Quote:
Originally Posted by The Toecutter
Did you ever get a chance to run the stock engine with the electric drive disabled? You must compare apples to apples. The hybrid drive allows the 3-cylinder to avoid its most inefficient operating points.
I drew my initial conclusion looking at the lifetime mpg figures you posted for both cars, btw.
|
I did!
I drove the car with the hybrid electronics completely removed for around a year. Fuel economy was largely unaffected. In the fuel logs, that year was a little lower, but I chalk that up mostly to different driving conditions - shorter trips, and more stop-and-go, mostly.
Steady-state @ 50mph was still very nearly 100mpg in good weather, whereas with the new engine it's more like 60-62mpg @ 50mph.
The last 90 days you see on "Gaptooth" were in the depths of Vermont winter, driving mostly in subzero stop-and-go conditions. I was living downtown in an apartment, and my commute was... maybe 6 miles? Lifetime economy was closer to 65mpg, and that included a lot of towing - some of it pretty ridiculous.
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Toecutter
A hybrid drive with your current setup should allow you to do the similar to the original, but I imagine remapping the ECU to take advantage of the larger engine's different operating characteristics would be a total nightmare, nevermind everything else you'd have to do to make it all work.
|
I think it would be pretty cool to bolt up a small motor to the belt drive, and have some electric assist.
That said, the assist with the stock engine did not actually do much to improve fuel economy. Off the top of my head, there were some fuel savings due to having auto-stop in city driving, a small amount from kinetic energy recovery (regenerative braking), and from a DC-DC converter that made electricity more efficiently than an alternator.
Mostly what the IMA system did, was allow Honda to gear the engine far taller than they would have otherwise. The 3 cylinder was geared such that in 5th, at redline, it would have been at nearly 180mph. With this gearing, the car generally could not maintain normal highway speeds with the A/C running if there was any grade whatsoever. The "assist' got you over a hill without downshifting, then recharged the battery on your way down the other side.
To see any huge gains with this engine, I *think* I'm likely to need even taller gearing. It's basically idling along in gear even at 70mph+, with a top speed of ~240mph in 6th. Something like Toyota's planetary gears would probably save me a ton of fuel.
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Toecutter
Soon, all that may be available in the U.S. are crossover blobs and oversized trucks. And then if/when the fad dies, they'll be scrambling for a taxpayer funded bailout as masses of vehicles sit unsold...
|
For sure. There's basically nothing domestically made that I have any interest in right now. I liked the Volt quite a bit, but I understand the 2nd gen was not all that reliable and not very repairable. I'm interested in some of the cars Korea is making, and if I needed something "new" today, I'd probably pick up an Ioniq Plug-In a few years old.
$10,000, low miles, 30 miles on electricity, then 60mpg highway when the battery is depleted? And it's a useful hatchback at that?
