Winter driving suggestions

Well winter is in full force here in the midwest and much of the northern USA. Our 5 day forecast has 3 mornings that are expected to be -20degF. There are a few things I suggest for those dealing with winter.
Blocking the lower grill and bottom half of the upper grill defiantly helps the engine to warm up quicker and stay warmer.
Putting the sunvisors down to keep the heat from the defroster against the windshield helps keeps the upper part of the windshield from frosting over.
Continental Pure Contact tires are doing well for me on ice and snow.
My Fiancee is preferring Michilen X Ice 3 tires.
(Her and I both have 2010 Red Prius II)

Good luck, stay warm & drive safe!

 

Well it just kind of worked out that way. I had bought my Prius in May and my fiancee had been doing a lot of driving for work with her Town & Country minivan. After showing her how much money she could be saving on gas she really didn't want anything but a hybrid car to replace her minivan after that. My fiancee was actually looking at a different Prius that was about 75 miles from home when we spotted this red one marked down $2000 and was Toyota Certified that was closer to home. We even showed the salesman the dealer website of the other one we were planning on looking at. They offered us a deal we couldn't refuse.
I know it seems kind of odd to have 2 almost identical cars, right down to the window vents, sitting in the garage side by side but she drives 100 miles a day going one direction and I drive 75 miles a day going the opposite direction.
P.S. It does offer some humor when my kids try to get into the wrong car.

 

I have driven for 32 years and have always used A/S tires. There is just so much of the time in Iowa that the roads are bare, even in winter, that I never felt it would be worth swapping tires for the winter and switching back in the spring.
For my Fiancee it's different. She came from Vermont where its standard to switch to studded snow tires for winter. Last winter was her first winter in Iowa. She got by last winter with A/S tires but wanted winter tires this year. I talked her into studless snow tires instead studded because she commutes 100 miles a day, half of that being freeway at 70+MPH. I thought the X ICE 3 tires would perform better in the mix of driving conditions from dry/wet/snow/ice than studded tires. She can tell the X ICE 3 tires are better than A/S tires but she still thinks studded tires would slide around less on ice. This surprises me since what I have been reading in reviews made me think that tires like X Ice 3 and Blizzacks should do better than studded snow tires. But now reading post here maybe next year I should let her get studded snow tires again.

There is one aspect of the Prius that I wonder if others have noticed. If you are braking on ice using only regen braking and the front tires start to slide it doesn't seem like the anti-lock system will kick in until you press down on the brake pedal hard enough to activate the mechanical brakes.
After I described this to my Fiancee and suggest she press harder on the brake pedal when the Prius start sliding during braking she said it was better.
I find this to be a flaw in the Prius system. If my foot in on the brake pedal wheel speed should be monitored for mismatch no matter if its regen braking or mechanical braking.
With good tires and change in driving habit the flaw can be compensated for, but really should be addressed in a design change at Toyota.
Have others noticed this as well? Are some model years better than others, IE, have they fixed in newer models?

 

I too used to own several vehicles with manual transmissions and I would do like you describe and pick a gear high enough to keep the torque down but the power high enough to be able to make the hill.

I never liked when automatic transmissions would downshift on me when climbing hills on ice because it would often mean it would make the tires break loose and start to spin.

However, don't think of the Prius as "downshifting". That's a perspective that really doesn't apply to Synergy system. Yes the engine does increase RPMs when you press harder on the accelerator pedal but that is because the system is trying to match the power you are requesting when pressing harder on the accelerator. The electric motor/generators play a big part in what power is going to the wheels.

Personally, every winter since I started driving, the first couple of winter storms of the year I "re-learn" how the car handles and get myself recalibrated on what to expect.
The Prius is a different setup. The first time traction control kicked in when I was on ice I caught myself lifting my foot off the gas to try to get the tires to "catch". This is because I had never owned or driven a car with traction control. I soon realized to do the opposite when traction control kicks in, press harder on the accelerator.
Something else I noticed with the Gen III is don't use ECO mode or PWR mode in bad weather. Running in standard mode seems to work best when traction control may be needed. I also found that "flooring it" doesn't help the traction control do what you want. However holding a steady pedal when traction control kicks in can cause the car to loose speed. For me a nudge more throttle to keep the traction control working hard but not so much it shuts down too much, is the best. There seems to be a sweet spot that all I can say it get out and pratice finding.
Personally for me when tackling hills in the winter I want to start the hill at the bottom at least at 45 MPH and keep pressing the throttle such that I think I can maintain my speed or at least not drop below 35 MPH by the top of the hill. If traction control kicks in, take advantage of it and press harder on the accelerator, without flooring it.

 

Well... it sort of is "locked up" all the time.... However it is MG2 that is direct drive to the wheels, not the ICE.
It might actually bet better for you to think of your Prius as primarily a direct drive electrical car that can use the power from the ICE to indirectly drive the wheels. Why do I say indirectly? Well, if it weren't for the MG1 apply counter rotation force against the ICE then power from the ICE would never reach the wheels.

Think of MG1 as one side of a teeter totter, MG2 as the other side, and the ICE as the pivot point or fulcrum. The "height" of MG2 on the teeter totter equals the vertical scale for the MPH of the car and its RPMs. As the ICE changes RPMs it raises and lowers the fulcrum point but can't actually change the speed of the car (or MG2) unless MG1 pulls downward on its side. So how the car goes up a hill really isn't related to what the ICE is doing but rather the energy applied to MG2 and what system is doing with MG1 to direct energy from the ICE to the wheels.

Check out this link to see where I came up with the teeter totter comparison.

Toyota Prius - Power Split Device