Toyota Sold 1 Million Hybrids in last 9 Months, 6M since 1997

not too shabby, thanks serg!

 

Funny how media twists things.... Autoline weekly said "Toyota's share of hybrids is dropping" and then described how Ford, Honda, etc were stealing hybrid sales from Toyota. They made it sound like Toyota was in a downward slump, and that's clearly not the case.

 

Actually Toyota and to a lessor extent Honda and Ford made hybrids real. Now we are starting to see a little more variety. Not enough variety for my taste (Where is the minivan, pickup, and service van hybrid?) Still it is a presence and the gas and diesel critics have muted down. There are still echos of their earlier nonsense but not like it used to be.

Bob Wilson

 

i wonder how many cars have sold 6 million in the last 16 years?

 

...wake me up when Sergiospl puts "hybrid" in his profile...that's when we pop the champagne cork.

 

In the US Honda lost market share, ford is the big gainer. This represents a better market for hybrids. Some in the media are in favor some against, it depends what you read. The Autoline definitely only told part of the story.

+1

Lutz is no longer running gm It was interesting seeing car and driver review the new accord hybrid, working the math with hp and fuel consumption and saying it was a better value than the non-hybrid, but at the same saying the reviewer would pick the non-hybrid, basically admitting one barrier is the emotional side.

 

This is how you make the most impact. Prius does not use any exotic materials or batteries, just plain smart and clever engineering.

 

Better graphic presentation of trend would be IMO:



Toyota Hybrid technology is alive and kicking!

 

16 years is a long time in the general public's conception. if we say, 'by 2030, 6 million ev's will have been sold', most of the response would be, 'so what?'.

 

By my calculation Accord Hybrid is $8000 more than the non-hybrid, so I don't see how Car&Driver says the gas savings make-up the difference? For my interstate travel the HAH would be 7.8 cents per mile and the AH would be 9.7 c/mile. (In other words over 400,000 miles to make-up the hybrid premium.)

I'm happy to see so many Priuses out there. It helps drive-down the pricetag on the used market (which benefits me as I shop for a G2). Somewhere around $3000-4000.

Vice-versa the relative rarity of Insights and TDIs means paying almost $10,000 even for ten-year-old models.

 

If you look at it, ofcourse everyone except maybe toyota expects plug-ins to take off faster than hybrids. It would be an awful failure for Tesla, VW, Nissan, and GM if plug-ins only were at 10M units in 2026. I don't expect all those companies to fail at plug-ins.

I think when hybrids hit 1 Millon it was big news. Now its a yawn story. Still good numbers for toyota, but outside of Japan its tiny market share for hybrids. Sales have picked up in the last couple of years, so there is hope for blow out numbers.

When the prius was first introduced using nimh traction batteries was exotic, and using higher cost materials like aluminum on the hood, electric air conditioning (gen II) was forward thinking. Today there is nothing exotic about lithium batteries, in fact if your cell phone or lap top had nimh instead of lithium you would wonder why you would buy it? Toyota uses lithium batteries in 3 of their cars. All of the camry hybrids competition (fusion hybrid, kia hybrid, sonata hybrid, accord hybrid) use lithium batteries. Using nimh is a cost cutting move by toyota, and perhaps a wait and see on reliability as they warant those batteries for 10 years in the US (non us prius v are called alpha and have lithium).

I doubt the lexus and toyota hybrid sucess is from the lack of using new tech.

 

Toyota has 3 cars with lithium? I'm aware of 2: Prius v (europe) and the plugin. Where else?

Honda switched to lithium in its 2011 Civic, though I don't know why ( it didn't boost the MPG or other benefit).

 

Lithium batteries are needed where a lot of them are necessary. The Prius hybrids don't need a big and very heavy battery pack. For the smaller battery pack that a hybrid uses, the additional weight of the NiMH battery is not hat important.

NiMH batteries have been proven for their long life and reliability in the Prius.

I have had many Lithium Ion batteries in laptops go dead or melt on me in 3 years or so.

It might have to do with the dendrites that form in Lithium Ion batteries.

I think that it is smart that Toyota has stuck with NiMH battery technology. A Gen III Prius Genuine Toyota replacement battery pack, with core exchange, list for $2,800. There has been talk that a replacement battery for the Volt list for over $30,000.

Ford is risking a lot on newer and less reliable technology, too.

I'll stick with the Toyota hybrids.

 

Compare to EV and RAV4 EV NiMH pack size, the cost to benefit was justified in Prius usage.

The same with Lithium usage. The biggest pack is in PiP that retains a flat cargo floor.

Aluminum usage in hood and hatch are again not extreme like the Insight frame.

Toyota's ability to balance many things (tech, emission, economy, practicality, etc) to reach mass market was the key to Prius success.

 

prius phv, alpha, and Rav4 EV. All use panasonic lithium cells but have different cells, bms, and packaging. The cells in the first 2 are assemembed into batteries by a mostly owned by toyota company, for the Rav 4 EV by panasonic. Toyota has mentioned looking for lithium suppliers in the US for US built hybrids, they mentioned that they wer not

Honda had reliability problems with their nimh batteries. Ford bought batteries from the same supplier, Sanyo, now panasonic (through takeover), and did not have problems. It is likely that it was because of using a more agressive bms. Ford and toyota are quite conservative only using 40% of the energy in the battery to keep the life long.

Lithium batteries for the same power, have more usable energy, are physically smaller, and weigh less. Ford mentioned in a press release that the batteries were also less expensive to them than nimh. The cells ford bought from panasonic were likely the same ones as toyota was already using for the alpha. It is likely though panasonic was charging ford more for nimh cells than they charge toyota, since panasonic is in a joint venture with toyota on nimh. Panasoic now has a monopoly on nimh cells, but must compete for sales of lithium cells.

I don't quite understand your point here. When the prius was new, nimh was less proven than lithium today. I would say toyota definitely took a risk with that technology.

But absolutely the prius is a front heavy car, and spending the money for an aluminum hood to shave weight is probably more important than reducing weight where the battery sits in the prius.

I'm sure you have, they aren't managed to last 20 years. You will note though that they are much more reliable than the nimh or nicad batteries that they replaced. No one is going to go backwards and put a less reliable nimh in a laptop or phone and make it heavier with less battery life.

And here I thought they were $3500 for the volt batteries. Fact is no one will know until they come off warnaties, but no insurance company or customer is spending that on volt batteries that happen to have over 10 times the capacity of the prius liftbacks battery.

If toyota thought lithium was so bad and unreliable why would they put them in 3 different cars that are for sale? My point is even toyota is no longer putting up the FUD that nimh is better. They say that it is less expensive, but that is likely to change soon.

Ford's highest volume lithium the hybrids and energis use the same cells from panasonic that toyota is using on their alpha and energi. I just expect as prices go down, toyota to spread them accross more hybrids. Lets stop pretending that the prius is the best selling becuase toyota only used old technology. In 2003, toyota had come a long way and added elecric airconditioning, while improving the battery design to be more reliable, and increasing engine power to put less strain on the battery.

I think you totally missed my point. Lithium is not strange risky technology. ITs today technology. Toyota never told anyone what the old rav4 es cost. We won't ever know. When they designed the new one did they pick nimh? Ovonics is off patent now. Toyota chose the current technology Lithium.

The rumors were the gen III was designed for lithium, but then had to be redesigned for nimh, when they found problems in the panasonic batteries. This was not a problem with lithium itself, but the choice panasonic and toyota had made. Fast forward to today, and toyota uses a different lithium chemistry that perfoms much better. I don't doubt the choice back then, other than tieing themselves to a vendor (sanyo and lg had lithium that would have worked), but its not the choice toyota has now for future designs. It would be a competitive disadvantage not to improve on new designs with the times. It is rumored that some of the next gen prius will stay nimh, while others will use lithium.

So you are saying that they should have stuck with nimh?

It was exotic for the 1997 prius. Both honda and toyota decided to go aluminum. You said they didn't use any of these materials, and that is what made them sucessful. Nimh was also exotic back in '97.

much better than your first false statement. There was more to it than that though. The civic hybrid also used your nimh batteries, was mass market, didn't use expensive aluminum. Toyota took a lot more risks and went higher tech with the prius and it paid off.

 

In thread discussing the Volt battery cost, A replacement battery for Chevrolet's Volt costs more than the car? | Page 2 | PriusChat a refurbished battery pack for a Volt is $3300. The 3 modules, new sans battery case is $4300. This is a battery over ten times the size in kWh than the Prius NimH pack.

The $30,000 figure likely came from a dealer trying to brush off a call from a non-potential customer.

 

I wonder if it was from Mike Kelly. He is a chevy and hyundai dealer that wants to kill the volt. He even fired a guy at his dealership for ordering 1 for the lot. A different pro-volt chevy dealer took it off his hands and sold it.

 

Funny that the Volt battery, with 10x more energy, costs the same as they teeny battery for myinsight Toyota has stated in a car interview that the NiMH chemistry is better-suited to high current demands than lithium & that's why they stick with it in G3' c, v, Camry, and their Lexus brands.

My first insight went over 200,000 with no battery problems (the transmission started leaking first). My second insight has 150,000 and still on its original NiMH battery.