I just picked up an 2008 Civic Hybrid on Friday. The seller insured me the IMA battery was replaced a year and a half ago at 150,000 miles. It now has 220,000 on it. I drive 65 miles each way to and from work in southern California traffic. At 486 miles on the trip odometer I filled up and it took 10.2 gallons. I use cruise control a lot and drive conservatively. I plan to build a grid charger in hopes this will help out a little.

 

What I plan on doing when it gets warm enough to work on it is making a plastic panel to block off most of that stupid opening at the bottom of the front bumper. It's beyond me why the mfgrs. persist in putting these huge openings on all of the cars.

If the NASCAR guys can put a dinky piece of duct tape on their grills and actually improve down force, what's it going to do to my aerodynamics, to reduce that hole to about 18 inches wide?!!!!!

I'm going to test my theory first with a couple pieces of vinyl, as I used to be a sign maker.

Have you seen that new Camry?? How ridiculous is that?

 

...................also keep your tires aired up a couple pounds over the base requirement and DRIVE the car. By that I mean stick in it neutral way before you come to a light, or when going downhill.

It's 20 degrees here in Illinois so I can't use the auto-shutoff like I want to because Honda put an ambient temp sensor on the front of the chassis!!

I also plan on moving that sensor inside cabin so I can fool the computer!!!

AND. I found that, on my dodge diesel pickup, I put an Air Raid air filter on it and left the filter exposed under the hood, by connecting it with a piece of exhaust tubing. Kids make a HUGE mistake by adding those stupid "cold air" kits to their vehicles because it kills their mileage in the cold weather!! By leaving the filter under the hood and making the incoming air as warm as possible I gained over 2 mpgs on my diesel Dodge!!!

For the most part I'm averaging over 45 mpg with my 203.......in the winter!!! The car does as good or better in town as it does on the highway because the wind on the highway kills the mileage.

 

That mileage is great if your commute involves any significant highway running at 65mph+

The grid charger won't help with mileage, but it will help with prolonging the life of the battery. 46,000 miles in a year indicates a LOT of freeway travel, and that should help prolong the battery life unless the terrain is very hilly.

This cart at Mouser contains all you need to build a basic grid charger:

https://www.mouser.com/ProjectManage...sID=c7830875ec

Add fuses, rectifier and diodes as you see fit for safety. Mine has none.

A three prong extension cord cut in half makes a great set of leads for the pack and charger. All you need past that is an AC power cord.

I recommend grid charging a frequency of quarterly OR needs-based. If you experience mileage deterioration or frequent recalibrations sooner than quarterly, grid charge. Additionally, deep discharging packs goes a long way to restoring capacity and eliminating voltage depression. I have personally taken 2 HCH2 packs to 1.8V with a 40W bulb after a 4-5A discharge with a 500W halogen to 120V.

IMHO, cautions concerning cell reversal and the ruining effect is has is not applicable to these "heavy duty" cells capable of delivering peak output of 100A and a 50A charge rate. Mike D. of the Insight community, who developed and deployed the whole grid charger concept to the Honda IMA system, REVERSE charged a cell at 15A rate and then discharged at a 15A rate. He saw no deterioration in capacity or performance at those currents. At 120V a 40W bulb is only pulling 333mA. As it progresses lower, the current draw decreases, so reversed cells rarely won't pass significant current in relation to their capacity (5500mAh).

I have personally cycled 106 total sticks between HCH1 and HCH2. I haven't seen a single incident where the traditional cycling to 1V/cell has produced any significant capacity improvement, but without fail, deep cycling has produced capacity improvements of 15-25%.

Once a stick has lost the ability to delivery a 90A load without excessive voltage drop, I have observed NO refurbishment technique that can restore it.

 

I agree wholeheartedly with the increased pressure recommendation. I tend to run about 38psi.

I violently disagree with the recommendation to put it into neutral. This is counter productive to high mileage. The HCH2 deactivates all 4 cylinders on decel to maximize battery regen (HCH1 deactivates 3). The ONLY reason to put it into neutral is if you DO NOT WANT REGENERATIVE braking. Of course, if that is your goal, then go for it.

Steve

 

They drove it 70K miles in 18 months?