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Do you all have second cars for when you have to go beyond the range of the car? What's the insurance like on the Leaf?
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Feb 29, 2012 21:24
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DreamOn13 posted:I drove a Volt this week and was pretty impressed with it. Very smooth and rides very well, even when the gasoline engine is running. We did mostly highway driving so I can't comment on much else like handling, etc. The interior and nav systems aren't too bad either, but we had trouble getting the voice commands to be understood properly. It's incredibly quiet and has a funny feature since it's so quiet...Under 40mph if you flash the headlights the horn pulses which is intended to alert pedestrians I guess. Overall I really liked it and would consider owning one as it seems like a great car first and a pretty decent EV that doesn't have the range problem that plagues others. When I drove a Lexus hybrid I was talking to the sales guy about the Volt (warning: I know he's pushing a Lexus agenda but he brought up a good point) and he said that since the Volt drains the batteries so often you're going to need new batteries more often. Is there truth to this? How discharged do the batteries become when the engine kicks on?
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Mar 25, 2012 16:53
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I'm going to reiterate my frustration that a Ford Focus EV costs $40,000. Who in the world would pay $40,000 for a Ford Focus ?
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Nov 1, 2012 20:28
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Tesla is currently up 20% to $45~ today. http://www.teslamotors.com/about/press/releases/tesla-model-s-sales-exceed-target
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Apr 1, 2013 16:18
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eeenmachine posted:The BEST thing about electric cars is that you you can recover energy going back down a hill. Imagine getting the bottom of a mountain with your gas tank fuller than when you left the peak! I took my hybrid down some hills in Tennessee and cool thing #1 was it was able to use regenerative braking with cruise control to maintain my speed even down the mountain. The second cool thing was that it had to switch to engine braking once the battery got full so that was neat.
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Jun 4, 2013 19:05
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are you sure some intern didn't just stuff the wrong envelope? 
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Sep 18, 2013 03:10
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I'm interested in a Leaf but the 70 mile range terrifies me. I'd feel so restricted. My commute is 10 miles one way so that isn't a problem, but going to the other side of the city (Indianapolis) would basically be impossible. For longer trips do you just rent a car and call it a day or is the Leaf really designed to be a second car?
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Oct 12, 2013 17:52
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Test drove a Leaf today. The amount of power it has is definitely surprising, especially once I found out how to turn off eco mode.
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Oct 12, 2013 21:24
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I was turning right on red and just peeled out because I didn't expect all the power at once :\
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Oct 13, 2013 01:11
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Powercube posted:The audio alert below 12mph would probably annoy the ever loving poo poo out of me. Hopefully they put in a secret way to disable it. Some cars do this already. Doesn't the Prius emit kind of a droning sound from a speaker while in EV mode at low speed?
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Nov 12, 2013 03:28
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KozmoNaut posted:No, that's just the sound of a typical Prius driver.  Ziiiiing
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Nov 12, 2013 15:15
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How do you measure the electricity drawn by the charger? Do you have a meter for that outlet or something?
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Dec 18, 2013 17:27
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Godholio posted:Buy a Kill-a-Watt or something. Do they make basic Kill-a-Watts for the high-amperage sockets?
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Dec 19, 2013 03:04
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Test drove a Tesla 85W Performance with my father today. Holy poo poo that thing is fast. I drive a hybrid but at highway speeds, passing people effortlessly with no gear changes is phenomenal. My father came in with no intentions but is now considering buying one (albeit the 65W version) 
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Jun 15, 2014 06:48
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I have one and I love it. It certainly won't win any races but my commute maxes out at 45-50 mph and it's mostly city. I probably spend half of my commute on electric alone. I get about 35-36 in the winter (mostly so the engine can provide heat) and 44-46 in the summer. A lot of criticism comes from the price tag for being, what you said, basically a Prius re-skin but I like it and it's not as recognizable as a Prius so you avoid a lot of the "hurr hippy prius owner" mentality. Don't get the nav package though since it's total poo poo and it has the typical Lexus/Toyota nannying where you can't do anything to it while you're moving. Compared to the Leaf/Tesla the electric motor is weak as hell but it's good enough to scoot around neighborhoods and parking lots. EV mode disengages at 25mph but, like the Prius, it can go on EV power up to around 45mph. ijustam fucked around with this message at 18:00 on Jun 28, 2014 |
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Jun 28, 2014 17:57
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It isn't bad, but it isn't great either. I'd say it's a bit better, if not comparable, to the Mazda3 (my previous car). Which reminds me, I'd say the CT has less usable space than the Mazda3. I think this is primarily due to the batteries taking up a bit more room. On the plus side there's no drive shaft tunnel (unlike the 3 which is AWD in Japan). More things I remembered: EV mode, by the way, can be picky and cryptic as hell. Sometimes you'll be on EV power and try to put it into EV mode and it just won't let you. If the batteries are too low (<45% I believe) it'll tell you but it also won't let you if the engine is too cold (but it won't say that, it'll simply say "not available.") I love the brakes on it. You don't use the pads until you get near a stop (or you need a lot of braking power like in an emergency), so normal braking is literally all regen. If you pay attention you can feel the pads apply (in EV mode you'll probably hear the brake assist pump run as well). I use a ScanGauge II with some x-gauges (gen 3 Prius codes) to show me the amp draw and heavy braking off the highway can pull in over 100 amps (other fields I show are battery state of charge, engine water temp, and gallons-per-hour). "B" mode on the dash will induce engine braking and force the engine to run so I don't recommend its use unless you need it (I like to use it during spirited driving, it basically emulates engine braking after downshifting). Cruise control is badass. It will induce engine braking to maintain speed down hills. I went down some mountains (the kind with truck runaway ramps) and it was holding me at speed using nothing but regen until the batteries got fully charged and it started using engine braking to maintain speed. Totally awesome. It has three driving modes, which I believe are in the Prius as well: Eco, Standard, and Sport. The most it does is remap the throttle position so eco makes the car slow as hell but it also tunes the AC down as well (which is really useful now since it's hot as hell and the AC can pull up to 10 amps, killing your battery, mostly if you're in stop and go, forcing the engine to run to generate charge. Standard is just that. Sport mode, according to the sales guy increases the available voltage but I think that's a load of BS, basically makes the throttle more responsive and the steering tightens up a bit. One of the neat things about the CT is it has a settings menu (unsure if the Prois has this). You can change when the tach shows up (always on, just in sport mode; however it's impossible to show the tach while on cruise), when the doors lock, the dash lighting, whether or the "EV" indicator shows up (redundant if you always use the tach), misc stuff like that. Nice to play with at first, but once I found the settings I liked I pretty much never go back in. The energy gauge is pretty useful:  The first third (solid line for ECO) means you can run on pure electric no problem. The dashed line is electric only in EV mode (otherwise the engine will kick on in this range). You can be in power on EV mode but you run the risk of the car taking you out of EV mode due to excessive acceleration. Otherwise in the range the engine will run about 2.5-4k rpms. poo poo for fuel economy, obviously. As an aside, the dash computer is optimistic. On my current tank it says I'm averaging 46.4 mpg, but in reality it's probably closer to low 45s. I have around 1/4th of a tank left after 320 miles. That was kind of rambly, but bottom line is I think this car is great, but I'm not sure what it has that the Prius doesn't. You can probably get a lot of features cheaper in a high end Prius, but the CT is a nice entry-way into luxury-spec cars without destroying the bank. I wish it had the solar roof/remote AC option of the Prius. That's probably the biggest downside in my opinion. ijustam fucked around with this message at 17:27 on Jun 29, 2014 |
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Jun 29, 2014 17:24
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Hypothetical question for EV owners. How would you deal with an extended stay away from a charging station? Say you're going to stay at a cabin for a week. It's 100 imles away from home and parking isn't close to the cabin. Would you resort to a mobile generator? Rent a car? I'm going to be in a similar situation next week and, while I don't own an EV (yet), I'm trying to see how it would play out if I did.
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Jul 20, 2014 00:07
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I can't imagine a solar panel is going to make a dent in the high voltage battery, given the limited amount of real estate on a roof.
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Oct 14, 2014 16:10
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Going to test drive a C-max Energi tonight. I'm excited!
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Oct 13, 2015 21:09
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| # ¿ Apr 29, 2024 10:08 |
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I like that car a lot. Is there a consensus on plug-in hybrids? Is the extra weight and loss of space worth the extra EV time?
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Oct 14, 2015 15:18
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