Turncoat!

Have to admit -- that's what I've just become. Though I completely enjoyed my Prius for well over two years, I just replaced it! All is not lost, however. First, its replacement is an 09 Camry Hybrid. I found it "used" at the local dealership. After only 5k miles, and less than two months, its original owner decided he just had to go back to a full-size truck!!! I got her for almost $4k less than the original $29k sticker (near-loaded, but no roof or nav). Here she is:

Since I have no nav, I'm having energy screen withdrawal, and having to make do with the little playing card sized display, there down in the speedo. Little energy arrows flow as they do on the Prius screen, and an engine icon appears when the ICE lights up.

So far, it's a really nice car. As expected, I average about 10 mpg less than I did in the Prius, but I'm getting better. Similar driving technique applies, with adjustments. You can feel, and use the car's greater mass. The ICE is more eager to light off, but once you get into a good stealth run, the TCH will hold it longer than the Prius (my imprecise observations).

And the other piece of good news: the Prius is still with us -- my college kid son is buying it on the extended "Bank of Dad" plan.

Any suggestions on how to drive this car efficiently are most welcome. I realize that most Prius techniques work, but as I mentioned, it's clear that the TCH needs its own refinements.

 

A Specific Question I forgot to ask...

Meant to put it in the original post, but forgot...

Anyone know if the TCH has the hot coolant reservoir like the Prius? I've looked over what's visible under the hood, and I can't see it, if it's there. It's not exactly obvious in the Prius, but you can find it if you know what to look for. If it's in the Camry, I haven't found it.

 

Here's another detail I'm sure all happy Prius owners will appreciate. Though I loved my Prius, and still do actually, I've always seen the car as embodying some degree of what I see as "Japanese Goofy-ness". Somehow, in some totally subjective sense, I've always seen the car as somehow including just a bit of the same spirit that gave life to the Japanese Godzilla movies of the 1950s and early 60s. For better or for worse, an essence that would never, ever come from Detroit, or anywhere else for that matter.

To the point. See those nice pretty blue halos around the speedometer and the mpg gauge in my picture, above? Nope, they're not there all the time. They actually increase in intensity as you improve your mpgs, and fade as you fail to do so! If you find yourself looking at just plain old black-and-white optitrons, you know you're in the dog house, mileagewise. One one level, it's a useful feature in that you can judge how well you're doing on this trip with just a glance. On the other hand, I'm afraid that I'm never, ever going to get over just how GOOFY this feature is.

I have great respect for the Japanese and their clever engineering, but I've come to realize that they'll just never get past their seemingly genetic ability to be GOOFY! Gotta love 'em (and their cars)...:der:

 

John:

Thanks for the good info. I need to get back on Greenhybrid. I've also re-activated my TIS subscription and have now gone over all the maintenance pubs for the TCH cooling system, and indeed, there appears to be no thermos. Oh well -- thought that was a neat feature.

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It does, two ways, in fact. If you do really well, it flashes "EXCELLENT!!" at the bottom of the "Eco Drive" display. Second, it does the glowing blue arcs, as I described above. Incredibly goofy, in my opinion, but there doesn't seem to be a way to set the arcs the way you want them and have them stay static.

 

It's funny that you say that. Despite over two years of fiddling with it, the voice command of ANYTHING in my Prius just never worked right. If I asked it to set a temperature, it would kindly inform me that it was resetting the destination to Timbuktu. If I asked it turn the audio off, it would do something with the AC. I do have what others have described as a deep husky voice, and in some settings, I have folks ask me to speak up so they can discern what I'm saying. I guess the car never got it. I had pretty much given up on the feature anyway... At least we do have temp control on the wheel in the TCH. The one button I really miss having on the wheel is RECICRULATE! I cycle that feature on and off frequently, and now I do have to stab at a button that's low on the dash, and over on the passenger side. That's about the only real annoyance I've noticed with the TCH so far, compared to the Prius.

 

John:

Very true as to both. The car's voice command system was approximately as obedient as my teenage son... :frusty:

And that CC memory piece may sound small, but it's actually very nice. Interestingly, the operation of the CC offers a tantalizing clue about the car's programming. One of the questions I often consider is what would be the optimally efficient profile for accelerating from one speed to a higher one. When doing it manually, I typically use a moderate amount of throttle. When using CAN-View, I'd accel at about 2000 rpms. Anyway, in TCH, when you hit resume, the computer almost always gets on the gas resulting in the mpg needle pegging at precisely 15 mpg. I don't know if this is some sort of programmed in compromise, or if that really reflects the "best" rate of acceleration.

The more I drive the TCH and compare it to the Prius, the more questions I have (these really are fun cars, aren't they!). As much as I do like the TCH, I am now wondering whether Toyota really selected the optimum drivetrain for this car. As most of you know, it has the same 2.4L ICE as the regular gasser Camry, but modified to Atkinson cycle operation. Adding to that the motor-generators' thrust results in performance almost as good as the previous generation Camry V-6 when you get on it (the total hp output is about 10-15 ponies shy of of a 3.0L Gen-5 Camry when fed regular gas). This gives you a car that's larger (except for the trunk...) and zippier than a Prius, but one which gets roughly 10 mpgs less than a Prius.

Now, what if Toyota had built the TCH's driveline using the 1.8L I-4 from the Corolla/Matrix series? Sure, you'd give up some acceleration performance , but presumably, you'd get better fuel economy, which is the thing I'd suspect most Camry Hybrid buyers really want. Buyers in this segment taught Honda a painful lesson about the demand for "performance hybrids".

Sorry for the long ramble, but I'm curious to hear others' thoughts on this.