Hybrid Vehicles Toyota Prius Toyota Prius MPG-Real World Numbers
767 messages, Last post on Sep 28, 2009 at 9:21 AM
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Replying to: jana6 (Oct 24, 2008 3:40 pm) Keeping the battery as fully charged as possible is where you need to focus. Since we don’t plug our cars in at night, there’s a few tricks. The #1 best way to charge the battery is when you are coasting at a speed with your foot off the accelerator. This charges the battery more quickly than braking or the gas engine charging it. Speaking of braking. That’s another subject. The car has regenerative braking as well as conventional brake pads. Regenerative means that energy is going back to charge the battery. You can learn to control this. When you use the brake pedal lightly, it is in regenerative mode. When you use a medium or firm brake pedal, braking is done by way of the brake pads, and the car is not capturing as much energy to charge the battery. The next thing I’ve learned has to do with basic physics. It takes more energy to push a car that has its front wheels turned to one side than a car that has its front wheels straight. What this means is that whenever possible, I do not press the accelerator pedal during a turn until I’ve straightened the front wheels. I accomplish this by having enough speed before starting the turn that I have time to straighten the wheels again before applying the accelerator. Can you always do this? – No. You may have people behind you or you might otherwise need to stay with the accerator during a turn. But doing it whenever you can is where the benefit is. I used to drive more with the regular flow of traffic, 10 mph or so above the speed limit. Now that I’ve got a car that can literally give a very wide range of gas mileage, I try not to drive over 57mph on the highway (unless I’m in a real hurry), and I find that not very many people stay behind me on the road which gives me much more opportunities to work the accelerator pedal in such a way that the car is charging the battery as much as possible. The highlight of my day is on my morning commute. There is a 2 lane city street in Houston (Windfern) that’s more like a drive in the country that I take every morning after getting off the beltway. I can drive for about 5 miles on this street without the gas engine coming on at all. The speed limit is 35, and I go about 37-38. I’ve noticed that speeds above 40 tend to keep the gasoline engine on rather constantly. It takes learning some new tricks, and allowing yourself to be taught how to drive again, and not by a driving instructor, but by a car that gives you a visual indicator of what’s happening in the drive train. I did a Google search early on after getting the car, and I stumbled on this film clip of a group of a dozen or so people in Japan that are known as ‘hybrid hackers.’ They have hacked into their Prius’ computers, and get over 100 mpg, and in the case of the one lady in their group she gets 150mpg out of a Toyota Prius. I know that hacking into the computer would void my warranty, so I’m not going to that extreme, but I am working with the car by way of ‘massaging the accelerator pedal’ rather than just depressing it to go. I hope this helps. The main thing is to take a deep breath, and don’t allow yourself to be in such a hurry. When you drive more relaxed, you will see an improvement. The more it improves, the more you challenge yourself to keep getting higher & higher gas mileage. Also I keep all tires at 40PSI
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Replying to: cdhc (Oct 24, 2008 5:11 pm)
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Replying to: cdhc (Oct 24, 2008 5:11 pm) I read about Japanese hypermilers but not that they achieved >100MPG through as you stated hacking the computer. Perhaps you like to provide the link to this story? Good / great mileage can be achieved without hacking the computer.
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Replying to: jana6 (Oct 27, 2008 5:42 pm) You always going to have a variance between the MFD MPG as compared to your manual calculation. How do you know that you filled up to the same level as your previous fill? Do the calculation and you'll find just a small variation will have a great sensitivity to the MPG numbers. Added to this complexity is the fact that the Prius has a fuel bladder that expands / contracts over time and its flexibility depends on outside temps. The level of fill-up depends on pump shut-off (some pumps shut off sooner); how fast you fill-up; how level your car is; and temps. Because of all these variables the MFD MPG is more reliable on an individual tank basis. In the long run the MFD has been found ~2% (only) more optimistic than manually calculated MPG over the same extended period. As an example I had my Prius now for 18 months and have driven it for 27K miles with 62 fill-ups. My life-time weighted average MFD MPG is 59.4 compared to 58.3 calculated. On an individual tank basis some tanks have large variations but overall 1.7% difference only. I don't advise to hack the computer instead recommend to study up on the car on www.priuschat.com where you can get lots of great tips from many experienced Prius owners. Good luck, Gabe
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Replying to: scottc3 (Aug 18, 2008 8:04 am) |
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Replying to: prius2007 (Oct 27, 2008 6:30 pm) |
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Replying to: jana6 (Oct 24, 2008 3:40 pm) I think you answered the question yourself; what people "claim" in reports on the internet is not necessarily what they actually got. There are various possible reasons for this, such as incomplete refills and reporting only the highest calculated outliers. But the idea that you're doing something "wrong" by getting only 44 mpg; ummm - - - I think you're beating yourself up over nothing. Quite a few people I know drive the prius where I work; we also have some in our fleet that I've tried. They all get low to mid 40's mpg on average. Nobody gets even 50 mpg, and none of them post on edmunds. Hope this helps you feel better. |
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Replying to: phd86 (Oct 28, 2008 6:44 pm) ...followed by many more and higher MPG numbers. |
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Replying to: phd86 (Oct 28, 2008 6:44 pm) how is this possible given your stmt?!!! link title I finally broke the 100 mpg/tank barrier! On 9/16/08 I filled up with 8.58 gallons after traveling 867.4 miles for 101.096 mpg. link title __________________ |
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Replying to: phd86 (Oct 28, 2008 6:44 pm) re"Nobody gets even 50 mpg, and none of them post on edmunds." Is that so?!!! Then what is this:  link title http://www.edmunds.com/toyota/prius/2009/consumerreview.html HMMM phd really does mean "Pile it Higher and Deeper"!!! 
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