Do any Prius Owners NOT love their Prius?

Of course there are some, though few. No car in automotive history has ever been perfect. This model of Prius just happens to match market expectations unusually well.

Look at it this way, some people haven't ever been passionate about any vehicle. They look upon them as appliances, transport from A to B. Yet, they purchase a Prius anyway. I certainly have run into owners like that. So their bad comment is all the attention drawn to them. After all, it is hard to blend into traffic with a vehicle constantly in the spotlight.

 

sure there are people who've had bad luck... seems like particularly for the early 04s... the first production run after a major redesign has a few bugs and that's po'd at least one member here i can think of.

then you get the people coming from benz and bmw and whatever else who are used to an entirely different kind of car. they want more luxury, better handling, etc.

lots of people just see it as a car and nothing more. they might not bother with high miler techniques and get frustrated with the mpg they get... but at any rate you won't find many dissatisfied folks around here.

 

Burn the unbelivers at the stake! Ok this car is not many tings. It is not a off road vehical. It is not a sprorts car. it is not a truck. It is not many things but it does get me from here to there. That is nice.

 

I was one of the people who got an early '04 model and ended up having the car die twice. So you could say that I was soured from the outset.

However.. the car is good for what it is, an econobox with some uplevel features. It creaks and rattles, but I blame that more on the hard plastic than anything.

I really don't have much confidence in the longevity of the car, to be honest, so I will probably be getting rid of my '04 in the spring since it'll be past the 60K mark at that point.

 

Jesse has quite a bit of confidence in his Prius...

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(john1701a @ Oct 21 2006, 11:50 PM) [snapback]336294[/snapback]</div>

Cool - what year is it?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(prius biker @ Oct 22 2006, 07:39 AM) [snapback]336343[/snapback]</div>

It's a 2002. See...

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(driverlee @ Oct 21 2006, 10:36 PM) [snapback]336266[/snapback]</div>

I like my Prius. I don't love it. That would be weird. After all it's a car not a Washington intern or page.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(jburns @ Oct 22 2006, 10:40 AM) [snapback]336366[/snapback]</div>

Indeed, but I do not "harass" my Prius!!! :lol: :lol: AND, I'm a Democrat, so I WILL NOT HAVE SEX WITH IT EITHER!!! :lol: :lol: (define sex.....and what do you mean by "page".....)

Good Sunday morning to all, from a flaming liberal in N.C. B)

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(jburns @ Oct 22 2006, 08:40 AM) [snapback]336366[/snapback]</div>

Hey, I loved a Page once. Now granted, it wasn't pedophilia because I actually was a Page at the time...but heck, when I'm 40 I'm gonna tell the world how I had innappropriate relations with a Page . Of course, by that time, nobody will know what the heck a Page is anymore.

But more on topic, some friends of my family got a Prius right after they lost their cars in Katrina, and they really don't like it. I think they got it for the wrong reasons, though. They fell victim to the hype and the promises of high gas mileage...that's not a stable foundation for being very happy with your car. They drive agressively and don't get good mileage, who would have thunk it?

They also hate the navigation system because it doesn't do everything they want it to. I say if it bugs them, don't use it. Oh, and they have about 10 dings and dents on it, cause from accidentally hitting things. I think the problem is that they got all hyped up, but their car is only utilitarian to them and thus they were disappointed because they had gotten impossibly hyped up.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(driverlee @ Oct 21 2006, 10:36 PM) [snapback]336266[/snapback]</div>

Don't get me wrong -- this is by far the best car I've ever owned. Wouldn't trade it for anything else on the road today. Love the mileage, love the utility of the hatchback, drives nice.

But...

I find the automatic stability control to be too touchy. At various times several people have mentioned the same problem I have had: hitting a pothole while coasting downhill with the brakes on will sometimes momentarily trigger the stability control. And you learn to work around it OK, and I've never had anything I would remotely consider a failure. It's just that, the first few times it happened, it scared the $#@)(* out of me to lose the brakes, even for a fraction of a second, while coasting downhill to an intersection. You really don't need that from a new car.

Oh, and the climate controls are disfunctional. The mechanical ac/heat/vent controls on my old Ford are far more user-friendly than the touch screen. The lack of a VENT setting means that either you leave the climate on full automatic (as some do), or you work through a little logic-and-programming problem to determine how to get untreated outside air into your car, depending on what the temperature is outside and inside. (It's cool outside, I want cold air, so, let's see, I need to set the temp to max cool, turn on the fan, make sure the AC compressor is off, and ... what was I doing again?) You get used to it, but it is cumbersome. And, for reasons that only Toyota knows, if you want to put front defrost on for a second to clear the windshield, when you turn off defrost (via the buton on the steering wheel), it turns on the climate controls (e.g., heat) as you turn off the defrost. Least that's how mine works. So, 10 seconds of defrost, followed by nothing, requires another multi-step programming task on the touch screen - defroster on, defroster off, heat off. Or maybe I've just been too dense to figure out how to make that work.

But let me say it again -- this is the best car I've ever owned.

 

The Prius is the coolest car in the universe. I'm just not sure I'd use the word "love" to describe how I feel about it.

However, I'm entirely saytisfied with it, in spite of a few imperfections and bad design choices.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Tideland Prius @ Oct 22 2006, 12:22 PM) [snapback]336393[/snapback]</div>

Yeah, the traction control is the pits. I almost got stuck last night in a driveway that had just had gravel added. Tires started to slip a bit and then nothing. Tried several times to go foward, no dice. It was a very slight grade, thank goodness, and I managed to back up enough to get a bit of a start to make it over the tire ruts in the fresh gravel.

I've also had it cut the power as I was pulling out from a driveway. Not good. <_< It's to sensitive and potentially dangerous.

 

After 1700 miles I love mine. No squeeks, no rattles, great handling, wonderful mileage, I love the way it looks, the best color red on the market, comfortable seats, lots of leg room even in the back, big car in a little package, love the touch screen, no problems with the climate control, decent stock stereo, quiet, decent power and acceleration, least pollution of any car, tax rebate, decent price, babe magnet (I hope), huge trunk, etc etc...

 

Well, the Prius is not the Universal Panacea for cars. No car is. Since people are different, the things we don't like about it depends on what we are like physically and what our driving habits are (that includes cars we're used to).

Most complaints are about the seats or the tires. Complaints about the handling comes up frequently. After that are items we're used to (NAV system or sound system) that just isn't the same in the Prius. Then there's things, like the NAV lockout when in motion, that's just irritating. Just look at the mods people have done to overcome the shortcomings.

And Darell would like to remove the ICE and put in a bigger battery.

Don't get me wrong. I really, really, really like my Prius. I volunteer to be the chauffeur, just so I can drive it.