Making a Prius Fast?

To date there is no "mod" for increased performance. The AC is a new far more efficient design - and has no pulley (electric). There must be a drive shaft of some sort as we have an engine - even an electric car has a drive shaft to its wheels.

 

i think to make this car faster you have to look beyond moding that eng.. think of it as how you would make a electric golf cart faster..

 

when you put the car in drive.. all your doing is going fwrd or Rev there is no 1st 2 nd 3rd gear to go through... so basicly your telling a speed control to go fwrd or Rev how fast to go the more you push the pedal.. if you ever played with a RC car.. prob the same principle.

the only logical way to really make it go faster is adding more batterys and a better motor.. from what im told the two electic motors are a direct drive to the wheels..

Are there any prius Mechs on this forum that can explain how this system works... before as soon as get my car i am just going to have to tear it down my self and figure it out..

man this is going to bother me all night now.. i need to know how this works..

 

here is what i found

HowStuffWorks "The Power Split Device"

to accelerate the prius uses the electric motor.. up to a certain speed and RPM..

and it does have a special transmisson that connect to the wheels..

I think its really more that moding the eng to make it go faster.. it will help but you wont get the full effect and usage like a noarmal gas car..

im sure as people tinker with these cars. the true secrets will be unlocked in makeing these car faster yet keep the good gas milage..

Im pretty sure those guys in Japan are already trying to figure it out..

But unless someone actaully experiments and adds a turbo NOS or any normal eng mod and puts the car on a dyno no one will really know the real truth..

 

The ICE is also being used at this point unless you are babying the system or have activated electric only mode.

Why not?

Toyota already did this. Look at the HP/TQ rating for the 2010 vs. the 2004-2009

The turbo has been done already and with dismal results. Tuning and the Atkinson style engine are the real headaches here. On the otherhand, why mess with it. If you want speed buy a different car. Not everyone in here is a racing noob but many of us just enjoy the car the way it is and see the cost and difficulty in making the car faster are not worth the gains. I wish I could have told that to many of my little import racer friends. If you truely want to go fast ditch the Civic and buy a Camaro/Mustang........

 

The Prius is front wheel drive, so there is no Drive shaft to the BACK wheels, but there are half shafts to the front wheels. The output of the Engine does not become electricity to get to the wheels, that is all mechanical. (The Engine can also generate electricity, and pretty much does so all the time, but it IS tied to the front wheels by gears and shafts. About 75% of the engine's power is getting to the wheels mechanically)

http://homepage.mac.com/inachan/prius/planet_e.html

 

You need to do a little research on how a Prius works.

 

Not on all electric cars. Some designs have motors built directly into the wheels, so have no drive shafts. This is not the case with the Prius, however.

 

Are you kidding me? Do you know what kind of power it takes to make any car do a mid 13s quarter mile????

 

Is there a reason you are re-opening a thread that has been dead for two years?

If you want a fast car, why in the world start with a Prius? Folks have tried superchargers, turbochargers, Otto cycle engines, none have made it very fast.

HTML:

http://www.autospeed.com/A_111655/cms/article.html
http://www.autospeed.com/A_112194/cms/article.html
http://www.caranddriver.com/features/04q4/got_hybrid_-sport

 

and thats because the engine doesn't turn the front wheels


/thread

 

I agree with mgb4tim, We bought our prius v for wallet hugging also, it replaced a Explorer that avg around 17 mpg. We have a low mileage 98 SVT Cobra not as fast as new one, but it satisfies my second childhood "need for speed". You want fast buy a muscle car, or one of the little Subaru rockets.
Our v in power mode seems to get on the freeway with no trouble. The test will be next summer when we go over White Pass and return from Yakima full from costco. We'll see what it's made of then.
We're neither tree huggers or Liberals.

 

The stock Prius is reasonably fast. It has all the speed and acceleration needed for normal driving. Only recently have Americans been brainwashed into thinking that the family car needs 300 hp just to get the kids to school.

If you want to race, then buy a race car. If you want good, efficient transportation, the stock Prius does just fine.

Tom

 

I notice you have an 08. I test drive a gen 2 and I found it lacking in power, but my 2010, while still no race car, is totally adequate.

If I could trade 5mpg for another 25hp, I'd probably jump at it, but with all the computers and exotic engineering involved in getting power to the wheels in this car, I think the old cold air intake/headers/exhaust route won't really gain you much other than a lighter wallet and a weird groan under wide open throttle.

I'm pretty sure swapping the Atkinson cycle for an Otto 1.8 would require some serious reprogramming of computers that only people involved with the car's design have access to. The transmission in this car seems plenty robust-but I don't think it's control system is designed to adapt to anything other than the expected output of the factory motor.

I drive often at 85 and over up some wicked mountain passes and still have plenty of reserve to pass Winnebagos and minivans. It handles quite a bit better than the gen 2. the electric steering is a bit numb, but it doesn't have much body roll and really requires some hoonery to make it under steer once you get rid of the stock tires.

 

Add a few suspension upgrades and 17" or 18" wheels and the Prius handles surprisingly well.

 

Looking for an update on any developments on making the prius a bit faster. I'd replace my Gen II with a new one but I can't stand how slow it is. A camry or other hybrids are significantly faster, but none in a smaller hatchback package that I want in a prius:

tch 2011 7.9 (0-60) 16.1 (1/4 mile) from edmund
tch 2012 7.2 (0-60) 15.5 (1/4 mile) from motor week
Lexus hs 8.4 (0-60)
rx400h 7.3 (0-60)
rx450h 7.6 (0-60)

Relative to these other heavier hybrids, the prius is a pokey 10+ second 0-60.

BTW, the argument about whether it makes sense to try to make the prius faster or not is not interesting to me. I like the hatchback and technology and convenience (and HOV lane legality) of the Prius. I'd be willing to sacrifice a bit of the fuel economy for better power performance. If you don't agree with that, feel free to have your opinion, but you won't convince me that it is unreasonable to want a slightly faster prius.

Please add any info about making the prius faster to this thread. And please start a new thread if you want to wage your personal jihad against people even talking about making power mods to a prius.

 

Yeah, done while flooring the gas pedal. How many drivers do you know (including yourself) that normally floor their cars on a regular basis while in traffic? The flow of traffic effectively prevents you from going 0-60 within the above times.

Don't you have a Gen III now (your profile reads 2010)? The power mode is great for those times when in a hurry or you want to accelerate faster.

 

There was a recent post linking to a video where Volkswagen was introducing their Hybrid entry.

Volkswagen's approach seems to be sacrifice some economy for sportier more aggressive performance.

I still think the two approaches or driving philosophies are very much counter to each other.

If speed and power are of primary importance to your enjoyment of the driving experience, I wouldn't even buy a Prius of any configuration.

Trying to adapt a Prius to become something it is not designed to be? Seems like a waste of time.

However, if a faster more sportier Hybrid IS what you want, it seems options exist and more are coming.

 

Shorter 0=60 times means either changes to gearing, a bigger motor, or a bigger ICE -- all causing lousier fuel economy. Since it takes a good 20% hit to fuel economy or a ~ 20% price increase to feel the added torque I hope it is never done.

In real life ? Just leave an extra car length between you and the car in front at the red light. Start moving when the car *two* ahead starts moving, and you will never feel slow again.

What can I say -- staying neck to neck with other cars up to a heart-wrenching << gasp >> 35 mph as the reason to buy a car is just so pathetic. I am fine with the other cars reaching the next red light 0.1 seconds earlier*.

* assuming of course that I wanted to brake late rather than coast -- which I do not.

 

And the argument for making a Prius faster is uninteresting to me. You can start a thread, but you don't own it. People will answer as they see fit.

But be aware that power mode adds no additional power. A Prius will accelerate just as fast in Eco mode as Pwr mode.

Tom