Leather Seats Require a Lot of Air Conditioner Use?

I've never minded fabric upholstery from a cleanliness standpoint. Vacuuming sufficiently frequently and being careful should be fine. I'm none too bothered by the "lack of luxury" in not having leather either.

The only detractor about fabric to me is the "stuffy" heady feeling it tends to give me, starting from my dad's Volvo 760GLE that used to make me semi-nauseous as a kid. I'm not sure how much of that is new car fabric with those protectors in it.

I've since learned how to disassemble interior trim and panels without too much difficulty and could see how to remove the OEM fabric upholstery easily enough on the new PiP. So the shop Clazzio leather covers are an option, with or without removal of the existing fabric upholstery, and much more affordably so even at the $500 price than the Advanced option would've been.

As for the comfort from heat issue, enough years of witnessing what happened with my family's older cars has convinced me that quality window tinting is worth it. (I'm just not completely satisfied with the amount of spectral transmission/absorption information in the specs of the various best regarded tinting films but it's seeming like the differences between the top choices won't be too notable.)

I'm in the southern SF Bay Area but I've always despised the summer heat here, enough that I think quality tinting will be a worthwhile first step. I'm even considering using thermal insulation in the various door panels if I can find one with both good reflectivity characteristics, robustness, and is still fairly lightweight, especially if I can identify the major heat sources in the car. Ideally, the components generating heat that should be cooled, should be so without dumping it into the cabin (except as part of the user-controlled heater system), and the parts that should stay warm should stay warm.

 

Yea, i think the auto feature will cycle the A/C compressor on and off more often. You should just try it at 70 degrees on auto, and see how it affects your mpg. Like i said, unless you are in really congested traffic or pretty much have all stop lights, i think you'll be surprised at what mpg you get.

 

AC season has arrived here as well(60 degs today woohoo! ). I've generally left my climate control on auto for the the entire 1.5 year period i've owned my new Prius. I merely adjust the temperature dial if its too hot or too cold. In addition 90% of the time I leave the AC on even in winter. I'm aware it only comes on when needed to control humidty/defrost, cool the air, etc, so from what i understand its not being used full time when the button is illuminated like some other cars.

My commute home every day is around an hour and involves lots of sitting in traffic moving at a slow walking pace for a portion of it. Until a couple of weeks ago my battery level would hold out with room to spare until the traffic cleared up and started moving again. The past week with CC set to auto and AC on, same traffic situation, the battery level drops down to 2 bars a few minutes before the traffic clears up and the ICE will idle for awhile to charge it back up to 3 bars. I've tried turning off the AC and leaving it on auto but after a few seconds i can feel the difference, humid and muggy feeling so i live with the battery drain and turn the AC back on.

I have softex seats, and whatever they are made of I love em.
I've had real leather on an old Peugot before and it was nice and comfy but the softex feels more like a fabric(polyester?) than vinyl or leather.
But i live in the great white north(aka Canada) so it never really gets that hot here anyway.

 

We are still talking about the AC in a Prius, right ??

AFAIK, none of the Prius models are all electric.
Therefore running the AC in the car will use SOME gas; maybe less in the PiP depending on conditions but still some.

With my C, I do notice some difference in fuel usage with and without AC.

 

gen III is electric a/c.

gen III is electric a/c.

 

And if it is not a PLUG IN type model, 100% of the power consumed to run the AC comes from the ICE and gasoline.
Well almost 100% anyway.

 

No, you were right the first time. 100%.

No, you were right the first time. 100%.

 

I can manage getting 50 MPG on cruddy non LLR tires, at 88*F temps with A/C on max and w/o ECO mode, seriously A/C has very little impact on your MPG the worst is its going to use your battery then again your battery drains in 7-10 mins with just A/C when parked and ICE is off, so don't sweat it over loosing 0.1-0.5 mpgs, and just Regen more often.

 

The smaller your engine IS, the more impact the AC will have on fuel usage.
I suspect that your estimates of the difference are a bit low.........and that on a C they might be a LOT low.
And to repeat........even if the AC runs off the battery, the energy source still is the gas engine, unless you have a Pip or are "cruising" down a mountain.

 

On a full charge, my PiP lists a nominal ~13.4 mi of cruising range before falling out of EV to HV mode. If I turn on the a/c, even at the minimal setting, it instantly drops to something like 10.2 - 10.8 mi, then back up again if I turn it off. According to the manual, the a/c draws power off the main ("fuel") battery. I don't recall if the a/c units in gas engine cars were driven purely by electrical power (or if some component, like the compressor, was mechanically driven by the engine in some way). Also not sure how similar the other Gen3s are in that regard, but everyone can make of that what they will.

So far, I've found driving with the windows lowered a couple inches effectively cools the entire cabin since it cycles air at the top to where hot air rises. Summer is coming though, including the days when the outside ambient air will be too hot for that trick... Regardless of the effect on gas mileage, sufficiently cool air in the cabin will be valuable for the unmodified battery ventilation system if push comes to shove, even if the occupants believe in sacrificing personal comfort for better mileage.

On a full charge, my PiP lists a nominal ~13.4 mi of cruising range before falling out of EV to HV mode. If I turn on the a/c, even at the minimal setting, it instantly drops to something like 10.2 - 10.8 mi, then back up again if I turn it off. According to the manual, the a/c draws power off the main ("fuel") battery. I don't recall if the a/c units in gas engine cars were driven purely by electrical power (or if some component, like the compressor, was mechanically driven by the engine in some way). Also not sure how similar the other Gen3s are in that regard, but everyone can make of that what they will.

So far, I've found driving with the windows lowered a couple inches effectively cools the entire cabin since it cycles air at the top to where hot air rises. Summer is coming though, including the days when the outside ambient air will be too hot for that trick... Regardless of the effect on gas mileage, sufficiently cool air in the cabin will be valuable for the unmodified battery ventilation system if push comes to shove, even if the occupants believe in sacrificing personal comfort for better mileage.

 

The electric compressor was introduced in the Gen II and was powered by the HV battery pack. Same as for the Gen III's. The Gen I Prius as I understand used a belt driven a/c compressor which required the engine to run to cool the cabin.


HTC Evo 3D

 

The amount of money saved by not using the air conditioner will never cover the cost to replace the HV battery when it fails due to heat.

 

How and why do you seem to think that those two things are somehow related ??

The driver pushing the OFF button on the cabin AC has no bearing on the battery cooling.

 

the air in the cabin passes thru and cools the battery. the cooler the cabin air, the more effective it is at cooling the battery.

the air in the cabin passes thru and cools the battery. the cooler the cabin air, the more effective it is at cooling the battery.

 

Is that a joke? Certainly you understand how air flow through the cabin is effected by turning the system off. And when the outside temperature is in the 90's, without A/C, I wonder what the temp of the battery is?

Unbelievable. Sometimes it looks like you argue just for the sake of creating discourse. But then again anonymity trumps common sense.

 

OK.......I screwed up and didn't say what I was trying to get at.
The implication WAS that if you didn't run the AC when it was hot out, that would somehow damage the battery and significantly shorten it's life.
I don't think that's true at all.
If it was, don't you think they would warn you about that somewhere in the manual ??

Turning the AC off is quite different than turning the vent air off.

The real trick is to get the heat dissipated away from the battery.
Air moving past the cooling fins or air tubes or whatever is there for that purpose does most of the "cooling" and the incoming temp. of the vent air really doesn't make THAT much difference.
Having the AC on but set to RECIRC might cool the battery less than having a lot of air blasting through the cabin and out the battery vent.

So, no it's not a joke and I don't appreciate the personal attack.
I'll try and remember to return the favor the next time you say something that doesn't come out just right.