battery life

Yes, absolutely normal. The regular Prius targets six out of eight bars. If you have more than this, it will try to use more than normal to get rid of the excess - it's so it has somewhere to store energy produced by braking. If the battery ever does get up to 8 bars it (reportedly) starts running the engine as an air pump to waste energy! The lower the charge level gets, the more determined the car becomes to recharge back up to 6 bars.

Even then the battery meter is a false reading - there's still about 40% charge remaining when the meter shows no bars at all, and eight bars really indicates about 80% charge. Restricting battery usage to this range extends the battery's life substantially.

I've now owned my car for over four years and I've never seen 8 bars, nor had the forced-discharge behaviour, but then I've never done a long mountain descent. On my car, with the colour Multi-Function Display, the battery meter is pinkish-red for one or two bars, blue for three to six, and green for 7 or 8.

So that it will have room to regeneratively brake going downhill, the battery never fills up on the level. (gradually braking 80 to 0 all at once may fill it) In, say, the Great Smokies, it can fill all the bars. Like me, you live near the edge of the Delta, so not many large descents.

Great!!! Thanks so much for the information. I suppose this is one of those concepts that I cannot believe I did not already think about. It makes complete sense that it never shows a full charge. Also, I can definitely understand what you are talking about with the speed in which the battery is depleted. At least for my vehicle, it seems that it takes just a bit longer to use the battery levels of around 3-5 than the upper levels, which go rather quickly. Regardless, I am glad to finally make sense out of the battery issue.

I am glad to know this now. I didn't even think about it having to have room to store the energy stored through the regeneration process. True enough, just as soon as I go down a long hill, the expected ascent does its damage enough that it is difficult to keep a relatively charged battery.

You are driving your Prius very easily. It is great your commute route allows this. Your HV battery should last way beyond the warranty period.

Normal...the car tries to keep the battery at 40 to 80%.

Thanks usbseawolf2000! I definitely hope it lasts for a while, but then again I may just have to purchase the plug-in. I'm obsessed with the vehicle, but I digress. I am curious as to what exactly you mean that I'm driving it easy. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the comment, as I hope to drive this vehicle for many years, so I'll stick with what seems to be working perfectly.

If you don't drain the HV battery too low or regen charge it too high, you are in the ideal state of charge. That'll extend the battery life.

When I say too low or too high, that's already in the Toyota conservative safe zone (40% to 80%). The ideal target SOC is 60%. It sounds like your driving is gentle on the battery since you have not seen it full nor low(?).

Does anyone know the testing conditions/duty cycles performed? How can Toyota make this commercial statement without publishing more data?

I'd be curious as to the life of the gen3 2009 onwards HV batteries. The gen2 was way over engineered and have run to massive miles 400k+. But there are early reports of the gen3 HV battery failing below 100,000 miles in harsh use taxi environments. Wasn't there a post some months ago about Greek taxi drivers avoiding the gen3 and using the older gen2 because of this?

I'm only at 65,000 hard miles and I'm sure the HV battery isn't what it was. It seems to cycle more and drop quicker than it used to do.

Time will tell, but just because the gen2 was bomb proof doesn't mean the later gen3 will be. Making parts smaller, lighter and cheaper but increasing the performance and limits doesn't bode well for a longer life in my book.

This is normal. Computer has to leave some space in battery available so you can go downhill and regen with "relatively full" battery

PS sorry I did not see all the similar replies - they were on the next page....

- Alex

I appreciate it Alex...I'm always willing to learn

I see. Who knew that my HV Battery would provide such an insight. You are highly accurate as to how I drive. Kudos! Thanks again for the information!

Yes That is normal.
You would only see full green if you drove down a long hill without pushing the gas