No kidding! That's why, more than any other reason, I love finding a slow-moving truck. Forget the drafting - I get to travel at FE speeds without angering everybody behind me. Though they're probably wondering why the crazy guy in the blue civic is staying behind the slowpoke.

 

I found the ignore member feature.

Now back to drafting. Yes I did get a rock chip, but I dont know that it came from the 10 miles of drafting I did on the 1000 mile trip. But I guess that is why they sell the little hood covers for the Prius. I just don't like how they look though. And since it's my Wife's car and drafting is senseless in the 20 MPH schools zones she drives in I guess I can save my money for the EV switch mod. That she will be able to use. But that is a whole other thread.

 

MG48,
I'm not sure how much you are planning on spending on the EV mod but if it is more than the $2 I spent on mine, your payback period will probably be quite long. EVb (Forced EV) can save fuel, but only under certain circumstances. First, forget about using EVb when it is very warm or very cold. You will just get the triple beeps telling you that it is not an option. In moderate temps you can see a benefit in two scenarios. First is if you find that your battery reaches 8 bars and the ICE starts cycling to burn off the excess energy. This usually happens to me when I go down long hills. In anticipation of the long downslope, you can invoke EVb in advance to drain the battery down to 3 or 4 bars, leaving more available regen capacity for the hill.

The second scenario in when you have many errands to run within a short distance from one another. I often go to the post office and then across the street to a strip mall where I make several stops at Target, the bank, the gas station and the grocery store. In that case, instead of making 5 short MPG killing trips, I can do most of it in EV. I just need the ICE to get me to the strip mall and then back home.

If you have both of these scenarios, and your wife is willing to a lot of button pushing, then the EV mod might be right for you. If your wife is as impatient as my wife, well, don't bother.

Dan

 

Here is her Mon - Fri route in Houston. 1.25 mile round trip in subdividsion 20 mph school zone to drop my 2 little kids at school. Then 1 mi in school zone to the high school for my Son. I thought she could probably do both of these in EV since it is so slow and stop, sit, creep, stop, go 20 mph home. If it is freezing out or scalding then she can just run normal mode. She won't suffer for FE.

Let me know what you think. And how you did the mod so cheap. I'm not electically challenged. I work on everything I own and they all still work.

 

http://www.sharetheroadsafely.org/no...sTheNoZone.asp

 

In my experience, EV won't get you more than a mile of stop and go driving unless you start at 7 or 8 green bars on the battery icon. So she would be lucky to finish the 1.25 mile trip in EV, much less the second 1 mile trip. I don't think you will see much (if any) benefit.

If you still want to do EVb on the cheap, send me a private message.

Dan

 

It's nice to see there's someone else who understands safety is more important than fuel economy.

 

Not intending to jump into the flame war about drafting "correctness", but my own experience has been the following:

- following a standard "big rig" gives negligible benefit unless I am within 1 second, which is in the can't-see-the-truck's-mirrors-at-all range. This is also close enough to have rocks kicked at my windshield, which has happened when I tried it. (Non-flaming personal note: I don't attempt this anymore.)

- other vehicles can present better "targets" - on a long trip recently I was able to follow an 'oversize load' truck hauling a huge snow plow (read: wind breaker ), at a distance of about 2 seconds (mirrors visible), and still get substantial benefit - 56mpg at 65mph in 35 degree weather for those 40 miles or so.

Also, it seems like constantly needing to match speed when following closely would negate a lot of the benefit. How much of a tradeoff is there to this?

 

EV might help a bit for me. It's about a mile or two of somewhat flat stuff,
then it's all downhill for 5-8 miles, losing 1500' of elevation. It would be good
to use the battery as much as possible those first couple of miles, since it will
all get charged back up again by the time I get to the bottom of the mountain.