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Some EV questions until I get my manual...

Discussion in 'Newbie Forum' started by shazcan, Jul 1, 2009.

  1. shazcan

    shazcan New Member

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    Hi All,

    I've been driving my Prius for about three weeks now and I love it. It's an 06 T3 but my dealer has been a bit slack in sending me the manual, as it had come from another branch of the dealership...blah blah blah..
    Anyway, I've been cruising the topics and found out quite a lot, though some things need a little clafirication so a. I know that I'm not doing any damage unwittingly and b. to make sure it's not faulty.
    OK-

    Do you always have to manually engage the EV? I've never seen it engage itself. Is that because I'm too impatient and go for the button as soon as the battery gets a bit of charge?

    The typical pattern is that it starts in electric mode, and after a couple of seconds the petrol engine kicks in, even when I'm not moving (usually fiddling with buttons at this point). If I try to engage the EV manually, it won't let me, even if the battery is on 4 or 5 bars. After a minute or two, I'm able to engage the EV. Does it have to "warm up" or something, regardless of what the bars say? (I've noticed that the battery is always either pretty low, or very quick to rundown in the first few minutes of driving)
    Lastly, aircon is a bit if a novelty for me and maybe I use it too much. The summer in the UK has been unusually hot so far so perhaps the battery power (and fuel economy) is being affected here?
    Even so, I'm getting 52 mpg normally which is so much better than my last car!
    Any answers to my boring questions would be appreciated!:D
     
    #1 shazcan, Jul 1, 2009
  2. F8L

    F8L Protecting Habitat & AG Lands

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    Why are you trying to engage EV mode?

    Unless you are just trying to show off the car to friends, I wouldn't recommend using EV mode until you've learned more about how to drive the car more efficiently. EV mode will cause you to lose MPGs if you do not use it correctly and that is what happens to 98% of the people out there. :)

    If you want to engage EV mode when the engine is cold you must do it immediately after pressing the Power button. Once the engine kicks in then you will have to wait for it to turn off again (after its warm up cycle) before you can engage EV mode again.
     
    #2 F8L, Jul 1, 2009
  3. shazcan

    shazcan New Member

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    Well, without the manual I didn't really know any better. that's why I thought I'd get some advice! I learnt to drive very economically in my old car to save petrol so I'm applying the same techniques here, ie anticipating when to slow down, accellerating smoothly etc.
    OK, maybe a little showing off has occurrred in the first few weeks with the EV- the surprised faces of my collegues when I parallel park in complete silence- that's starting to wear off now so hopefully my mileage will improve!
    I did get this car so I can reduce emmissions when driving through the centre of Cambridge. (A very lovely city with ancient university buildings that I want to help protect)
    So will the car switch to EV when it knows best?
     
    #3 shazcan, Jul 2, 2009
  4. F8L

    F8L Protecting Habitat & AG Lands

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    #4 F8L, Jul 2, 2009
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  5. tumbleweed

    tumbleweed Senior Member

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    #5 tumbleweed, Jul 2, 2009
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  6. ksstathead

    ksstathead Active Member

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    I did a 1-page synopsis of the stages of operation which is in the knowledgebase. It links to various threads on the driving techniques and helps one understand what is available based on the warm-up cycle. Search stages of operation.
     
    #6 ksstathead, Jul 2, 2009
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  7. Mike Dimmick

    Mike Dimmick Active Member

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    Welcome to PC.

    Around here, electric driving is normally called 'stealth', up to 42mph, or 'warp stealth' above 42mph. The difference is that in 'warp stealth' the engine has to spin (but without fuel) so that MG1 stays below 6,000rpm. (42mph is speedometer indicated road speed on a US model, which shows about 2mph over actual road speed; a UK car shows about 43-44mph as our fudge factor is 10%.)

    The car will shut down the engine and run in 'stealth' mode whenever the engine load drops below a certain point, if the engine is fully warmed up, has performed an idle check, the speed is below 42mph, and the battery state-of-charge (SoC) is sufficient. It will cut fuel and spin the engine slowly at speeds over 42mph.

    The 'Five stages of Prius operation' article explains how the car behaves as it warms up. In the current weather conditions, expect to get to Stage 3a quite quickly. In 3a you can force the engine off with the EV button, but it will still want to do an idle check when the engine is next started. The idle check is the bit that takes 10 seconds, counting from when the engine goes idle, which it will do as you slow down past 6mph (this is why the article talks about five to ten seconds). If you find the engine won't turn off when travelling below 30mph, it can be advantageous to pull over for ten seconds to let it complete the idle check, if you don't anticipate a 10 second stop coming up shortly.

    Using the EV button (factory-fitted on UK models) forces 'stealth' driving. The car will stay in 'stealth' up to 29mph (US aftermarket EV switch: 34mph). You can push the car a little harder in EV mode than it will accept without starting the engine in normal mode. Too hard and it cancels EV mode.

    EV mode is primarily useful for very short trips, like manoeuvring your car in a car park to unblock someone else.

    Do remember that all the energy in the battery ultimately comes from the fuel, and conversion efficiency is not 100%. Minimizing battery use generally yields better results than trying to force the engine off. Think of the battery like an overdraft - anything you borrow has to be repaid with interest. Six bars is the target point that the car aims for; treat this as the zero point with anything under being 'borrowed'. Anything over this will be spent quite quickly!
     
    #7 Mike Dimmick, Jul 2, 2009
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  8. shazcan

    shazcan New Member

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    Thanks guys, that's been really helpful. I'll have a good read up on all this new info. Just by taking your advice and keeping my mits of the EV button has already improved my MPG from 50 to 56 so that's great.
    Love the term "stealth mode"... especially when in the pedestrian zone in Cambridge- the look of surprise is priceless- though I do have to get to my destination a little slower these days unless I want someone on my bumper!
     
    #8 shazcan, Jul 5, 2009
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