PiP Owners: How is your EV-ONLY acceleration performance?

I'll be providing some YouTube video of my PHV within the next few weeks on my channel... http://www.youtube.com/user/priusguru

Don't be expecting any great effort to keep the engine off, since I'm a "just drive it" owner... and that with my prior PHV driving experience, local hill climbing was no big deal. The engine always stayed off unless I intentionally dropped the pedal hard.

By the way, you can EV accelerate even into the PWR (red) range without the engine starting with the 2010. It's rare, since exceeding 24 MPH prior to that is what usually happens first. But with the much higher EV threshold from the PHV, it will likely be a common sight.

Remember, my interest is efficiency improvement, not the elimination of gas consumption entirely.
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I think there will be a lot of focus on your movies John. As you said, no pressure.

Are you planning on contracting Danny Elfman or John Williams for your soundtrack?

 

I'm interested to read about the handling and performance compared to conventional prii.

Does it feel more powerful or handle better?

 

it's a little heavier, would that make it worse, or better?

 

Today I sent in the check to pay for my PiP. It will thus be shipping to me (from Dianne) hopefully early next week. It is such a good feeling to know my purchase is now pretty much complete and read the questions in your post (knowing that soon I will be experimenting myself to find anwers to these questions...and more of my own). I am so excited!

One of my favorite parts of driving my Gen2 Prius was driving on EV power alone. I'm excited to experience this at the next level, and yet, at the same time, still have a super efficient car for long road trips. Toyota appears to have done excellent work!

 

Me too! My check made it there this morning, so we'll be set fairly soon.

My errand running around town sure is going to take on new priority. Rather than being a chore driving from place to place, it will become a joy. And since most of the travel 55 MPH or slower here in the suburbs, I'm thinking much of the driving will be engine free... in the warm season, that is.
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I think EV acceleration is good enough to keep up with traffic. If I am trying to keep it all EV, then yes, I'm watching the HSI very closely. This morning I was out driving around and was able to get it right up to the PWR section on EV.going into the PWR section triggered the ICE. The ICE also came on when I accelerated past 62mph or so.

I actually seem to feel acceleration off the line FEELS slower than from, say, 30-60. But I will also say that my other car is very torquey so it's an adjustment for me. Watching the speedo, I THINK I'm doing ok accelerating, but I just don't feel it.

Actually, see if this makes sense to you. In EV, I feel like I can accelerate faster than when I'm in HV and trying to not make the ICE sound like its starting to struggle. For example, today, while I was out, I ran out of EV range. So while driving around on HV, I tried to not give it so much throttle that the ICE sounded like it wasstruggling. However, when trying to keep it from struggling, I felt as though the acceleration wasn't adequate and found myself giving it more throttle and bringing up the RPMs on the ICE. Nothing quantitative, just my feeling.

I'll see if I can get some video.

 

It would be interesting to note if you had a fully EV charged battery, but in HV mode, would acceleration be more adequate.?. Seems to struggle less?

 

Depends on what you want: My father liked his big heavy Cadillac. He called it an "old man's car." Comfortable, stable, and if you didn't shut the doors hard enough they'd shut themselves.

A lighter car should be more maneuverable. Is stable "better" or is maneuverable "better"? Just depends on what you prefer in a car.

That "struggling" sound is actually not hard on the ICE. The feeling that it is struggling arises because in the Prius, ICE rpm is almost entirely decoupled from vehicle speed because of the way HSD operates. (John's web site has some cool graphics of this.) The ICE can rev up at low vehicle speed when there's a demand for power during acceleration. But our ears are used to a slow rpm at slow vehicle speed because of the way conventional transmissions work, and the higher rpm sounds "wrong."

Bottom line, you really don't need to worry about that sound. HSD is very robust and the computer will protect the ICE.

 

If I'm understanding your question correctly, I dont think there is any difference between "EV range available HV acceleration" versus "no EV range available HV acceleration". If there is, its subtle enough that I havent noticed. And just to be clear, there is no struggling. I only meant to compare pure EV acceleration to HV acceleration when not floored (so right at that point where the RPMs are coming up, but not as high as when floored)

Yeah, I think it will take a bit of getting used to. It sounds so much like a slipping clutch