First 100 miles

Got my Prius on Tuesday. Now have 100 miles on it and here are some things I noticed:

1 Cars seem quite rare around here and most people are unfamiliar with the car.
Surprised how many ask about plugging it in, can it get up to speed on the highway, etc.
Also people seem to assume I got the car for environmental reasons. It doesn't bother me except that the general public doesn't seem to see anything else about the car, including the stuff that made me buy it!

2 Full EPA mileage is clearly possible without much effort, I should think in the New England area. Been around 30-40 degrees this week and I am getting 42 commuting to work on 128 mostly, for 12 whole miles. Car never warms up.

Went to Boston and through the new tunnel and then back home. Going in the tunnel was all 5 mph! Rest of trip was 60-70. This brought mileage up to 46 overall. Last part of trip with the car warm mileage was consistantly over 50 and close to 60 mpg. So on trips or in summer getting over 50 seems assured.

3 The by-wire brakes and steering felt just about perfect to me, and much like my old Citroen. Citroen had one advantage in the steering: auto centering and you could always feel a centering force that was entirely artificial. Otherwise the controls felt very similar. Car tracked straight once I got it aimed right. Citroen hydraulics would aim the wheels themselves.

Found steering and braking easy. A friend drove and found the car kind of disconnected from his input and was bothered and he had trouble with both steering and braking keeping it smooth.

4 Same friend used to a Volvo found car ride too firm and noisy. I found it extra silent and was pleased at the Euro suspension feel. Some how it felt better to me than I remembered it being when I drove the demo a year ago!

Steering felt especially better to me, as I remembered thinking the demo car had too much play in the wheel, and I felt none in my car.

5 Everyone was impressed by the back seat leg-room.

6 HID headlights are super. I never want a car again without these!

7 Felt more like a real electric car than I remembered. This is from the engine noise not tracking the accelerator, and the lack of shifting. One of the best features!

8 EV button will clearly help! Due to my short commute, going last part of trip on battery would save gas for sure. Car will have extra power anyways when starting in the cold mornings. A bit of battery charging then will help it warm faster. Mileage is noticably better going home from work than going to work. All theory for now. I got the button, but will wait a bit before putting it in.

9 Dash looks like it is perfect for holding my Garmin.

Now for the bad parts:

1 Radio is a disaster. (std one since I have AM pkg) Speakers mostly and their bad locations too. (I generally find factory radios in cars bad in general.)
2 Rear visibility terrible esp in rain at night.
3 Front view with no hood will take me a while to get used to. I expect this will be temporary.
4 Wish I had auto park. Even if slow it would help teach me how to do it better! For now I just avoid parallel parking.

Looking forward to my first real trip, but or now the seats feel great.

 

Re: First 100 miles Now 300 miles

Just want to list some new info on my mileage. Still on tank 1 so I am going by the computer graphs!

Drive to work about 10 miles. Car stays cold so I get 42 mpg so far for that, at 30-40 degrees. This with regular stock tires at 30 lbs pressure.

When I drive for an hour or so and the car gets warm my mileage at 60-70 mph goes up to 50 mpg to 55 mpg and stays there.

Never got to try higher pressures in my tires because I wanted to get my snow tires on in time for snow storms. Just got my snows on and did a test loop. Now using 40 lbs and 38 lbs in the tires, Michelin X-Ice from Tire Rack, with steel wheels.

Mileage when warm seems to be down 3-4 mpg but still stays at 50 or so.
Work commute still unknown, but not likely much different with the cold the major factor.

No idea how these tires do on snow and ice yet but on dry roads they seem way better than the stock tires. Much quieter, and very stable feeling for snow tires.

 

Re: 50 - 70 MPG in New England in the winter ?

Hi Norm. Don't feel too bad! I think you mixed my mpg with mph numbers?

As to how I read I used a bit of everything. I reset the computer at the start of a trip sometimes and read the average. Other times I read off the bar charts averages.

Now I have used a full tank and my calculated mileage was 43.5 for the tank.

The very best I got was going to work this morning at 58.8 average on the computer which I reset at start up. Reason I got it so high was I really worked at it and went back route with top speed of 40 mph and much at 35 mph. It gave me miles at a time of stealth mode when I was extra careful with the accelerator! Normal commute on rt 128 stays around 42 average.

Trips of over 1/2 hour get really good on the highway and the bar graphs stay over 50 mpg once the first 3 warm up ones go by.

Hopeful my next tank will be better. Seems like it has gotton better after the first 200 miles on this last tank. I get stealth more easily now. Also note the car charges the battery higher, I guess because it senses I have no big hills around here to go down. I get green battery bars now quite a bit. Before when I first got it the battery seemed to try to stay at the half way up point.

Boy are these cars hard to fill. But I am still used to a diesel where I just fill till I see the fuel in the neck! Took 9.46 gallons. Filled to the gurgle sound, slowly.

Now wonder how much is reserve that is usable, how much unusable, and how much a reduced capacity tank?

 

Just the auto shutoff. When I filled I think I added more through a dozen auto shutoffs.
I stopped when I heard some gurgling. Never spit back but I pulled out the nozzle several times so it wouldn't build up pressure. Never felt like I could repeat the same fill point each time as the full sound was so vague and gradual. I am used to seeing some fuel in the pipe with my last car being a diesel.

After the first shut off it took a lot more fuel. And I don't think I overfilled, as none came out and the engine ran normally and smmothly.

I'd also like to get 450 miles on a tank, more in the summer! But after that flashing light starts I think I will carry a can of gas just in case, till I know what is reserve fuel and what is just the bladder shrinking.