Plug in Prius sales in Japan

Wasn't the PiP going on sale in Japan on 1/30?

Has anyone heard how that's going?

Looks like they received 3000 pre-orders since they started taking pre-orders on 11/29/2012

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Still havent found anything with regard to today's launch date though.. still looking

I just did a search and found this NASDAQ article about the Japan launch. One thing in the article that I find interesting:

That's an EV range of 16.4 mi (26.4 km) up from the 15 mi that has been in the specs. Also the figure of 61.0 km/l equates to 143.5 mpg. It will be interesting to see what the EPA figures turn out to be.

Maybe they've already replaced the battery that we will get with a better one??? (I doubt that, though).

Is that using the JP 08 drive cycle ? I cannot even begin to guess how that will translate to EPA.

Yea, that 16.4 mile EV range is under Japanese test cycle. The "15 miles at speeds up to 62 mph" was announced in the US, not clear if that will be the EPA official number.

Nice! Is it from the production model? It is definitely 2012 model as the MID has more shades.

That image is from a video available in September with the reveal of the production model.

This photo was provided then too:

Toyota rolls out rechargeable Prius plug-in hybrid - AJW by The Asahi Shimbun

This article show a red car for the Plug-In. The red color is not available on the Plug-In in the U.S.

In the US, it should cover over 40% of a day's trips. In Europe, it is right around 50%.

On average across the globe, electricity and gasoline miles should be 50/50. That's an elegant balanced design.

Thanks, so 50% of the population(daily commutes) in Japan & Europe and ~40% in the US may use no gas at all during weekdays. I have a 12.2 mile roundtrip to work, Awesome.

I have 23km round trip. I wonder if I manage that distance without Prius starting the warm-up procedure (1.5miles according to usbwolf's videos) before switching to HV mode after the battery is empty. That warm-up would be completely useless, because it would happen just as I'd enter the garage.

Interesting. In Japan, the PiP is aprox. 6.000 EUR more expensive than the regular Prius. Why is it then, that in the Netherlands, the PiP is 13.000 EUR more expensive than the regular version?

tax?

You'd need to compare specs. Is the PiP available in Holland in the standard spec or are they forcing more features?

It could also indirectly be tax. If there's a larger price differential between electricity and gasoline they'll figure they can screw more money out of you.

Sadly, this is true. In addition to that nice red, there is also a darker blue color available in Japan that we don't get here in the US. Color me sad...

So that chart is saying that 40% of US drivers avg only 5,475 miles a year (15mi x 365) or for weekdays it's only 3,900 (15mi x 260)???? I think that chart is plotting the avg trip length but not necessarily the number of trips per day. My daily trip is 10 miles but I do a minimum of 4 per day.

15,000 miles is the considered normal. Hmm, that 41 miles per day.

i thought 12,000 was normal, did it go up since i started driving in 1897?