2018 hyundai sonata hybrid mods
 

Got a 2018 hyundai sonata hybrid (not a plug in I will explain at the end of the post) with pretty much all the options except for a sun roof, leather and wheels, it has the standard 16 inch wheels.
Glad it didn't have a whole in the roof, glad it didn't have leather and I already have the wheels I want for it.

The first mod is already completed, I think.
I took the 17 inch wheels off her old 2008 and put them on the 2018. Put the 16 inch wheels on the 2008. Those wheels on the 2008 are not original. I think they were all replaced as of 2014 or 2015.
I just swapped them over, no TPMS light yet.

Second mod, throw the spare tire kit in the trunk.
The hybrid does not come with a spare. You get a BS emergency tire inflation kit.

Brighter high beams. Probably install some double brightness LED 9005 highbeams.
I did 100w halogen high beams using a relay and slave relay on the old car and they work pretty good but I put double brightness LEDs in my leaf and liked it better.
The double brightness LEDs use about the same power as a standard halogen.

That's kind of it for now.

It gets 48 to 55mpg when I drive it. It scores me 7 out of 8 economy driving marks, just kind of driving it the same way I do with my leaf. Good enough for me.

I had a plug in hybrid 2016 lease turn in lined up but the stupid dealer can't tell the difference between a plug in and a regular hybrid.

I would like to double or triple battery capacity at some point and make it plug in chargeable.
But used Li-poly batteries for these cars run about $2,000 each and only hold 2kwh.
So far the only person I can find that has charged one of these batteries with external power is a guy that took it apart and charged each cell individually.

Could you install the battery from the plug-in model?

Not likley.
The plug in hybrid uses a big 370 volt 10kwh battery that takes up gas tank and spare tire space.
The regular hybrid uses a 260 or 270v 2kwh battery that pretty much only takes up the spare tire hole.

Well this thing is going to be hard to improve upon aside from charging with grid power and bigger battery.

I knew it had a 6 speed auto (not a cvt) but what I didn't know is hyundai used the electric motor to eliminate the torque converter.
https://www.electricvehiclesresearch...-sonata-hybrid

Some guys took apart a hyundai battery to find it uses an off the shelf bms.
Isopack: Hyundai Sonata Hybrid battery pack teardown

Much better than nissan and their proprietary battery everything. Maybe the hyundai kona runs an off the shelf BMS and active thermal management, by by leaf.

Drove it 340 miles at 80mph most of the way it got 40mpg.
It was getting 44mpg but the calm to no wind condition turned into a head wind.

Car salesmen seem like real estate agents to me; only good at pointing out the obvious like "this is the kitchen" or "this car is blue". Ask any questions that go deeper than the paint and you'll quickly derail.

I'll second that. They can't even answer questions that are in the sales brochure.

These salesmen seemed pretty bad: https://www.zdnet.com/article/at-t-l...g-galaxy-fold/

I had a briefing at Fort Leonard Wood. They showed a picture of a guy in his 50s and asked "Would you buy a car from a man like this?"

I called out "I already did! That looks like my dad!"

Had this car go into ev mode at 92mph today.

Did the first at home oil chage.
Oil changes are so dirty. I don't mind living with out them.
I got the Blackstone oil test sample kit to send off a sample.
Changed the oil at about 3,770 miles. The oil stunk of fuel, probably due to hybrid being too efficient for its own good.
Always turning off and often not getting up to full temperature on kind of short trips that a straight gas burner would have no problem warming up on.
I'm going to use the oil tests to figure out when I should change the oil. Might be 3,000 miles in the winter and maybe 5,000 to 7,000 in the summer.
This hybrid also has an oil to coolant heat exchanger, doesn't seem like enough.
I also installed a magnetic drain plug. Will see what it catches next change. It's barely got 11,000 miles on there so far.
Put in on a wix filter and regular flavored mobil1 5w-20 oil.
I'm going to try and find a larger filter, there is plenty of room for a bigger oil filter.

Why would you replace oil at 3770? Hyundai recommends 7500 miles.

The oil stinks of fuel. Probably from all the short trips my wife makes to work and back.
The oil appears that it may need to be changed more often in winter when cold weather and short trips are in play.
It should be able to go all summer on this oil change.

Looks like changing the oil was probably a good idea.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1583847198

I left some wiggle room in this oil change. I filled the oil to about 3/4 the way up the full mark, in a few thousand miles I will add the last half quart or less in as 10w-30.

Blackstone Labs
 

That's very cool! In the Air Force,crew chiefs pulled oils samples every time a plane landed,for shipment to Wright Patterson AFB,where the lab would do what Blackstone is doing.With the data,they could more accurately predict when major engine service would actually be necessary.Glad you dodged a bullet on oil thinning.:thumbup:

Yeah my job pulled oil from the oil servicing carts to make sure the oil was nice and clean before it went back out and to make sure some dummy didn't fill the fresh oil up with used oil, which I saw happen at least a dozen times in 11 years.

.

I wonder if excessive fuel dilution is due to enriched fueling during warmup since it doesn’t run all the time and may cool in between being called upon to run.

You may want to buy a air fuel ratio gauge to see what’s going on. It may have a bad injector or not coming out of enrichment. Cheaper than a new motor.


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Enriched fuel for warm up to get the catalyst going is very likey too. During the winter this car will drive around town with barely 3 temperature bars, which is no where near full operating temperature.

So for next winter I'm thinking grille block at the very least.
But I have to keep the high voltage electronics and motor coolant at winter temperatures if possible.

Maybe some sort of thermal layer or blanket for the block; retaining that heat in the engine could help keep the inverter cooler too. I've been tossing the idea around for my car, and found this person who did it on an Insight. BMW also experimented with an engine jacket a few years ago that they claimed kept the block above ambient for up to 12 hours after shutdown.

http://99mpg.com/getimage.asp?id=/Pr...ide.jpg&mode=0

Its been 1,000 miles since the last oil change, about 7 weeks ago and the car is doing 42mpg with out even trying. I have been trying to sabotage the fuel economy when I drive it. I will put it in sport mode to run the engine more and get it to warm up all the way.

It did right at 40mpg going 250 miles at 75mph from lockdown land of the oppressed to Lubbock and back.
We dropped major coin in Texas because they're open and we're still working.
Might do it again this weekend. I feel bad for people trapped in the middle of this vast empty state.

Changed the oil again at 17,828 which is almost 7,000 miles. Going to do another oil analysis, put it in the mail today.
Some how "2 weeks of flatten the curve" got dragged out like 7 months.

Still got some fuel in the oil.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1608781947

Coming up on that next oil change. The hybrid is a half quart low cause didn't fill it all the way to the full mark.
Since I get fuel in the oil from the hybrid being all efficient and stuff I'll go ahead and top it off with some good old 10w-40 weight oil. The fuel thins the oil.

Last oil change results were emailed to me on 12-17 of last year.
https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1649206050

And got the title today.

The oil milage is at 4,600 today, I usually change it once for the cold months and once for the warm months. So I'll do it in a day or two.

We went on a 700 mile road trip to Dallas and back.
I got 34mpg going 80 to 85mph most of the way there and back.
This car can easily make the trip one way with out refueling.
Total fuel consumption was about 22 gallons of gasoline.
These things make battery powered cars look stupid for longer trips.

thats pretty good. 45 mpg here going 80-85. sometimes more

My 2022 version does a little better. We came back to Montana from Minnesota last weekend and the headwinds were blowing 20-30 still got 34 doing 80-85. Normally my 230 mile drive from Missoula to Livingston I do in exactly 3 hours but there is 4 miles of town on each side. I get usually 42 mpg doing that. 6 months in and I'm over 14,000 miles so it has really saved me some money on gas for sure.

I’m going to Missoula in a few days. I’ll try to track my mpg around that area because I know going 85-90 with the hills and turns definitely affects my mpg in that region!

I saw a dark Ioniq on I90 3 days ago and wondered if it could have been you. I guess it's not that far fetched.

my ioniq stands out a lot now, so it wont be hard to miss. dark tinted windows. rear wheel skirts. the wheel skirts definitely get attention and people ask about them almost every day

GDI engines have problems. Being a GDI on a hybrid drive train makes it worse.
https://youtu.be/uVd-ZS5bnyY
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uVd-ZS...ature=youtu.be

Went on a road trip did another oil change when I got back.
Found out that the car gets better than 20mpg at 100mph.
Here is the last oil change I forgot to post. Looks like I changed the oil at about 3,800 miles, if I don't do it now I'll probably be doing it in the middle of winter when it's 0F outside.
https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1665498672

1st nice weekend in May is usually when I do auto maintenance. I'll just make a day of changing oil on all equipment.

Yeah normally I try to run the summer oil change 5,000 to 7,000 but the car was broke down for 3 months this summer. When I thought about it and that puts my oil change at 4% to 5% fuel dilution, has me changing the oil in the middle of winter. Naah.

Which rig is this in? Is it short trips throwing gasoline into your oil, or something wrong with the vehicle, or is that just how quickly it accumulates gas in the oil?

I'd expect a longer trip at 100MPH to do a good job at burning off volatiles from the oil.

See post 32. It's just the nature of GDI and being a hybrid that constantly starts and stops the engine makes it worse.

Does this Hyundai have that handy start-with-a-USB-cable feature? https://www.motorbiscuit.com/who-are...teal-your-car/

I should post a tiktok of how easy it is to steal a mail truck. Something about a lock being used 100 times a day for 30 years that just makes them turn with about any key inside. Good thing federal prison is so much worse than juvenile hall.

Also glad to hear my push button starting Hyundai should be more theft resistant than one with a key. I can start it right now even though it's 200 miles away from me right now, I'm not sure the functionality of that feature.

Apparently it is super easy to steal a cop car if they leave the key in the ignition! https://i.imgur.com/wl93kwg.mp4

Maybe it was push-to-start.

Lock your cars, people!