How many assault rifles can you fit in a Prius C?

Actually you did buy your Prius to be green. Using less oil and polluting less are the only reasons for paying the premium costs for hybrids. You don't save any money.

We see a lot of conflicted right wingers who know they need to stop using oil, stop requiring oil wars so they can drive fast in gas guzzlers, stop polluting so they and their kids don't face nightmare scenarios of heat, drought and rising seas. Their defense to their right wing buddies is they are "saving money" and their cover is exagerrated machismo of guns, god and whatever else they think will provide a cover for their secret green behavior...like buying a Prius.

Their theme song is from Monty Python's "He's a lumberjack and he's OK".

Part of my reason for getting the Prius was to cut my overall gas use because I also have a boat. Combined boat and car is 420 gallons of gasoline a year which is 84% of national average of 500 gallons per person. Since I'm rarely in the boat alone, I should get credit for additional gallons. At 84% I'm on the Kyoto path of getting my carbon footprint down by 80% from 1997 levels by 2050. My next car will be EV/Hybrid which will likely reduce my gasoline use to 300 gallons by 2015, a 40% reduction.

 

It doesn't use regenerative breaking but it's certainly well equipped to configure it to use recoil breaking... LOL!!! probably hard to use that kinda of braking power when going around corners at speed though...

 

I'm a little surprised the universe didn't implode from the title of this thread.

 

^^^
LOL.

I didn't pay attention to the gun thread that I thought I saw here but over on MNL there was My Nissan Leaf Forum • View topic - Gun discussion goes here, which I also don't pay attention to. Someone's semi-OT posts within various threads about guns caused the mods there to create a gun thread, which became quite active, at times. There are a # of gun enthusiasts Leaf owners, just as I'm sure there are some Republican/conservative Prius drivers.

And... no, let's not get into a political discussion. I have no time, energy or inclination to discuss politics. And, I'd hate for this thread to get moved to Fhoppol.

 

. LINK?

SGH-I717R ? 2

 

only in America do they have car forums that talk about guns....

 

Nothing is smarter or greener than buying a Prius (well OK, Teslas, Volts, C-Maxes etc also) but you don't save money on them due to the higher cost for the hybrid vs. equivalent car. Average is after about 5 years you will break even and that usually doesn't account for cost of money, lost earnings on the money or the security of the money in the bank.

But smart and green...oh yeah.

That's why it is always funny to see the "OK lumberjacks" feel they have to say how many guns they pack to cover up for buying a hybrid so their gun buddies won't think they are green.

 

$500 electric bill? That's crazy. Last month's electric and gas bill as $47.27 combined. There's only 1 person in my household though but I live in a somewhat large house.

Without knowing your location and more details, I don't know what's typical for your area. If you could update your location field...

You could start by getting P3 - Kill A Watt (or one of their fancier models) to look for huge energy consumers. There are plenty of habits you can adopt (too many to list) to save. There's a ton listed on my utility's web site (Pacific Gas and Electric Company), but I think you can only get to them/get personalized ones by being a customer.

 

Wave one of the guns at him. Put Romney stickers on your car. Lots of ways to camouflage being so wildly green you bought a Prius. WE will never tell.

 

Installing insulation is probably the first thing you should do (I think people hate being told this because it's practically the least sexy thing to do to reduce your environmental impact). Solar water heating supposedly has a pretty quick payback period too.

 

^^^
Thanks. Which San Diego Gas & Electric rate plan is cheaper? | PriusChat has some discussion of energy conservation tips.

Wow. That's right, houses are in that size range are actually affordable there unlike in Silicon Valley. I don't even have AC here (other than a portable rolling unit that only use if I really need it). I'd imagine your weather is a lot hotter than mine.

Do you also have a pool or hot tub? I hear pool pumps can be costly to run.

How many kwh in a month is that? I'd imagine you have tiers w/different amounts depending on whether it's baseline or how much above baseline.

Feel free to start a separate thread on helping you reduce your electric consumption.

 

wild guess, but I'll bet you're not a certified financial planner, as banks are currently paying ZERO percent interest. and as for the 5yr break even estimate, well there you go. After 5 years you realize your petol bill is going down and thus you're saving you money - even from a similarly sized car. Many on PC changed over from bigger rides. We used to have a Ford explorer and a Range rover . . . . 17mpg & 14mpg. Even the reliability has 'paid for it' ... not even counting the gasoline.

 

Stock market is up 13% over last 12 months. No guessing you are definitely not a financial planner, certified or otherwise.

Interesting but irrelevant. The choice made was paying $4K(+/-) premium for a hybrid vs. a similar non hybrid. Use Camry hybrid and non-hybrid for good example. As financial analysis after financial analysis shows, the payback is about 5 years for average driver and that payback calc does not include the cost of money, financing charge or the front end or interest earned on the money on the back end.

The reason to buy a hybrid is to use less gasoline so US doesn't have to pay gasoline trade import tax of $500B a year, so US doesn't have to spend $1.4T a year on oil wars going on 22 years straight now, so US doesn't keep polluting and destroying environment. Saving money? Not so much individually, we pay more to do good stuff.

 

Again, comparison is not to your old truck but to higher mileage (30 mpg range) vehicle you could have purchased vs. hybrid.

The payback for the hybrid additional cost is 5 years for typical driver.

 

ProximalSuns, why is not our payback as valid as your payback?

I needed a vehicle that could hold a certain amount of cargo, (I rarely have passengers, see my avatar)) I found the most fuel efficent vehicle that held that much cargo. Comparing that to the vehicle I was previously using to transport that same amount of cargo makes sense to me. (Neither a Volt nor a Leaf nor a Prius C would work for me, let alone an iMev)

Once you compare the 30,000 miles a year I drive at 46 MPG to my former 24 MPG, Prius looks very nice operationally, even though it is more as a capital expense.

 

Not "my payback". Just the basic financials on paying premium for hybrids and thinking it is paid for with fuel savings. Of course exceptions but for average user the numbers are pretty much a wash, premium paid vs. fuel savings. Numbers are from Consumer Reports to Wall St Journal.

That leaves the other real benefits of paying extra for hybrid technology, using less oil and polluting less...you know those "tree hugger" motives that lead some people to use guns and chain saws as cover so their neighbors won't think they are being green.