To lakedude's point, I haven't done a whole lot of highway driving (the truth will come out this weekend when we drive 550 miles to my parents' house), but I have driven 20-30 miles with the cruise set to 70mph and I get right around 50mpg with the Prius.

I accelerate with the rest of traffic in the Prius and I get an average of around 46-47mpg.

I am an autocrosser (not in the Prius though! ), and I don't find the Prius's handling sketchy. It's got a softer suspension and is kind of tall, so I am betting the civic will handle much better, but I wouldn't call the Prius "sketchy". Test drive them and see. The OEM tires on the Prius are horrible so that might be part of it.

 

The HV battery failure is very very rare, a few per million.

The Prius will run a mile even if you run out of gas, the Civic will not.
A lot of Prius drivers experienced that.

Ken@Japan

 

I bought two Prius's last November to replace my company's two end-of-lease vehicles. A month later, one of them had to be towed to the dealership because it would not start. To this day, the dealership has not disclosed what went wrong. The battery (NiMH) among other minor components were replaced according to the work order. Three weeks later, the vehicle was returned to us and its been working flawlessly since then.
I guess, we must have been one of the unlucky ones.
Our local taxi companies could also add a little to my experience since the dealership where we service our vehicles have admitted similar issues before. I suspect large fleet operators may provide a better representation of the NiMH technology we have available.

With respect to the Civic not running on EV after running out of gas...
I have not personally tried it with either of my vehicles, but other HCH-2 owners did verify that the Civic will continue to add EV even when the vehicle runs out of gas. You'll find several reports of this phenomenon in the HCH-II forums.

As many will agree, running on EV exclusively for anything but short distances (1 mile as you said), especially when out of gas is bad even for our Prius. Battery packs on our prius have indeed been harmed because people rode them empty after running the gas tank dry. You can find several reports of this too at Priuschat and other sites. Please do correct me if I am wrong.

Cheers;

MSantos

 

Series or Parallel
Sorry for applying the wrong term to the Civic's drivetrain. Parallel, Series, or Fluffy Unicorn, it still starts the gas up every time you let go of the brake, along with the rest of what I said.

Highway MPG
I say the Civic gets better MPG at 75mph both because I was able to get better MPG at 75mph with very little practice (had I bought the Civic instead I likely could have learned to do even better), and because it makes sense: All of the Civic's gas engine's motive power can be delivered to the wheels, and Honda has a slight technological edge in gas engine efficiency over Toyota - many have fantasized here about Honda's gas engine tech in a Prius. The Prius's gas engine is slowed ("retarded") by the electric motor, letting at most 72% of its motive power be delivered to the wheels.

Handling/Suspension
I think I've made it clear I'm not biased - I'll criticize or praise either car where it's due. I think the handling issue in the Prius is overexaggerated on this forum. The Civic can take an offramp slightly faster than the Prius, and the Prius will handle a pothole slightly better. The difference isn't a big deal.

Visibility - Blind spots
I complained about this at length when I bought the Prius. I was skeptical messing with sideview mirrors could fix it - to my surprise it's made the issue negligible - not eliminated - I'd still say the Civic's visibility has the edge - but not significantly. That said, you can get in a Civic with the mirrors pointed all over the place and get good visibility.

Visibility - Rearview
Civic wins here. If you adjust the rearview of the Prius down farther than you expected (so you can see out the little bottom window below the spoiler) this issue is minimized but it still causes a problem at night - cars will have their headlights disappear behind you, covered by the rear spoiler that cuts across. Depending on how tightly someone's tailing you, this can sometimes mean a car appears to you out of nowhere. Spooky, but I can't see how it would present a safety issue - a car coming at you quickly would cross this visibility threshold quickly so it'd be irrelevant.

 

Hi,

Everything else I agree with but this part is not quite accurate. It would be more accurate to say 72% of the torque takes one path and 28% of the torque takes another path and they combine at MG2. In some cases, a form of overdrive, the power split goes in the reverse direction from MG2 back to MG1 where it combines with the ICE. Toyota calls this "re-circulate" mode.

It has taken me over a year and Graham scanner data to understand it. I'll start a new thread to hopefully make this clearer.

Bob Wilson

 

OK, happy to discuss that part in a separate thread. Generally speaking though, if 28% is being bled off to a separate path, any path that isn't mechanically delivered straight to the wheels has to be more lossy than that singular path. The Civic delivers 100% in this manner. The Prius does not.

That said, I own a Prius, and I love it.

 

Without contradicting Bob, I believe you are conceptually correct. On the other hand, I would say that the CVT losses of the HCH-2 however phenomenally low for a CVT, would still make it somewhat less than 100% for gas only operation.

In the end, and despite all the discussions of merits and attributes of a particular hybrid implementation, I would submit that the best recommendation we can offer to a person looking for an economy hybrid vehicle continues to be: Test drive all available vehicle models.

Heck, I am still excited before I get behind the wheel of either car. To me it amounts to yet another FE challenge. Prius or HCH-2? Does not matter, they are just too much fun.


Cheers;

MSantos

 

Yeah - let's wait for Bob to create the thread to keep discussing that specific detail.

As for comparing the cars, the one problem I have with the continually repeated answer of "test drive it yourself" is that it's a bit like saying "Don't ask us, figure it out for yourself." There's a lot I know I've learned about all sorts of hardware I own that I knew only from long-term experience - something a test drive does not afford. So it seems like it just avoids the question and instead of offering helpful information just says good luck. It's like someone asking you a question you know the answer to, and you telling them to Google it.

And it's not like someone's really going to buy a car without a test drive anyway... .

I'm aware personal preference plays strongly here and I've tried to enumerate what car plays to what sort of preference in my advice, but I'd rather offer the advice than say "Good luck."

 

Speaking just for myself I'm about a million times more likely to have an issue with the traction battery than run out of gas. I haven't run out of gas since I was a kid. Others might play that silly "lets see how far we can push a tank after the light comes on" game but not me.

Another part of the original point I failed to make is that I think the Honda IMA will make a better old/used car since the hybrid battery is non-essential. Of course the belt and pulley CVT may have issues long term so overall I'd call it about even. I'd give my gen one HCH with a manual tranny the best odds of making a good older car but sadly manuals are no longer available ....

 

The stats I've read seem to find more problems with the Honda's CVT belt than the Prius's traction battery.

So, my best bet for an aging car? A Civic Hybrid that had its CVT belt replaced under warranty! Late in the warranty if you can get it.