The issue with Nissan and hybrid service is the training and commitment. Nissan has in the past made very strong comments about how hybrids are usless and should not be pursued. Then they flipped positions and worked a deal with Toyota to use their technology. Now they are starting to sell hybrids, but how many technicians have been trained on the systems and how to diagnose and repair them? The technology is great as Toyota has ben woring on it for many years, so I doubt there will be many issues, but it can happen.

With Marianne's strong feelings towards the plasma cluster, she should just get the Nissan and not look back. It will be a good car.

 

I talked to a doctor friend yesterday who is a big car buff. His advice on the Altima hybrid was to wait another year. He said he never buys a car the first couple years it comes out to make sure there aren't any problems. This sort of makes sense to me.

But I'm not sure how applicable this is to the Camry and Altima hybrids because both the Camry and Altima have been out for years, only the hybrid aspect to the design is new.

It's so stressful trying to decide on what to get. I'm trying to be patient, but then every time I drive one of the cars I think "this is great" and want to buy it on the spot.

One debate I'm having with my husband now is whther or not it would be practical to just buy the Camry hybrid and not run the AC ever. During the summer, it never really gets all that hot here except a few days, and during the winter it never really gets all that cold. We live in southern California. The weather is always nice here, so we live in one of the very few places that is even a possibility. And it won't even be a consideration to possibly need to use the AC in the car till maybe July or August and I'll bet by that time somebody would have figured out how to take the Plasmacluster out of the car.

 

I live in North Alabama which means it is already spring here. But in the summer, I use the AC as needed depending upon the temperature and humidity. When we get high humidity, I'll run it in the middle-80s. If it is dry, I can go up to 90+ if the sun is not shinning on me.

One advantage of the newer Toyota hybrids is the AC compressor is electric, it runs off of the batteries. This means you still get the engine off, fuel efficiencies. So IMHO, don't worry about the AC and adjust it for driver comfort. Avoiding accidents depends upon an alert and rested driver, not someone beat-up in the heat.

Bob Wilson

 

Bob,

Her issue is not with the FE aspect, but the fact that the plasmacluster WILL kill her husband.

I think the plasmacluster is active even with the a/c off. There is still a small amount of airflow through the vents with the entire system turned off, and even then you will probably want to have the vent on getting fresh outside air.

As for the nissan relability, I don't know. The technology was obtained from Toyota, so it should be rock solid. heck, even the frist generation prius was/is very reliable. The hybrids have proven to be better for reliability than the ice only cars with transmissions. The transmission in a car is the most problematic component they have.

 

We got an Altima Hybrid two days ago. It had been driven by a dealer about 170 miles to deliver to us, but I re-set the fuel mileage stats and just driving around locally for one day, not more than 10 miles total, am getting over 41 mpg. I'll start posting stats once I've driven it more and figure out how the site works.

I test drove the Camry and the Altima, and liked the Altima a lot better in terms of handling, visibility, and general comfort. After one whole day and a grand total of about 20-30 minutes driving time, I still think it has great handling, visibility, and comfort. :-)

Tonight we'll actually take it out on the highway for about 30 miles, we'll see how that goes.

 

I've done two trips now that were about 20 miles on highway with some city thrown in, and the average over all of it (according to the on-board stats, which I re-set before starting these trips) is something like 35.5 mph. Ambient temp range was from about 50 to about 70.

 

We finally took the plunge and have concluded our quest with the Altima hybrid. It's actually a bit scarry to have bought because I think the servicability and other unknowns make it a very "iffy" car when compared to the Camry hybrid. Our early impression (after two days) is it drives like a dream, and it is definitely the better looking/handling of the two. I just wish it didn't have some of the "ifs" that make me worry.

We got the 100,000 mile extended warranty. Our total cost for the car was $24,000 for the base model +convenience package. The $24,000 was inclusive - no destination charge (we got them to drop destination all together) -but did not include tax and license or extended warranty. My husband talked to the internet salesman at length and he said they were having a VERY hard time moving the Altima hybrid. They are the first dealership in our area to have it... and ours was only the 5th one they've sold. Everyone, perhaps more sensibly, is going for the Camry hybrid.

We also got a really interesting GPS feature that comes with the car for $200 that lets the police find it if it is ever stolen.

We've only got 60 miles on it so far, and we are resisting the urge to "take it our for a spin" so that we can get a feel for our real driving routes. The mileage thing is one of the issues that worries me. Car and Driver said they only got 23 MPG. Other users I've read are saying 37-41... which is what we hope for... so I will be really happy when our first tank of gas gets us over 700 miles before we refill. (That will be a MAJOR sigh of relief.)

Is there a feature on the car that tells you how much MPG you are getting per gallon? Can anyone tell me where it is or how to use it? (Or what page of the manual to read?)

I love the feature that tells us when we are in EV mode. I'm going to read the entire manual this weekend.

Also, I talked to the regional top manager, and he confirmed (as did the manual) that you need to use high octane gasoline.

 

Welcome to the CLUB!
Being a pioneer is always risky but also rewarding. I'm looking forward to seeing more Altima mileage records and performance reports. It is good to have choices.

Bummer about the high octane. My only suggestion is in the past, I think the differences between brands in high octane gasoline are more pronounced that the lower octane grades. This is only based upon my former motorcycle experience but I can to trust only a few brands, Sunoco was high on the list. But I couldn't find as obvious a distinction between the brands at lower octane.

GOOD LUCK!

Bob Wilson

 

Bob, is there any where to look online to find a list of the best high octane brands?

I agree the big thing i'm looking forward to is other performance reports. If I see a consistant reporting of 37+ MPG from users... I'm going to be one happy camper.

One thing I can report, we had to make an "emergency" stop today. (Someone slammed on the brakes right in front of my husband... and boy does the Altima hybrid stop well.)

We are trying to figure out "hypermiling" with the Altima hybrid. You have to acclerate VERY slowly to keep it in EV. That's not always a problem, but sometimes we'd be impeding traffic if we acclerate that slowly so we gun it and go down to awful efficiency.

My husband made a very interesting observation about hybrids and hypermiling. He said that if high school driving classes teach hypermiling... it would actually encourage kids to drive safely rather than like speed demons.

 

I've looked and been disappointed. Even the EPA reports significant differences in gasoline energy content between different batches. With my motorcycle, the tank was small enough that I could easy try different brands and settle on one that worked.

As a suggestion, you and your husband might decide to just do 'short tanks' for now . . . enough for a week at a time. Then work up a schedule to test the different brands to see how they 'work' in the vehicle. Crude but that is my best recommendation short of a home-made calorimeter.

I wish I could help but I don't know enough about the Altima hybrid system. If it is licensed from Toyota, then some of the Prius tricks will work. If it is an IMA system, like the Honda, then the techniques that they use will work.

So let me ask a few questions:

1) If you start at say 50 mph on a flat road and lift off on the accelerator, does the car slow down to a speed where you hear the engine going off? What is that speed and can you reproduce it?

2) If you start at say 50 mph and slow down under the engine off speed, can you gently apply enough accelerator to sustain your speed without the engine? This is to find the maximum electric-only mode speed.

3) On a flat area without traffic (empty parking lots are great for this), can you hold a steady speed of say 20 mph on electric only and have the engine cycle ON-OFF? Try to record your MPG at this speed (it may take 10-15 minutes). This is likely to be very close to your maximum distance speed.

Another trick to consider, especially if you have any long distance trips coming up, is to make your own MPG vs MPH chart:


The protocol is break up a cross country trip into a series of 2-3 hour, cruise control managed segments. Measure your MPG at each speed and plot it out. I also did this for my weekly commute. Because of this, I was able to find the "do not go here" speed, ~42 mph, so I'll either be going 0-38 mph or 48-65 mph. These speed ranges consistently give me my best mileage.

You might also check this web site to see if the Altima hybrid ever shows up as a test car:

http://avt.inel.gov/hev.html

GOOD LUCK!
Bob Wilson