Priuses(?) on the Highway

[redpoint5]

I use Cargurus to track the price trends. Usually I price somewhere between KBB and Edmonds values for private party.

https://www.cargurus.com/Cars/price-...-Bolt-EV-d2397

Used car prices are generally up 30% from their previous low.

[Ecky]

I found the 3rd gen Prius's handling to be quite confident. I'd say it's overall a quiet, comfortable, numb vehicle, but you can still carve some corners in one.

My vote will likely always be a 1st gen Insight, if you can find one. There isn't a better car to eat up highway miles, and the engine is practically bulletproof - you can find examples with 7-800,000 original miles. They're also easy to work on and more fun to drive than a car that slow should be. Budget in a battery replacement though.

Between a 2nd gen Insight and a Prius, I'd probably take the Prius, personally, especially a 3rd gen. I know the Insight has better driving dynamics and arguably the better engine, but Toyota's overall package is better.

As for Civics, a 92-95 CX or VX have the same tall, tall gearing, and neither has economy-robbing power steering. They're probably the highest fuel economy Civic. They're also extremely highly regarded for their handling characteristics, and they're cheap and easy to work on. The downsides, in my mind, are that they're likely to fall a little shy of modern hybrids even on the highway, and at nearly 30 years old, expect to replace every piece of rubber in the car if they haven't been already.

There's also the option of a 1st gen Civic hybrid with a manual transmission. If your province doesn't have vehicle inspections, you could just remove the hybrid battery and drive it with a CEL. So many of these around here end up in junkyards with failed batteries. They run fine but can't pass state inspection. They're good for 55-60mpg driven conservatively.

[RedDevil]

One last thing to note about the second gen Insight.
The recommended 2.4 bar / 34 PSI tire pressure is quite low considering the weight of the car and the size and narrowness of the wheels. Not only does it affect handling and cornering speed negatively, it also makes the car sensitive to side wind.
I run mine at 3 bar / 40 PSI which almost completely removes the side wind sensitivity and makes it steer so much sharper.
And it is 5-8% more economical on average, more so at low speeds.

There's a double lane T-junction on my commute where I can throw the car through with the extra lane as a safeguard. When the car was new and running stock tire pressure I could not exceed 48 km/h through that corner. When I upped it to 2.8 that improved to about 52, and at 3 bar 55 is doable. My best ever is 57 km/h, almost 20% faster!

[JacobLeSann]

the Insight sounds pretty decent, but a I agree that a Prius from the same era seems more proven overall. I’m just looking for a good deal on one.

We have stupid level of inspection/insurance crap here, so that’s probably a no-go :/
The civic hybrids do look decently cool, though I’ve heard they’re unreliable? Feel free to clear me up. I missed my chances on a civic HX, CX, and DX now. Hate being indecisive.

[Ecky]

The 1st gen HCH (Civic hybrid) isn't at all unreliable, but their batteries typically only last 10-12 years. I haven't heard of anything else commonly failing.

The 2nd gen HCH was even worse off when it came to batteries. I'm not exactly sure how quickly they failed, but it was well south of 10 years. They also only came with a CVT.

The 1st gen Insight's real advantage where I live (besides being able to cruise at 100mpg or 2.3L / 100km with basically no modification) is that they're made of aluminum and impervious to road salt. All of the Civics older than maybe 10-12 years here are rusted to pieces.

[JacobLeSann]

I love the 1st gen Insight for all the reasons you’ve listed. I got into one myself and test drive it last winter; 48 MPG while stuck in a slushy rut, haha. Very cool interior and fun machine to drive with amazing mileage. Only problem is storage space. I live with my parents currently so it’s not a huge problem, but I do a lot of projects as well as some carpooling, so it’s not too smart to have a two seater. Other thing is my bicycles, which I like to be able to carry inside the cabin.

I’ve actually just found a clean 1st gen Insight for $3200 CAD, but of course it’s way far away.

[Xist]

I have watched for good Prius deals for years and have shared many on here. It used to be that I regularly saw them for sale with bad transmissions. I don't know why that changed, but now I usually see them with bad or stolen catalytic converters or bad displays.

Many people claim that you can throw a cheap eBay cat on whatever vehicle, but my Fischer cat started throwing codes again after 2.5 years, and if the CC was stolen they probably damaged a bunch of stuff.

Prii also have especially-expensive cats that are integrated with the rest of the exhaust, so unless you have a muffler shop weld in a new one, it is going to be complicated.

I used to always see Prius drivers going 80 on the freeway. I always figured they were in a hurry to save the world. I always laughed because in Germany I always saw Audis passing everyone.

I feel like almost everyone, Prius and lifted pickup drivers alike, drives 80 in Phoenix.

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by Xist

I have watched for good Prius deals for years and have shared many on here. It used to be that I regularly saw them for sale with bad transmissions. I don't know why that changed, but now I usually see them with bad or stolen catalytic converters or bad displays.

Many people claim that you can throw a cheap eBay cat on whatever vehicle, but my Fischer cat started throwing codes again after 2.5 years, and if the CC was stolen they probably damaged a bunch of stuff.

Prii also have especially-expensive cats that are integrated with the rest of the exhaust, so unless you have a muffler shop weld in a new one, it is going to be complicated.

I used to always see Prius drivers going 80 on the freeway. I always figured they were in a hurry to save the world. I always laughed because in Germany I always saw Audis passing everyone.

I feel like almost everyone, Prius and lifted pickup drivers alike, drives 80 in Phoenix.

There's a reason the aftermarket cats, even the ones designed to fit a Prius, are a tenth the cost of an OEM one. Recently a guy on the Prius Chat forum put on an aftermarket cat and took it to an emissions test and failed. And no, that was not from a visual inspection, it just didn't pass the acceptable levels of pollution in the exhaust.

[aerohead]

' neighbor up the road, with a late model Prius Prime, drove with his wife, from Denton, Texas, to Oshkosh, Wisconsin, for the Annual EAA Fly In, and home.
His wife did all the driving, 'fast', at 75-mph, to 80-mph, averaging 53-mpg for the roundtrip.
I've driven a friend's 3rd-gen Prius between Sanger, Texas and Fayetteville, Arkansas, at 65-70 mph. I've never seen over 42-mpg in that car.
That's all I got.

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by aerohead

' neighbor up the road, with a late model Prius Prime, drove with his wife, from Denton, Texas, to Oshkosh, Wisconsin, for the Annual EAA Fly In, and home.
His wife did all the driving, 'fast', at 75-mph, to 80-mph, averaging 53-mpg for the roundtrip.
I've driven a friend's 3rd-gen Prius between Sanger, Texas and Fayetteville, Arkansas, at 65-70 mph. I've never seen over 42-mpg in that car.
That's all I got.

In my cars fuel mileage drops noticeably after 65mph. Therefore I tend to stick to slower back roads that are a lot of times also shorter.