Article: Is a hybrid worth it?

[tomauto]

I am putting on 550 miles a week in my 1996 Civic. I dont feel like it is going to blow up. I am also about to pass 150k miles also.

I figure it paid for itself in the first year when you consider the maintenance and FE savings over the Jeep Grand Cherokee I replaced it with. It could (and might ) blow up tomorrow and I'd still be way ahead over what it would cost for a new car when you figure in payments and depreciation.

I showed my co-worker the exact same senario with his Jeep. He still thinks he needs an SUV. I told him that I only saw him once with his Jeep being put to true use by hauling some roofing edging, but that is the only time. Its all in their mindset, they want the vehicle for the chance of using the utility, not actually using the car for its purpose.

[rh77]

I commute 2300 miles every week, granted some of that is air travel :-D

I'll probably go about 500/week soon, and the '98 Integra should fit the bill.

TomAuto: I completely agree with the Jeep thing. When I had to haul a bunch of stuff from the Home Depot, I rented their truck for $20 and that was it. It wasn't a hassle, it was very simple, and it would save the SUV buyer 1000's of dollars! Just rent a truck when you need it!

RH77

[JanGeo]

Home Depot delivers DUH! Got a storm door coming for my Prius friend tomorrow morning of course the kids are in school and she is in Australia so I have to be there.

[rh77]

Originally Posted by JanGeo

Home Depot delivers DUH!

Well I know we've rented their truck on a few occasions for bulky items and to run to Sears for the outdoor table and chairs. Free delivery...buggah. They should put up a sign or something.

RH77

[Compaq888]

I stand corrected

[rh77]

Originally Posted by theclencher

I've flown over cities and I've driven in them. From the looks of things (a million cars going from the west side to the east, and a million cars going from the east side to the west every week day, twice a day) everybody goes out of their way to live on one side and work on the other- it's hilarious! And then they have the gall to whine about traffic congestion! What would happen if all the east siders swapped houses with the west siders?

Now, I live in the sticks, and we have a similar phenomenon here- everyone pretty much knows where they are going to have to go to find work, yet many decide to live 60 miles away and drive the 600 miles/week- mostly, in full-size 4x4s. Well the road has some snow flakes on it sometimes!!! Gaaaaaaaa!!!

When I got my job, I did my house hunting within a six-mile radius of work so as to make bicycling every day or most every day a practical thing to do. That worked out quite well. When you think about it, I could have commuted in a Hummer and gotten higher FE for the task than someone with a long commute in a Metro.

1. I agree with you on the 4X4s
2. The housing market generally dictates where you live in the city: if the East side is too expensive, no money is saved by getting closer, so buy West.
3. Married couples don't work at the same place, so if you have a dual-income family, there's going to be commuting.
4. I bought my house because of it's initial price per square foot, school district, and re-sale potential. In the sticks, your options are limited.
5. Until the we help develop safe, reliable, useful mass-transit, nothing will change.

RH77

[kickflipjr]

I have always been opposed to long commutes. #1 the amount of time #2 cost.
I won't even bring up the enviro...

[basjoos]

I commute about 500miles per week in my 92 Civic with over 420,000 miles on it (and getting about 70mpg) with no reliability worries. There was no way I could buy a 3 bedroom house for $29,000 (in 1988) in the Asheville, NC area. At the time, my wife also worked in Greenville, SC, so I bought a house about midway between the two cities. Plus this way if the Asheville job goes belly up, I can access the Greenville and Spartanburg labor markets without having to relocate.

[drydem]

Yes. It's an interesting ride. I bought my 2010 Toyota Prius in April 2010 for about $23K but when you add tax, tag, title, registration it was about $25K. Auto insurance has been about $1000/year. I've driven it about 60,000 miles over about 60 months and averaged about 60 mpg. The Prius has the largest and most active hybrid driver owner community - and I have learned a great deal from them. The Prius is an ultra low emission vehicle - so it is a green car. I didn't buy the Prius just for saving gas - I wanted to learn how to hypermile and I wanted something interesting to play with. At the time I bought my 2010 Prius, I was also looking at a 2010 Honda Insight, 2010 Hyundai Elantra Touring, and a 2010 Honda Fit. The Insight was cheaper but smaller than the Prius but lack an active driver-owner community. The Elantra Touring was a low tech conventional car that got about 28 mpg but about 6000 cheaper and look like a better deal than the Toyota Matrix. The 2010 Honda Fit was a hi tech conventional car with special rear seats that made it roomier and more functional than an Elantra Touring but was only about 4000 cheaper than a Prius and got about 32 mpg.

Cons:
The Prius' undercarriage plastic engine shield's oil change access door tends to fall off.

Area mechanics have a difficult time properly diagnosing hybrids. if you live in San Francisco CA there are some excellent hybrid mechanics - but the Washington DC metro area mechanics are not that good when it comes to diagnosis and repairing hybrids. I went through hoops to help my Ford Explorer Hybrid friend get her vehicle fixed .... it was a real headache to get the braking system computer to work right. The intellectual property restrictions and the sheer magnitude of knowledge needed to understand hybrid tech makes knowing how to service them daunting.


Strange thing for hypermilers might want to know. The Prius OBDII port can be temporarily overloaded by attaching two ScangaugeII in series to it... it will cause the Prius onboard computer to go on the fritz from time to time (it seems random) ... if you detach both ScangaugeII units and then reattach only one ScangaugeII obdII meter everything returns to normal. My guess is that temperature changes may affect the cable connections and cause the Prius OBDII port to send a false reading.

Toyota Prius Atkinson cycle gas motor has a really difficult time with long up hill roads in the mountains and MPG suffers until you go downhill. The Toyota Prius low ground clearance makes driving in the snow difficult and driving over rough roads dangerous. The Prius is not designed to provide another car with an electric jump start. The Prius is not designed to tow a heavy trailer or carry over 800 pounds of both passenger and cargo. The Prius 100 watt rated 12 vdc accessory power adapter cannot pull more than 80 watts without blowing a fuse this makes running a normal portable 12 vdc tire air compressor to inflate a tire impossible - I have a portable hand pump and a 120vac air pump for the tires now.

Last month in snow storm, when the driving temperatures started dropping below 20 F degrees, my windshield started fogging up despite the having been cleared up by the defroster before starting the trip home. The outside temperature was dropping as a snow storm approached and caused ice to form along the windshield wiper blades making them less effective and the windshield started fogging up even with the defroster running at 100% percent. To defog the windshield and melt the ice forming on the wipers I had turn off the cabin heat and divert all the Prius' efforts to running the defroster to keep the windshield clear from ice formation

[Jay2TheRescue]

Originally Posted by drydem

Area mechanics have a difficult time properly diagnosing hybrids. if you live in San Francisco CA there are some excellent hybrid mechanics - but the Washington DC metro area mechanics are not that good when it comes to diagnosis and repairing hybrids. I went through hoops to help my Ford Explorer Hybrid friend get her vehicle fixed .... it was a real headache to get the braking system computer to work right. The intellectual property restrictions and the sheer magnitude of knowledge needed to understand hybrid tech makes knowing how to service them daunting.

Koons Ford in Sterling, VA has done an excellent job working on my Escape Hybrid. The only thing that they didn't get right was the a/c system. I eventually just worked on that myself even though it was under warranty because I was tired of bringing it in. (It had a Freon leak that they could not seem to get fixed right.)

Originally Posted by drydem

Toyota Prius Atkinson cycle gas motor has a really difficult time with long up hill roads in the mountains and MPG suffers until you go downhill. The Toyota Prius low ground clearance makes driving in the snow difficult and driving over rough roads dangerous. The Prius is not designed to provide another car with an electric jump start. The Prius is not designed to tow a heavy trailer or carry over 800 pounds of both passenger and cargo. The Prius 100 watt rated 12 vdc accessory power adapter cannot pull more than 80 watts without blowing a fuse this makes running a normal portable 12 vdc tire air compressor to inflate a tire impossible - I have a portable hand pump and a 120vac air pump for the tires now.

My FEH may scream going up a mountain, but it does not seem to have problems getting to the top. I can set my cruise on 80, and it will hold 80 MPH all the way to the top. I haven't had problems running 12v air compressors or jump starting other vehicles. Only "problem" I had with the power system... We had a storm a couple years ago, and our power was out for several days. I tried to plug an electric chainsaw into the 120v outlet on the dashboard... didn't have enough power.

Originally Posted by drydem

Last month in snow storm, when the driving temperatures started dropping below 20 F degrees, my windshield started fogging up despite the having been cleared up by the defroster before starting the trip home. The outside temperature was dropping as a snow storm approached and caused ice to form along the windshield wiper blades making them less effective and the windshield started fogging up even with the defroster running at 100% percent. To defog the windshield and melt the ice forming on the wipers I had turn off the cabin heat and divert all the Prius' efforts to running the defroster to keep the windshield clear from ice formation

My FEH's defroster works exceptionally well, as does the 4wd system. It is an extremely capable vehicle in the snow, even with the LRR highway tires I have on it.