Stressed

Regarding my comments on braking lightly, it's because the HV battery can only accept the charge so fast. If it's beyond a certain point, the car will have to fall back to friction brakes. It won't necessarily "keep the charge up better". It's just a matter of sending more to the HV battery in the first place.

http://www.autoshop101.com/forms/Hybrid16.pdf briefly talks about the limit. The 1st and 2nd gen Priuses referred to in the PDF did in fact provide no instruments to show you how much/little regen was happening, unlike the NAH and 3rd gen Prius.

You also should also see little or no regen in the ~7 mph (this # might be a bit off) to 0 mph range, at least that's the way it is on the 2nd gen Prius. The car simply isn't moving fast enough at that point generate power and the car falls back to friction brakes at that point.

(If you didn't know, the NAH uses hybrid technology licensed from Toyota and at least some (or all?) hybrid components sourced from Toyota and/or its suppliers. I've seen the plastic inverter cover detached from a NAH at an auto show before and it had a sticker with "Toyota" on it and a Toyota part #. )

You can likely improve your mileage a bit by adopting a few of the techniques at CleanMPG, - What is hypermiling An authoritative source on fuel economy and hypermiling. I'm not advocating being a hardcore hypermiler but some of the tips there like proper tire pressure and anticipating lights are useful.

Anyway, assuming you need no major (4 digit) maintenance or repairs on your NAH, you're likely better off keeping it, as you're doing now, instead of increasing your debt. Good luck!

 

I went to several dealers and obtained "out the door" quotes. I put these together in a spread sheet, then mailed (not emailed) the spread sheet back to each dealer thanking them for their "initial quote." Several more on site visits and I received a good quote from one dealer. Based on the quotes I obtained financing at my credit union in advance and obtained a Consumer Reports print out. I traveled on Amtrak to the city, the dealer met me at the train station. I purchased the car and drove it home. No mess, no fuss, no harassment.

 

This is the best plan. Extract all possible value from the current car while saving up to pay cash for the next one. In five years you will be much happier for it than if you went into hock up to your ears now.

 

Yeah, his name is Raul Traverso @ Centennial. Nice guy. IF YOU GO... let me knwo; maybe I can get a "Birddog" fee out of them.

P.S. Many moons ago ('94) I wanted a Camaro Convertible. Hottest shot on earth at the time. So a "friend" referred me to his friend at Fleecer Jones, for an "inside" price. Well, the "inside" price was $5000 over factory sticker. When I said I was expecting a discount, not a $5000 bump over sticker, I was informed "That IS the sticker price." I said the Federal Monroney sticker, not the dealer add-on sticker. He maintained that WAS the factory sticker. I said "prove it." He gave me a load of crap saying "the car is too new; so he could not show me the price. Understand I had the car priced out exactly as I wanted, and knew the sticker to the penny. There were none in stock anyway. So I slammed my checkboook on is desk and said "If you can PROVE to me that was the sticker price, I'd buy TWO of them!" Silence....
That is why I'll NEVER buy from Fleecer Jones. Not quite as bad as "The Chopper" but close. I'm sure a fellow Vegan knows who that is.