Raves & Rants

Just picked up my pkg V last night; and I read this thread this morning. I went to check my car at lunch; and sure enough I've got the same black sticker on my windshield. Except mine is inside the car, tucked up behind the sun visor. In the photo it looks like yours is on the exterior of the car.

Going to take it off tonight.

 

Just take the thing off, already. You said it's not wired to anything, so if you're really worried SKS or something else is gonna stop working, you can always put it back in.

As others have pointed out, you're worrying over nothing. The fact that it's not attached to anything pretty much proves it is not connected in any way to the car. What, do think there's some sort of wireless connection? What would be the point of that?

Mail it back to your salesperson and tell her the SKS works just fine, but you heard this thing explodes if left unattached to the car for more than 72 hours...

 

kind of funny ... made me laugh at least.

But saying something like that can get you in serious trouble with the authorities, even if it is a joke, even if it's "just a car dealer". Many facets of society, jointly with authorities, are cracking down on that stuff. It has all evolved from how jokes about bomb threats at airports are dealt with.

 

I actually had to stop by the dealership on the way home. I pointed out the black sticker to the new car manager, and he said it is a RFID sticker. He said Toyota has just started using them, and it should have been removed at port. He just peeled it off and threw it in the trash, then cleaned my window. Its similar to the security RFID stickers you find in DVD cases; I don't know what other information it carries.

My SKS is working fine.

 

A really thorough and fantastic review! Despite the cons (which you will have with any vehicle since so many factors come to play when building a car), I really am looking forward to the day when I get mine!

 

We picked up our new Prius today at 4:30 at Lithia Toyota of Medford. Two Barcelona Red Prius’ left the new car delivery area within a half hour of each other. One was ours!

We did not test drive the car before handing over the money. All I wanted to do is make sure the drivers seat adjusted nicely for my better half and it did. If she has to sit just perfectly in the seat I’m sunk. When her eyes came down one third on the glass, I breathed a sigh of relief.

Fit and finish is a perfect Toyota 10. I don’t know if I have ever driven a better family sedan than this Prius. It felt rock solid on the road. The view out the front window was fine and I could see more out of the rear window than I thought I would. That lower window in the back gives you a lower view out the back, which I liked.

My Corvette fits around the driver real well and so does the Prius. I felt snuggled in the drivers seat with everything within easy reach. I like the deeper cup holders.

Navigation was nice and the sound system was better than I expected. I want to compare it with the Bose but did not have my car tunes in the CD player. I’ll get back with you on that.

The one negative that someone else voiced was a bit of vibration on the rear view mirror. It is not to bad but there should be no vibration at all. None of my other cars have that problem.

I have to hand it to Toyota for crafting a nice suspension. The ride was smooth and quiet. We in Southern Oregon drive over some of the worst freeways in the country because studded tires dig out the tar between the rocks in the road. I could hear the road but on a scale of one to ten, I would place it at a 2 just audible. The car has been soundproofed very well. I could not detect the engine turning on and off. It all seemed seamless. We averaged 52.2 miles per gallon on the 40 or so miles we put on the car today.

It is a lot of car for the money! I could not be happier!

Dan

 

RANT: Love my IIIBLUEII except for the its constant dirty backside! Everything below the rear spoiler gets too dirty too fast. It's kind of like a black hole sucking in or attracting dirt & road grime. Wonder if this situation could be solved by having a few slots through the spoiler to draw air flow down, thus repelling the dirt by blowing it away!?!

 

All cars have a lot of dirt collecting at that part of the car. On the Prius, it's exacerbated by 1) the aerodynamics, and 2) the black spoiler and very dark lower hatch window, both of which highlight the dust.

One suggestion would be to get a California car duster. I've used them on my cars for years with great results (one for the body, a mini duster for the wheels, and a mini for the interior).

One positive I'll mention here--brake dust accumulation on the wheels is virtually non-existent, particularly compared to the high performance cars I've owned for the last 20 years (which would have dirty front wheels after a few days).

 

My RANT is that the non-nav radio (JBL) only shows 10 characters of song or artist information. Sure I can extrapolate everything by googling but annoying still. Would it really have been that hard to make it scroll so it shows the entire transmitted information? Come on, that's just lazy engineering. Maybe the extra letters were too heavy to qualify for the oh-so-important 50mpg barrier.

RAVE on the small interior light that shines on the gear selector. Totally unnecessary but looks very cool.

 

Agreed on both counts!

 

It does.

 

My only rant is the NAVI system's ability to display text for XM stations, etc., is limited to only 16 character. How can they fit entire city blocks with names (across the NAVI display), yet allow an FM station in my area to display song name / artist / album information scroll bye, yet XM is limited to 16 characters? Is there a way to set this to display all the letters, , or the first 32 at least?

 

I agree with the rant on characters as well.

I also dislike how you cannot have the preset screen (with 1-6 presets) visible WHILE looking at the text of the XM channel (i.e. Artist/Song Title).

 

A bit OT but

 

I knew this was around.... the 70mph for pure EV... how do I get this to happen????