I originally asked this question in diyelectriccar but got crickets back; I guess it was not appropriate there so I will try it here. These questions have baffled me since I first read about the Prius. Friend of mine has two of them but every time I asked he kept going over MG1, MG2, and planetary gears while dancing around the real topic without ever approaching it. I will even be nice and use ICE instead of just engine (I normally use motor vs engine to differentiate between electric motor and gasoline/diesel engine). I am specifically mentioning the transmission from a Lexus GS450h because of my interests, but in principle it should apply to the other Toyota hybrids.
- So I I read a thread called lexus gs450h transmission to a mustang? where it mentioned the gs450h transmission can do "800 hp in a burst for a few seconds." How would that work? And that leads to...
- How much of the ICE does the Toyota hybrid system exposes to the driveshaft? By that I mean (AFAIK) the MG1 needs to be in some balance with the ICE; I take the ratio between ICE and MG1 power is addressed by the gearing ratio between them and the max RPM the MG1 can do. Doesn't that cost energy (V6 292HP + transmission 192HP for a total of ~340HP (Lexus GS - Wikipedia) means we have a lot of missing horses)? The same "case of missing horses" is also (unintentionally) mentioned in an official Lexus blog. What if there was a way to lock the ICE so you could get all of its power + MG2? Probably that would not work, which leads to...
- In The Lexus GS450h motor thread there is a mention of the "purely series hybrid design (BMW i3, Nissan e-Power)"; are those like the Honda Insight system where the contribution from the electric motor can go from 0% to 100% but the ICE must stay on at all times? That thread seem to indicate the BMW and Nissan has a much more sophisticated system than that.