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The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

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Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#211

Post by JeremyNT »

quanto wrote: post #209

It's difficult to overstate how ground breaking Prius was when it came out; arguably more surprising than Tesla's success and paradigm shift. Before Prius came out, people questioned whether it was even physically possible to have a any working hybrid system in a commercial car, let alone a non-serial hybrid system. At least Tesla had seen working prior art in commercial EVs (albeit far less famed than Tesla). Toyota…

Plug in hybrids really remain the sweet spot for usability.

If you can cover the 50 mile typical commute round trip range on grid electric and then switch to the ICE for longer trips, that's a lot more practical. It's like having the best of both worlds.

Yes, you sacrifice in weight and complexity, but Toyota has absolutely mastered this design and their reliability is great.

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#212

Post by _yb2s »

jgilias wrote: post #203
_yb2s wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly never quite understood this perspective or why it's so popular... in general I try to always find ways to do normal life things a little weird, or make it a little more challenging, fun, and memorable- and try to break up the routine drudgery. Even just getting groceries can be a fun adventure with my kid if we put the top down on the Porsche, play some music we love, and maybe go to a weird store that tar…

What if you have another kid and a wife? At a certain level of utility/space, cars just stop being that fun. Well, until you get to the vans, those are fun in their own weird way.

I do have a wife, not planning on more kids. I'm a bit of a car nerd and have a bunch of older cars I maintain myself- including several that fit the whole family- all of them together costing less than a newer economy car. There are plenty of large cars that are still fun to drive. A Porsche Cayenne/VW Touareg/Audi Q7 can tow as much as a full sized truck, seat 5 in comfort, offroad as well as almost anything, and post sports car worthy track lap times- and you can get a nice one for 5-10 grand on Craigslist nowadays.

There are some fun weird vans. I've always loved the Toyota HiAce, Mitsubishi Delica, and other strange Japanese minvans with weird features like built in karaoke machines, beverage coolers, tiny diesel engines, and real truck 4x4 systems. Also love the old VW vanagons.

They used to run (tongue in cheek) ads for the Boxster with the slogan "The more kids you have, the more practical it becomes" and that it fits "Two child seats. Up front." There's some truth to that- if you have a large family you will likely have multiple cars, it can still make sense for one of them to just take two people for 1 on 1 activities.

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#213

Post by wpm »

fortran77 wrote: post #60
Toutouxc wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? It’s a hybrid, by definition, always has been. What is it exactly that you think confused the market?

[flagged]

You have repeatedly stated this without explanation as to how it supports your position.

A BEV can be charged entirely by a gasoline powered generator, does that mean it simply ceases to be a BEV?

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#214

Post by naijaboiler »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #201
01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it couldn't decide which gear to pick. I haven't felt that since I've been driving my CVT ICE for so long. Then again, a coworker told me the CVT is likely to break before 100,000 miles. So.... thinking of buying a Prius. I love Priuses.

Honda CVT is supposed to be pretty solid if that’s what you have. Other CVTs are less solid, or so I hear.

nissan cvt is akin to you just giving money away

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#215

Post by philwelch »

warner25 wrote: post #149
philwelch wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They're number two for now, but seem screwed in a world that's moving towards outlawing gasoline-powered cars. I wouldn’t worry about that anymore.

For the next 2-4 years, sure, but this seems like a longer-term trend towards something that's going to happen eventually.

No, I think we're seeing a correction in the long term trend. It's possible that EV's will take over the car market, but if they do it will be because that's what consumers prefer, not because of government mandates.

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#216

Post by datavirtue »

hollywood_court wrote: post #207
lwhsiao wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Naive question: aren't belts lower maintenance than chains, and don't let last longer? Why doesn't a engine with a chain drive require equal or more replacements?

No. Chains are better. My Land Cruiser has a timing belt. I replace it every 90k miles per Toyota's specifications. My Tundra has the same engine, except that it has a timing chain. I've never bothered to replace the timing chain. A timing chain is preferable as long as it isn't something like a Jaguar/Land Rover. The chain in those doesn't matter because they use plastic tensioners that eventually become brittle at…

Chains can stretch, weigh more and make noise. This is why belts are used, in addition to being a space saver. The ultimate in reliability are gear drives. Those truly never wear out or need replaced (found in nearly any diesel engine).

Chains were very common in American cars and trucks for decades and they did need replaced after 150k-200k miles. I replaced the one in my 1993 Ford 5.0 at about 150k hard miles and it made a dramatic difference in performance (solved knocking/preignition on hills).

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#217

Post by usrusr »

jgilias wrote: post #148
usrusr wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would not call a CVT "not a gearbox". Were Audis equipped with their multitronic option (not in any way related to hybrid or BEV) "cars without a gearbox"?

Yeah, I’d say “not a gearbox”. A gearbox to me is something where there are actual gears engaging and disengaging leading to wear and tear. Doesn’t matter what kind of fancy electronics are then used to hide the mechanical operation from me. A mechanical CVT with belts and pulleys with changing diameters is even worse. What the hybrids (e-CVT ones) have though is basically a planetary gear set, where the gears are pu…

To me the key element is that it can run different transmission ratios: wether that's in discrete steps or a continuous ramp, that's an implementation detail. BEV (most of them) don't have that, the Prius has. When I read GP post my (surprised) impression from the "no gearbox" claim was that the Prius started as a serial hybrid. (it did not)

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#218

Post by datavirtue »

bityard wrote: post #166
frosted-flakes wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike most bicycle chains, timung chains are permanently lubricated with filtered oil. Belts are not.

Ford and a few other makers have been using oil-immersed timing belts lately. They quite reliably fail after the car's warranty is up but well before the rest of the car is junk.

I agree, they are a disaster. However, I have heard people argue that Honda and other manufacturers have been using oil emersed belts for decades.

After 2017 Ford started using belts to drive the oil pump in F-150 engines (and possibly other Ecoboost engines). I have seen 100k teardowns of failed engines and the belt is not looking good at that point. If the belt breaks the engine is toast by the time the operator realizes what is going on.

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#219

Post by _yb2s »

sonofhans wrote: post #196
_yb2s wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Prius system is an excellent design, but as someone that loves driving, it just feels and drives awful- little tactile or audible feedback on any of the controls, and really unresponsive to inputs- arguably dangerously so. My regular daily driver is an old Porsche Boxster, and by comparison the Prius feels like I’m driving a dishwasher or playing a cheap arcade game- it will get you there reliably but it’s just n…

To be fair, you are contrasting an econobox with one of the all-time great driver’s cars :) I bet I have enough fingers to count cars more fun to drive than a Boxster. I do agree about the Prius, though. It feels like driving a dishwasher.

I know it's weird to compare/contrast such different cars, but they're both in the same group to me: old cars I can buy cheap on Craigslist.

Re: The Toyota Prius transformed the auto industry

#220

Post by datavirtue »

loeg wrote: post #132
jgilias wrote: post #36

I sometimes chuckle that most of the cool Lexuses are now Priuses under the hood! But that’s a good thing. I own a Toyota Corolla hybrid myself, and hybrids are one of those things that I can say I’ve completely changed my mind about. I used to dislike the idea of hybrids, because I assumed that the overall system complexity must be higher than either an ICE, or an EV. And I’m a sucker for simple systems, so I though…

I wish Toyota would make enough Siennas to satisfy demand. Instead, there's are long wait lists at dealers.

It's the only good minivan in exsistance.
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