Quote:
Originally Posted by MikkiHuuru
20 km is 12 miles. Wikipedia says this:
"Toyota estimates that the all-electric range varies between 10 to 15 miles (16 to 24 km) on a full charge depending on quick acceleration and braking, road and vehicle conditions, or climate control use."
This is what I copy-pasted from some forum:
"Consumer Reports field tested the Prius PHV for two weeks and reported an all-electric range between 14 to 17 miles (23 to 27 km) "
I just took the average from the first source, but it seems you can go 23-27 km in real world. Another assumption I made is 95% efficiency of electric motor and drivetrain. I don't how much it is, but if it as low as 80%, the Prius should go 25 miles. That's almost 150% of what it actually does. Cd can't be 0.25.
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Toyota may be reporting EPA "Combined" range based on 55% Urban/45% Highway ratings and a performance discount which includes use of the air conditioning.
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During EPA CAFE certification testing,the car is driven on a twin-roll chassis-dynomometer,with only the front wheels rotating and an electric fan blowing air into the grille.No accessories are operated(no AC).
The dyno is adjusted for aero and R-R loads provided to the EPA by Toyota.
Only a fraction of testing is actually done by the EPA,with the majority of tests conducted by the carmakers themselves.
The 'original' EPA Highway portion includes stops and starts,has a maximum of only 60 mph,and averages only 49.6 mph over the speed trace.There is a higher speed test done in conjunction with accelerations up to,I think,75-mph.
With all the transient loads of this kind of testing protocols it's tough to single out pure R-R or aero contributions.
If the Prius were fully-charged,then started and accelerated up to a highway velocity and held there at constant velocity,we'd have a better chance to predict a performance under such limited conditions.
I suspect that the limited range of the Prius is a result of the inertial losses of acceleration/deceleration,stops,starts,and the air conditioner cannibalizing the battery as it moves along.
It would be very difficult to sort it all out.
And this is exactly why they'll use the wind tunnel to ascertain a cars Cd,as it is so difficult to learn from 'driving'.