Oh Snap! This forum is addictive! I'll post here as I've got a few things to say without attacking anyone's views directly (you're all smart people and I'd be nuts to take on a crowd LOL).

Here goes - when the Prius 1st gen was introduced I rented one for 2 weeks from Budget Rent-a-Car in Los Angeles. LOVED IT. I drove that little white rocket like I stole it and it returned 41mpg. It was able to maintain 110mph in 100 degree heat with the A/C on full blast, while driving safe and quiet like it was a VR game. I also ran the little tyke out of gas on purpose, and then drove it to a gas station - even more fun! A little orange triangle popped up on the screen to warn me I was out of fuel (doh!) and away I went, albeit slow and silent.

I came very, very close to buying one - and then logic hit me like a cream pie in the face - WHO IS GONNA FIX THIS THING?! The dealer - oh yeah sure, they couldn't fix the lemon issues with my 1993 Toyota T100 4X4 SR5 for the first 19,000miles, couldn't fix a no-start condition on my mother's 1990 4runner after 2 months at their lot, couldn't fix the idle issue on my 1986 Toyota XtraCab SR5 EFI 4X4 to this day, and last but not least - wouldn't own up to anything really being wrong with the above situations.

Thanks to the independent shops, all but the T100 were fixed at a reasonable cost by techs who had NEVER worked for or been trained by Toyota. However, these same shops will never touch a rocket science vehicle like a Prius due to a number of large concerns.

1) You need high dollar, specific, dedicated troubleshooting equipment to establish the problem with a hybrid drive system. Listening to the whine of the motor controller will not tell you why it's not working properly, or regenerating power properly, etc.

2) ALL ELECTRICAL PARTS ARE NON-RETURNABLE. Any dealer parts department has a big sign stating this and you bought it you got it is SOP (standard operating procedure). In a car where 80% of the parts are electrical in nature, good luck getting the right part when you can't troubleshoot at all. And don't even think about inexpensive aftermarket parts for that rocket ship, or salvaged parts cheap for that matter. Ever tried to find a cheap motor for a Honda Accord V6? And they made a PILE of those.

3) There aren't enough of these cars to bother learning a unique set of skills, let alone buying the special tools, and there never will be. Don't think there are special tools? You should've seen the tools I had to gather up to change the starter on my last Supra :-) let alone a hybrid. You could argue that a few million Prius' would change this but ummmm - nope - it won't compared to the 50 million other cars on the road.

So other than coming back to the dealer, time and time again, at $85+/hour - there are no good choices here folks. Like when Henry Ford had the bright idea to bolt the hoods shut and only give the dealers the key (determined against the law), and then when he wanted to make and sell his own special tools (determined against the law again), this is a sided situation and Toyota is the eventual winner.

WARRANTY they shout - mmm hmmmm just like my T100. It kept slipping out of park when locked up tight, and they had the nerve to call it (or me) something different every time I brought it back for the same issue. Finally, they embarassed my wife (at the time) by giving her a short class in how to shift an automatic transmission into park. I did not pay $29,000 in 1993 dollars to have some lot porter insult my wife's intelligence. I made that and a few other issues known quickly - like the fact that I inspected and test drove heavy equipment for the US Army for a living and how can something NOT be in park if the safety interlock system let me remove the ignition key?! They had no answers and it took 2 years time, the Better Business Bureau, and 19,000 miles on the odometer before they finally fixed the issues with the truck. So warranty that while you're at it.

K.I.S.S. is the fundamental principle in engineering taught to me by my grandfather, who worked his entire career in the aerospace industry as an R&D quality control engineer. It stands for KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID, and that principle allowed them to put men on the moon. There is nothing even slightly simple about any of the hybrids on the road, I've looked - NOPE - K.I.S.S. is not well represented at all. Anything made will break - and that itself sounds simple.

Another issue is the batteries themselves, and those are more than mildly toxic. The responsible thing to do there is require that every car and battery is tracked through it's lifespan and properly disposed of - to include the possible disposal of the whole car. This reminds me of the DOE's handling of spent nuclear fuel - they said they would handle it, and they do - by canning it and burying it in the ground basically. Out of sight, out of mind, and I sure hope the cans don't leak until we're long gone. In order for someone to be allowed to make something, we need to know how we're going to dispose of it. Full-cycle engineering I would call it, or full responsibility creation. This may seem crazy, but people used to bury lead acid car batteries in their yard to get rid of them - whoooops!

I definitely need to close this up and leave some material for the next comment. Feel free to exercise your American right to free speech, it's one of the few that go (somewhat) unchallenged. I'm not always right, I just call it as I see it based on my angle of view. Thanks for reading this pile and I've tried not to repeat myself or anyone else in the process. I read your posts and thanks for your time and effort :-)