Honda Car Forum

On Thu, 19 May 2005 19:04:00 -0700, "Michael Pardee"
<michaeltnull@cybertrails.com> wrote:

>"L Alpert" <alpertl@xxgmail.com> wrote in message
>news:FrSdnS3GV8-I3xDfRVn-rw@comcast.com...

>Toyota already has a program to buy them back for $200 and to recycle all
>the metals. Few batteries probably will ever reach the point where they will
>be replaced though - the battery is expected to last the design life of the
>car.

All batteries will 'last'. Define 'design life of the car' - 10 years?
less? Batteries degrade on 2 factors, time, and charge. Lead acid
batteries, for instance, degrade at roughly 10% capacity/year, even if
kept in pristine condition. NiMH tend to last around 8-10 years at
most. even if topped up - about the same life as a lead acid kept
optimum. So, according to you, a Prius is only designed to last 8-10
years? sounds like a poor investment to me. I know my 17yo civic's
still going strong. my 16yo volvo is utterly bombproof - nothings
needed doing in the 5 years i've had that, except for the routine
maintainance in the manual. tell me your prius will do that.

> Individual cells can be replaced and the hybrid computer even has
>diagnostics for determining if individual cells are performing properly. I
>expect the overwhelming majority of Toyota's hybrid batteries will be sold
>for the bounty when the cars are scrapped if current trends continue. There
>are 1999 model year Prius cars in Japan and their batteries are doing fine.

99 is only 5 years.Still well within life. I've got a niMH battery in
my MD recorder thats from 97, and thats still going strong, despite
having a hell of a lot more c/d cycles than that prius. 5 years
isNOTHING to a battery. 8-10 is the end of the life, even for the very
best batteries 9which include hawker sbs series, which is around $250
for a 30Ah 12V battery (also the ONLY lead acid batteries, that i'm
aware of, that can be checked into aircraft luggage)

>
>Mike
>

On Thu, 19 May 2005 21:56:54 -0400, "Elmo P. Shagnasty"
<elmop@nastydesigns.com> wrote:

>In article <R6GdnR15abIOohDfRVn-hw@sedona.net>,
> "Michael Pardee" <michaeltnull@cybertrails.com> wrote:
>
>> I have a 2002 Prius. So far (2 1/2 years, 45 K miles) it has been the most
>> reliable car I've ever owned.
>
>I would hope that for 2.5 years and 45K miles, ANY Toyota would be
>dead-reliable.

You'd think so. Friend bought an 05 camry in december. Its been in the
shop 4 times, including headlight replacement, 3 times to fix the
airbag system (was on its last-lemon-chance) ABS problem This for a
car thats 6 months old, and 14k miles on it.... Oh, i should also
mention that there's already rust on the car (and this is georgia, it
don't rain that much!)

Toyota hasn't been the same since half the management resigned in 01,
and they switched steel suppliers to cheap south american steel
(whereas before, they'd been using high quality turkish steel, at
least for europe)

Yes - I've had it back to the dealer twice - computer showed no
problem - the second time the service manager asked me
"well, just what mileage would you expect anyway?" I told him
I didn't expect 48 but thought low 40s should be expected.
He had no answer to that - as far as how the car is driven, when
it says 48 city, most people would assume normal around the
town driving would do. I did get 40 on a 2000 mile round trip
on the interstate last summer, just to see what it would do - of
course we don't usually take the civic on long trips, so that
figure is pretty redundant.




On Sat, 21 May 2005 07:05:20 -0700, "L Alpert" <alpertl@xxgmail.com>
wrote:

>muzz wrote:
>> It might help you to be aware that even tho the Honda people advertise
>> 48 mpg on the civic hybrid, mine gets 33 in the summer and 34 in the
>> winter after 18 months of conservative driving.
>>
>>
>>> Does anyone have any info on the long-term reliability of hybrids.
>>> Any brand. Batteries?
>
>Are you sure? One can get that with a regular Civic. Not impressive at
>all. Maybe there is something qrong?
>

"K`Tetch" <no.email@here.for.you> wrote in message
news:21nu819csdqso8utcmsjbf5ekgh0eohd5j@4ax.com...
> All batteries will 'last'. Define 'design life of the car' - 10 years?
> less? Batteries degrade on 2 factors, time, and charge. Lead acid
> batteries, for instance, degrade at roughly 10% capacity/year, even if
> kept in pristine condition. NiMH tend to last around 8-10 years at
> most. even if topped up - about the same life as a lead acid kept
> optimum. So, according to you, a Prius is only designed to last 8-10
> years? sounds like a poor investment to me. I know my 17yo civic's
> still going strong. my 16yo volvo is utterly bombproof - nothings
> needed doing in the 5 years i've had that, except for the routine
> maintainance in the manual. tell me your prius will do that.
>
Battery life is most strongly dependent on operating conditions. The flooded
lead-acids in our communication sites at work have a typical life of 20-30
years, and most of those are taken out of service with the capacity still
within specs (our battery guys load test them twice a year). They usually
fail because the positive terminal has "grown" out of the case. I guess
there is a chemical explanation for that phenomenon, but I don't know it.
Anyway, the NiMH main battery in the Prius is kept within a relatively
narrow range of state-of-charge, temperature controlled, and with charge and
discharge rates limited. It should be good for the life of the car, as
Toyota says. 15 to 20 years should be about right. I would be as surprised
at failures within 10 years as I would at lasting to 30 years. Toyota is
betting their own money there will be negligible failures before 8
years/100K miles (10 years/150K in California, IIRC), so I feel comfortable.
More than that, Toyota's credibility would suffer horribly if there were
such a rash of failures, and I won't insult Toyota's leadership by
suggesting they are that reckless. I think it's more likely they know
exactly what they are doing - a lesson our stateside companies should learn.

What is the design life of a car? Only Rolls Royce has had the nerve to
advertise that; they used to advertise 50 years. The standard in America was
implicitly 10 years for a very long time. Most quality cars, like Honda and
Toyota, are probably around 15 years - certainly more than 10, certainly
less than 20. Your Volvo and mine (an '85 765T) also had design lives in
that range. There is no percentage in making a car last 20 years, and 10
years builds a reputation for schlock (like GM, Ford and Chrysler have), so
the 15 year target is the sweet spot. It didn't work out well for my '85,
which has the French wiring that had a 5 year life, but that's life. At
least yours was built after the biodegradable wiring era.

The central point is that every individual car reaches the end of its life
sometime. It may be an untimely end in a collision, but more often it needs
a repair that the car is no longer worth. For my last Volvo, a 1970 145, it
was when the car was no longer worth putting a water pump in. (I never
thought to question what the life of the water pump is.) This '85 won't
survive its first turbo failure - at 235K miles it is overdue. I had a 1970
Mercury Capri that was no longer worth a U-joint, which was integral with
the drive shaft. It's always something. With the Prius it is very unlikely
in my estimation that battery failure will be a significant factor. I expect
at least 15 years from the car, and I expect the battery will still be
servicable at that point. If you feel differently, you'd be wise not to buy
one.

Mike

On Sat, 21 May 2005 12:44:59 -0700, "Michael Pardee"
<michaeltnull@cybertrails.com> wrote:

>"K`Tetch" <no.email@here.for.you> wrote in message
>news:21nu819csdqso8utcmsjbf5ekgh0eohd5j@4ax.com.. .
>> All batteries will 'last'. Define 'design life of the car' - 10 years?
>> less? Batteries degrade on 2 factors, time, and charge. Lead acid
>> batteries, for instance, degrade at roughly 10% capacity/year, even if
>> kept in pristine condition. NiMH tend to last around 8-10 years at
>> most. even if topped up - about the same life as a lead acid kept
>> optimum. So, according to you, a Prius is only designed to last 8-10
>> years? sounds like a poor investment to me. I know my 17yo civic's
>> still going strong. my 16yo volvo is utterly bombproof - nothings
>> needed doing in the 5 years i've had that, except for the routine
>> maintainance in the manual. tell me your prius will do that.
>>
>Battery life is most strongly dependent on operating conditions. The flooded
>lead-acids in our communication sites at work have a typical life of 20-30
>years, and most of those are taken out of service with the capacity still
>within specs (our battery guys load test them twice a year).

Then you have a very low level requirement. Its slightly erring on the
cautious side to say that lead acid capacity decreases at 10%/year
However, after 10 years, you're left at 35% capacity. oh, the load
will still be ok, but the caacity will be shot to hell. The growing
terminals are the exact same reason that the capacity drops - chemical
action.That 35% is also some eavy rounding. after 20 years, you're at
11-12% capacity. This is, as i remind you, keeping th batteries in
their optimum condition.treat them sub-optimally and they won't do
half as well.


>They usually
>fail because the positive terminal has "grown" out of the case. I guess
>there is a chemical explanation for that phenomenon, but I don't know it.
>Anyway, the NiMH main battery in the Prius is kept within a relatively
>narrow range of state-of-charge, temperature controlled, and with charge and
>discharge rates limited. It should be good for the life of the car, as
>Toyota says. 15 to 20 years should be about right. I would be as surprised
>at failures within 10 years as I would at lasting to 30 years. Toyota is
>betting their own money there will be negligible failures before 8
>years/100K miles (10 years/150K in California, IIRC), so I feel comfortable.
>More than that, Toyota's credibility would suffer horribly if there were
>such a rash of failures, and I won't insult Toyota's leadership by
>suggesting they are that reckless. I think it's more likely they know
>exactly what they are doing - a lesson our stateside companies should learn.

Toyota has very little credability with me anyway, but then, are you
SURE its their money they're bettingwith? there's a long running
dispute between toyota and pastafont steel, for instance, where toyota
owes pastafont some $5m for steel its not paid for.
$5million+interest over 5 years buys a lot of hybrid battery sets. If,
however, your batteries are claimed to last 10 years, i'd be very
interseted ina bout 10 sets of them (I build Electrically powered
vehicles as a hobby) so i've contacted Matsushita, since this kind of
longevity is something Saft hasn't been able to give me with their
12Ah Sub-F cells (nice cells, especially the max discharge of
100A/cell, which moves the bottleneck to the controllers - a 1500A
150V controller isn't as easy to build as you might think - for those
that aren't up on your maths, thats about 300Hp, less losses to
efficiency)

muzz wrote:
> Yes - I've had it back to the dealer twice - computer showed no
> problem - the second time the service manager asked me
> "well, just what mileage would you expect anyway?" I told him
> I didn't expect 48 but thought low 40s should be expected.
> He had no answer to that - as far as how the car is driven, when
> it says 48 city, most people would assume normal around the
> town driving would do. I did get 40 on a 2000 mile round trip
> on the interstate last summer, just to see what it would do - of
> course we don't usually take the civic on long trips, so that
> figure is pretty redundant.
>

Dissapointing to say the least.... :-(

>
>
>
> On Sat, 21 May 2005 07:05:20 -0700, "L Alpert" <alpertl@xxgmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> muzz wrote:
>>> It might help you to be aware that even tho the Honda people
>>> advertise 48 mpg on the civic hybrid, mine gets 33 in the summer
>>> and 34 in the winter after 18 months of conservative driving.
>>>
>>>
>>>> Does anyone have any info on the long-term reliability of hybrids.
>>>> Any brand. Batteries?
>>
>> Are you sure? One can get that with a regular Civic. Not
>> impressive at all. Maybe there is something qrong?

In article <d90v81pj7lfaa52m6c77lc032chs02d51b@4ax.com>, muzz
<jmuzz@charter.net> wrote:

> Yes - I've had it back to the dealer twice - computer showed no
> problem - the second time the service manager asked me
> "well, just what mileage would you expect anyway?" I told him
> I didn't expect 48 but thought low 40s should be expected.
> He had no answer to that - as far as how the car is driven, when
> it says 48 city, most people would assume normal around the
> town driving would do. I did get 40 on a 2000 mile round trip
> on the interstate last summer, just to see what it would do - of
> course we don't usually take the civic on long trips, so that
> figure is pretty redundant.


Hello,
I read an article about Hybrid vehicles in a car magazine. The magazine
staff used a Hybrid vehicle for about two years. Each of the staff members
that used the car (for free) for trips had to write a report related to
problems and miles per gallon. The consensus was that gas mileage was
great when the trip involved lots of city (aka stop and go) driving but
was very poor when the trip involved lots of freeway and interstate
driving. The reporter that wrote the story indicated that the electric
engine kicks in quite a lot in low speed stop and go driving but rarely
kicks in on interstate and freeway driving. It was his opinion that this
was the reason for the differences in the miles per gallon. The
conclusion: If you plan to do a lot of city driving--buy a hybrid. If you
plan to use the vehicle for lots of freeway and interstate driving--don't
buy a hybrid.

--
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In article <jason-2105051805230001@pm1-broad-91.snlo.dialup.fix.net>,
jason@nospam.com (Jason) wrote:

> I read an article about Hybrid vehicles in a car magazine. The magazine
> staff used a Hybrid vehicle for about two years.

Which kind? The series hybrid type such as what Honda does, or the
incredibly complex parallel hybrid type such as what Toyota does (and
licenses to Ford)?



> The consensus was that gas mileage was
> great when the trip involved lots of city (aka stop and go) driving but
> was very poor when the trip involved lots of freeway and interstate
> driving.

If you understand what a hybrid does, and what problem it's trying to
solve, this is no surprise at all.

"K`Tetch" <no.email@here.for.you> wrote in message
news:sakv8153ef517808rqvsiu060ek6r110ic@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 21 May 2005 12:44:59 -0700, "Michael Pardee"
> <michaeltnull@cybertrails.com> wrote:
>>Battery life is most strongly dependent on operating conditions. The
>>flooded
>>lead-acids in our communication sites at work have a typical life of 20-30
>>years, and most of those are taken out of service with the capacity still
>>within specs (our battery guys load test them twice a year).
>
> Then you have a very low level requirement. Its slightly erring on the
> cautious side to say that lead acid capacity decreases at 10%/year
> However, after 10 years, you're left at 35% capacity. oh, the load
> will still be ok, but the caacity will be shot to hell. The growing
> terminals are the exact same reason that the capacity drops - chemical
> action.That 35% is also some eavy rounding. after 20 years, you're at
> 11-12% capacity. This is, as i remind you, keeping th batteries in
> their optimum condition.treat them sub-optimally and they won't do
> half as well.
>
>
20 years is the standard design life for communications lead-acid batteries,
although cell sites often go for the quick and dirty versions with 12 year
design life or less:
http://industrialenergy.exide.com/index.asp?gnb=2 and select "Flooded"
technologies
The load test is a complete capacity test; loss of 20% capacity is the
trigger for replacement. Most have less than 10% loss in capacity after 20
years and are usually budgeted for replacement within 30 years - earlier if
they show signs of case failure or (more rarely) loss of capacity.

Mike

"Elmo P. Shagnasty" <elmop@nastydesigns.com> wrote in message
news:elmop-E84911.21535321052005@text.usenetserver.com...
> In article <jason-2105051805230001@pm1-broad-91.snlo.dialup.fix.net>,
> jason@nospam.com (Jason) wrote:
>
>> I read an article about Hybrid vehicles in a car magazine. The magazine
>> staff used a Hybrid vehicle for about two years.
>
> Which kind? The series hybrid type such as what Honda does, or the
> incredibly complex parallel hybrid type such as what Toyota does (and
> licenses to Ford)?
>
From the description it would have to be Toyota's series/parallel Prius.
>
>
>> The consensus was that gas mileage was
>> great when the trip involved lots of city (aka stop and go) driving but
>> was very poor when the trip involved lots of freeway and interstate
>> driving.
>
> If you understand what a hybrid does, and what problem it's trying to
> solve, this is no surprise at all.

Exactly. In theory, a serial hybrid could be made with a very low power
engine and using just the electric storage for acceleration, and in that way
get a measurable improvement in freeway economy. But for the forseeable
future hybrids just don't have a significant advantage at freeway speeds.
Cars like the Civic are pretty efficient at that already and there is little
room for improvement.

Mike