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My new 2019 PPP

Discussion in 'Prime Main Forum (2017-2022)' started by AshPrime, Aug 5, 2019.

  1. alanclarkeau

    alanclarkeau Senior Member

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    Yes, I've got a couple of them - and yes, I'll run say a drill recharger through it while partly coiled - but any load, it has to be uncoiled.
     
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  2. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    When you brake late you waste energy in a couple ways. First, you're going to most likely need more friction braking and will reduce or even eliminate regeneration. Second, when you stay "on the gas" longer than needed, you're using more gas or electricity than needed to get to where you're going to stop. If you're going to have to stop anyway, why use power (money) to get there if you don't have to? When traffic permits me to stop properly from 60 mph, I will usually regenerate about a half mile of battery range and sometimes more than that. When the light turns on me at the last second, I regenerate almost nothing. It's just gas or electricity thrown away as if I wasn't even driving a hybrid.

    If you mean dynamic radar cruise control (DRCC), then that's something I don't use in town. Only on long trips where I do find it handy. I still use regular cruise control in town sometimes when I'm lazy but I keep a finger on that cruise control stalk so I can disengage it in a heartbeat when I see slowdowns ahead. The DRCC doesn't anticipate well. But normally, in town, I can get better efficiencies and higher eco scores without the cruise control. This morning, traffic was fairly cooperative and I got a 95 on my 9.5 mile commute.
     
  3. ETC(SS)

    ETC(SS) The OTHER One Percenter.....

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    Greetings and Welcome Aboard!

    Everybody has already hit all of the highlights.

    Relax and enjoy the new car.
    'Yes' to extension cords. Outdoor rated. Short and fat (somewhat like yours truly)
    'No' to unnecessarily fretting about MPG for at least the first 3-4 tanks.
    'Yes" to getting a dial-type tire gauge and using it semi-occasionally to measure cold tire pressure.

    Read.
    Read.
    Read.

    Read the manual.
    Read the Warranty and maintenance guide.

    BUT most importantly....read other's experiences in the forum.
    Then in a little while you'll be the subject matter expert and you'll be able to share your knowledge and adventures.

    But mostly?
    Relax and enjoy the new car.
    That's what new cars are for.....

    Good Luck!
     
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  4. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    Always good advice! (y)
     
  5. AshPrime

    AshPrime Junior Member

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    @ETC(SS) Thank you for your comment! Funny that I was just telling a friend of mine last night, I really need to just turn off the middle screen and all it's various diagnostics (which I discovered I can do in settings) for a while and just sit back and enjoy this car. My OCD has had me glued to learning and maximizing this vehicle and it's kind of taking the excitement and fun away from that 'new car experience' one should enjoy. And there is a lot to enjoy about these cars.

    On another note here is my first 'mod' ! (y) I decided I wanted to cover up the white gearshift console and ordered this cover from Toyota. I do prefer it now in black.

    20190805_095401.jpg

    20190802_182014.jpg
     
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  6. alanclarkeau

    alanclarkeau Senior Member

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    I do the same thing - but with DRCC, flick it off just the same as normal cruise.

    And yes, you're right - you can get better litres/100km with a smooth accelerator - but for most people and in some driving situations, DRCC will be better. I have to be in the right mood to HyperMile, and it has to be somewhere where there isn't much traffic.
     
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  7. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    Ditto on all points. (y)
     
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  8. AshPrime

    AshPrime Junior Member

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    So I've now put 7200 happy miles on my 2019 Prime. It's been quite a surprise to find out how much I enjoy driving this car. While I was originally just looking for miles per gallon advantage when buying the car I didn't expect that I'd have such a high degree of driving pleasure. It glides down the road and is incredibly comfortable.

    But what I'd like to ask the veteran pro's on this forum is how I can better understand the EV Auto mode. I've not used it yet and I'm not really clear on if/when my average daily drive could/would benefit from hitting that switch.

    My typical M-F commute is 19 miles driveway to driveway. For a total of 38 RT and about 2 to 5 miles on any given lunch break. I basically get full electric mode for roughly 80% of my commute. When I leave my office to go home the battery tells me I have on average 5 (+\-) miles of juice left so I usually turn the EV off first and get the engine going to warm up in order to avoid it starting cold at 65 miles per hour on the freeway going home. Then I turn the EV mode back on at about 4 miles until my house. Make sense?

    My main question is, would using EV Auto when I leave the house in the morning be a better thing to do? My commute is on flat ground with no hills. Mostly I am at 72 miles per hour until the last 6 or so miles on either end of my commute when I hit the proverbial brake light wall crawl the rest of the way in.

    Another question I'd like to ask is; In addition to the small starter battery, and the plug in traction battery, does my car have a third battery bank that it uses to run in HV mode? I know this is a newb question but I can't figure out how the car is running in HV mode after the main plug in traction battery goes to ------ (empty). And on this same subject, how is it that the traction battery is able to get replenished during regeneration only while it still has juice in it but once it goes to empty regeneration no longer recharges it...?

    Thank you in advance for thoughtful and informative replies. The folks at Toyota that I have asked just don't really seem to understand the car very well either so I've not been able to get answers that seem correct.
     
  9. Chazman62

    Chazman62 Member

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    I don't think it's really empty as you see that 1/5 of the battery symbol on the screen is still blue, about 20% charge still left in the traction battery.
     
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  10. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    I gave up on EV Auto a long time ago. I also live in a flat area. As I understand it, the EV Auto is really just EV unless the engine is warmed up. Then the car will switch back & forth between EV & HV choosing the mode that's most efficient for the conditions. I just manually switch, using EV on the slower speeds and HV at the higher speeds and try to be sure to use all the EV before I get home if I'm going far enough to finish it off.

    You have two batteries: the auxiliary 12V and the traction or HV battery. The small battery is not a starter battery. Most people call it the 12V or the aux battery. It just fires up the computers and closes the relay that connects the HV battery to the car. You could say that it wakes up the car. MG1 starts the engine and it's powered by the traction battery.
    [Edit to add the following picture from the owner's manual]
    Screen Shot 2020-01-08 at 7.49.41 AM.png

    The traction battery gets charge whenever you decelerate by coasting or by light to moderate use of the brakes. It makes no difference if you're above or below the state of charge that enables EV driving. If the hill is long enough, you'll be able to charge it enough to once again show EV range, but the first number you see will probably be about 0.6 miles. Not sure what the percentage would be. But at that point you can put it in EV and use it up like that or put it right back in HV and lock in that range. And at any time, you can press the EV/HV button for a couple seconds to put the car in charge mode although that's not a very good use of your gas.
     
    #30 jerrymildred, Jan 8, 2020
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2020
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  11. m8547

    m8547 Senior Member

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    What you're already doing sounds like the best way to use EV and HV mode. EV Auto isn't going to do any better, because it can't anticipate driving conditions ahead of you or later in the day. I think consolidating the number of times the engine warms up will be best for it in the long run. For example using EV auto on your morning commute might cause the engine to run if the weather is cold or if you need too much acceleration on the highway (going up big hills or flooring it excessively). The engine might run for a few minutes then and also a few minutes on the way home. It would be better to let the engine do all of it's work at once, so it only has to warm up once. That lets it spend more time running efficiently, and lets it fully warm up to eliminate any condensation from running slightly cold.
     
  12. AshPrime

    AshPrime Junior Member

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    @Chazman62 @jerrymildred @m8547 Thank you guys so much for your replies that really helps me a lot. Sounds like I've been getting it somewhat figured out on the best way to drive based on your comments. And Jerry thanks for taking the time to post the owners manual page that was huge. I'm not the best when it comes to reading and research so that manual has been awful for me.

    Regarding cold starts, I'm really curious about too many cold starts on the freeway at 65+ mph aspect for those who don't worry or think about all this and just drive it. I have a friend who owns the exact car (in the premium trim) and she said she doesn't worry and just drives it. She says she does feel that engine kicking on and a sudden 'drag' feeling but she just keeps her pedal into the drive and goes on. I imagine there are many drivers around the world who do the same as her and there must be some sort of data on how these engines put up with that. All I've found in searches on the matter are that people just tend to say; "Toyota must know what they are doing so I'm sure it's okay". But for me I think I'll just keep managing the EV/HV button actively to help minimize the cold start at high speed.
     
  13. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    You're welcome. And your friend is right. Just drive it. Sometime when you have nothing better to do, get on the freeway in EV mode with a cold engine and switch to HV mode while keeping one eye on the mpg indicator. Guess what, it stays pegged or nearly pegged for a while. That's because even though you're in hybrid mode, the electric drive is doing most of the work until the engine warms up and runs cleaner. It's part of what makes this almost a zero emissions vehicle. As the engine warms up, it'll take more of the load. When it's warmed up enough it will get low mpg while it pays back the "energy loan" it borrowed from the battery. It's an amazing car.

    Also, I always recommend downloading the PDF version of the manual from Toyota's owners' website. Then you can have it on your computer, your tablet, your phone, whatever. And you can search for any word you want. I don't even have a paper manual. Then spend some time with the manual. You'll discover all sorts of treats. This is NOT your grandfather's Oldsmobile. :D
     
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  14. m8547

    m8547 Senior Member

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    The car is designed to work well without thinking about it or understanding it. But most of us here are too curious to leave good enough alone. The "drag" she felt is just different accelerator pedal programming between HV mode and EV mode. It's probably worst in Eco drive mode. It's really annoying, but not anything mechanical.

    jerrymildred is right, the car warms up the engine before using it. It's safe to manually switch it to HV mode any time. I've noticed in rare cases when the battery can't supply enough power for a given accelerator input, the engine might come on and start working immediately. But it's unpredictable so there's not much you can do to avoid it, other than preemptively warm up the engine if you think it might be needed. That usually happens when the battery is cold, for example if it sits outside for several days without charging in the winter. I need to do some more experimentation to see how short the warm-up time is in this case. From what I've seen since battery output becomes quickly and sharply limited, the only choice is for the engine to start working right away. For example on a recent drive I saw the discharge current limit quickly drop to 22kW (with a warm fully charged battery it's around 68kW). It normally takes more than 30kW to maintain speed going up this hill on the highway near where I live, but on this drive I expected this to happen since the battery was cold, so I let my speed drop to 40 to see if I could make it with the engine off. Toyota doesn't want you to lose power unexpectedly, so presumably the engine would make up the difference if your accelerator pedal position was calling for more than 22kW of power.

    I think this hill is nearly a worst-case scenario for engine warm-up. If you're driving on a flat section of highway the engine will usually come on as the steady state power hits about 3/4 of the discharge current limit, so that gives it time to warm up and some margin for acceleration from the battery as it warms up. And if the battery is too cold, the engine will probably start immediately when you start the car. In other words, don't worry about my rambling in the previous paragraph, because it seems to be a very rare situation.
     
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  15. Chazman62

    Chazman62 Member

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    Whenever I drive Prime, I'm thinking the technology used on this car is like that from a rocket science.
    I think it's even more sophisticated than what's in most Tesla if not all.
    With all the rebates, credits and discounts I have received, it comes out I paid less than $20,000 for my Prime XLE.
    Now that's a real bang for the buck!
     
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  16. mistermojorizin

    mistermojorizin Active Member

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    I also use DRCC most of the time, and one thing that was different from my prior car with auto cruise is that you can control the aggressiveness of DRCC acceleration by changing from ECO/Normal/Power modes, which is pretty awesome.
     
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  17. AshPrime

    AshPrime Junior Member

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    Hello again Everyone. Been a while since I posted and I now have 35000 miles on my 2019. I'm a bit surprised frankly speaking that I have put this many miles on the car. I drive quite a bit but I didn't think it was this much.

    I had an incident the other day that I wanted to ask the pros here about. I've never noticed this before and my driving habits and patterns have not changed. I usually drive the 18 miles to work on the freeway in EV mode and on one particular morning while doing the same something unusual happened. Briefly the engine kicked on. I thought I was imagining it and I did double check and the light still said I was in EV mode (no not EV Auto). Has anyone experienced that before? It was a moderately cool but not unusual California morning of about 58d and I did NOT have the heater or the seat heaters on. Only thing on in the cabin was the radio.

    While I'm asking Q's I do have another curiosity that I've never found the answer to. How or why is it that, when there is still energy in the traction battery for EV mode, that portion of the battery is allowed to be regenerated, but when that portion of the battery is depleted the car will not longer be allowed to regenerate through braking and deceleration as usual..?

    Oh and here is an odd one for curiosity sake to all. I recently had the car aligned and they bungled it up big time in the electronics. It's a long story but ultimately the car went into 'safety mode' and everything went into a weird partial shutdown mode. The brakes barely worked, the car didn't steer right, etc. They couldn't fix it and they said they had to wait for their senior tech to come to work the next day (I was not at Toyota FYI). I had to leave my car there and get a ride home. Long story even shorter, they got it corrected the next day by doing a reset of some kind. I googled this event and it turns out there is some discussion about this happening during a wheel alignment if a tech is not careful. Something about leaving the brake pedal depressed for to long. It was so frustrating and I was very worried my car had been ruined at the time.