Nitrous Injection

Wow, so much hate. I'm glad that using a bunch of acronyms to complicate an explanation as much as possible to show the internet how smart you are makes you feel good, and that you need to be insulting to other people on the internet to make yourself feel even better. I've read the Prius Turbo install piece from start to finish many times. I saw what he said about the system wanting to charge the battery more as a result of the increased power. I also saw what he said about it being much easier to climb hills now. Seeing as how I live in Colorado, this is beneficial to me. I don't care (although it is relevant) how the power eventually gets to the wheels (be it more battery for the electric motor to run longer, or more power from the engine (or ICE as you like to say)). Also, in that video, the nitrous resulted in more power to the wheels. You can pull out your technical engineering manual to search for more acronyms and brainstorm ways to shut down my idea, but you can't argue with a dyno.

To everyone else thats been creative, open minded, supportive and most importantly, polite, I appreciate it. If we want to make the world a better place, Hybrids have to be cool, younger kids have to look at Hybrids as cool, and they have to look at them as something where car traditions of power modding and styling are alive and well. As of right now, the Prius primarily has a reputation as a soft, boring, fuel efficient car. Nobody looks at those Lexus's other than the wealthy older people that are able to afford them. The Prius is the victim of a lot of hate and ridicule (albeit by ignorant people), but unfortunately mass opinion must be changed in the long term to make a difference. Personally, I think it could have a long term impact to have more people doing awesome things with these cars. The main thing this car needs is to be able to go faster. The budget on this project is not an issue, just trying to figure out the best starting point and route to go.

 

haha just sad.....

 

I respect your opinion and well thought out response. However I think that in cities like LA, Denver, SFO, NY, etc... there is a bit of a bubble of perspectives around Hybrids (especially Prius). Even in those cities I encounter more skepticism than positivity around the car. My car definitely slows down heading east up Vail pass from Vail. And god forbid somebody cuts me off when I'm cruising because it will be very difficult for the car to get back up to 70+mph. I guess my goal is more than just "adequate" performance which makes me a weird "unique" Prius owner. I think its great some kids drove GS Hybrids to school but I think that is definitely an exception. Tesla is succeeding at electric cars because they made electric cars cool and relatively affordable. I know this because I was an early employee of Tesla and launched several of their major initiatives pre-IPO.

Prius is by far the best selling Hybrid, and among the most affordable, which is why I wanted to start here. For those who said I bought the wrong car, I still have other cars in my stable to take out when I really want to have some fun.... Just love the Prius because I think its a great car and presents some fun challenges.

 

No the problem is when people like you and DtEW jump to conclusions and are insulting. 1 post and you think you've been ignored, just because I didn't reply with "Thanks guys, this was a dumb idea and impossible, I give up!". And because you both thought just your opinions were being ignored, you threw and tantrum and decided to insult me. I read what both of you had to say, and compared that with information that was obtained elsewhere. Just because I continue to pursue answers and further details does not mean information was ignored. This is how innovation works. Gather as much info as possible, so that the best plan of attack can be created. And however complicated the explanations given were, there is a dyno video of our cars on nitrous that is a glaring contradiction to the info that was provided: Nitrous injection had a direct result on wheel HP, end of story, video proof. True, this was a darkly light video with clearly some amatures messing around in what can hardly be described as a controlled experiment, however the results are intriguing. So other power modifications to some degree must also translate. To what degree will have to be determined, along with at what levels of safety and reliability. Thus far nobody seems to have provided an answer to those two questions.

 

engerysaver, I'd feel lost and alone in the cold hard world that is Prius Chat if it weren't for you Here's to the mad scientists!!! I read your alcohol VPI System thread and very much enjoyed it!

For clarification the 230hp figure was obtained by swapping the standard Prius Atkinson Cycle Motor for a Corolla Otto cycle version (this has already been done in the Prius landspeed record vehicle). The next step would be to turbo-charge that motor which would take it to 230 hp. Now I've been looking into this extensively over the last week and spoken with some real experts and we think we may have a solution around the Synergy Drive system, though it certainly isn't going to be cheap or easy I have to say that in my research outside this forum I've met some awesome people who love the idea and are excited to tackle it, despite the inevitable challenges that are going to arise. This project is likely going to take some time to complete as its going to be quite expensive and we are no doubt going to run into numerous issues. But like everything else, we'll just work through them as they arise. Luckily motor and trans aren't terribly expensive (motor, trans and battery seem to be about $1000 each for replacements on ebay) in the inevitable case that some of our experiments go bad....