elec motor life

[DaveinOlyWA]

if you think its a good deal, buy it. from all that i have seen and read, 100,000 miles in nowhere near the end of life for a Prius. its just well broken in.

with all used cars, basic maintenance issues will come up... brakes, fluids, lubes... a lot of stuff that would not be easy for a do-it-yourself kinda guy, but i think it will be lower or equal to any other car you might be looking at

[Flying White Dutchman]

well

car salesman are as arrogant like realestate salesman

OMG

cant believe this

when to a shop today.... well dont even going to say anything about it just that its like if i dont buy it for the price offerd then 10 poeple are just behind me that will.

[Evilshin]

The Prius uses two brushless motors. They definately aren't subject to the brush motors that most people are used to.

Brush motors work by using an electro magnet in the rotor, which are powered by physical contacts called brushes. (In early designs they were metal brushes that made that electrical contact. Today brushes are eccentially copper bushings that slide with minimal friction while providing maximum electrical contact.) The brushes would power the rotor's electro magnets one way and they reverse direction when it rotated far enough. To provide something for the rotor electro magnets to push against, either a second set of electro magnets are placed in a stator (which can be in series: a "series" wound motor, or in parallel: "shunt" wound motor). But more common is to use permanent magnets to push against. Either way, not much in terms of circuitry is needed to make brush motors go... just power.

To make motors more efficient, brushless permanent magnet motors put the permanent magnets in the rotor and they make the electro magnets in the stator. They then use a sensor to figure out which set of electro magnets to turn on to make the motor turn. The electro magnets are turned on and off electronically, which is no simple task since the amount of current in bigger motors is usually enough to fry most common transistors. This makes brushless motors controllers expensive.

Also the torque of the motor is proportional to the strength of the permanent magnets. You can make the magnets bigger = bigger motor, or alternatively you can use stronger magnets = higher cost.

Bottom line is that while the prius' motors are expensive, they are not as prone to wear. Yes, the electro magnets can burn out if you over power them, but the controller was designed to prevent this. Now semi permanent magnets will wear out, but permanent magnets (which are not truely permanent) won't wear out very quickly. This leaves the only part of the motor likely to wear as the bearings. But unlike the wheel bearings, there is plenty of suspension to dampen shocks on the motor bearings.

I would think the motor controller would wear out before the motor.

[jayman]

Originally Posted by lIon

car salesman are as arrogant like realestate salesman

You bet they are

If any salesperson made such a pitch to me - "Ten people are behind you waiting to buy etc" - I'd march out of there. There is being a jerk, and there is being a JERK

[darelldd]

You'd be wise to worry about the ICE WAY before the electric motor "wearing out." In the many millions of miles of production EV studies, none of the electric motors ever showed any signs of giving up the ghost. That's the least of your worries! The typical assumed life of an EV motor is at least a million miles. And that is with zero maintenance.

[Flying White Dutchman]

Originally Posted by jayman

You bet they are

If any salesperson made such a pitch to me - "Ten people are behind you waiting to buy etc" - I'd march out of there. There is being a jerk, and there is being a JERK

yes frustraring
buth the prius is a car that a lot of poeple are looking @
not realy buying it yet ... but a lot of intrest.

and the price for fuel is going up so salespeople just wiat there turn to sell this car for the best price