Advice for buying a PIP?

Yep, I've seen it (going down Moeser Lane in El Cerrito if you know it, long & steep with noooo stops). And the owner's manual says as much on page 39. Plus, supposedly it will automatically switch back to EV mode if you restore enough EV range. (If it had automatically switched out of EV to HV due to low battery.) I didn't pay attention to that part on my test.

 

Reference for the one big battery statement? I (like another poster) was led to believe there are 3 Li-On plus 1 Lead Acid battery. This was what I was told when I had the 6 week trial in 2010 and what I was told when I ordered my 2012 (which I received in early April).

 

Maybe one of the senior forum members could help me here. There have been lots of discussions in this forum about this, but I cannot get the search tool to find them right now. The 2010 prototype definitely had separate HV and EV batteries. One of the big gripes from users was that regeneration could not recharge the EV battery, and this issue was addressed by making it one battery.

 

congrats waprius, enjoy! there is a lot of misinformation here as far as the battery is concerned, charles is right. one hybrid battery (li-on) and one 12v battery. everything you see on your screen is just a computer repreesentation of what is happening. they changed it from the prototype to the production model. john1701 has all the info.

 

Hi All, I just got home with the PIP on late Friday night after purchase near San Diego California. Drove it a little bit yesterday and drove it @150 miles today across Riverside county to Orange county down to San Diego County and back over the 76 freeway and back up the 15 to home. Basically a bg loop My EV was completely depleted after my trip was about 20 miles on and near the end I was able to regenerate 3.6 miles EV @ 1250 Watts of 4.4KW by finessing the regen braking. This was while I was varying the throttle a lot (breaking in) and still managed 49 mpg at the end. The last leg coming home off of the freeway was almost entirely EV.

So far very happy with this vehicle, a pleasure to drive and not a dog by any means...

 

The lead acid battery is just a very small 12 Volt battery. The Li-On battery is as I said, many cells assembled into a single unit. It depends how you define "battery", I suppose. But it's divided into quarters, which rotate duty as the HV battery, presumably to provide some degree of wear leveling.

I think the theory is that the car needs to function as an ordinary Prius, but it also needs to be able to output higher current for EV mode than HV mode. I know from experience that the battery behaves much differently in HV and EV modes.

 

I bought that premium outer protection for something like $400, since I don't have a garage. Don't bother with this add-on that the dealer is sure to offer to you. I spoke to a detailer afterwards - he thought that perk is a waste of money, it does not add my more protection than a good wax job does.