Force charging Prius battery

Everybody knows how to force discharging Prius battery - that's what the EV button is for. Today, being afraid of the red triangle error, I wanted to charge the battery before going to the automatic washing booth. Pressing gas pedal while in [P] doesn't charge. But pressing both brake and gas pedals in the same time in [D] did the trick.

Single most annoying Prius problem

I'm a happy Prius driver. But one thing that bugs me a lot in Prius 2006 is that Consumption MFD screen doesn't show the current consumption value, only the approximate bar. I have to switch between the information screens to read that value and then switch back to see the chart quite often.

As a side note I'd also like driving instructions (turns) to appear in the corner when Consumption screen is active. This way I would not need to switch to the map screen either.

P.S. I accidentally googled an interesting screen. I wish I had this one as well.

Source: http://priuschat.com/threads/next-generation-mfd-check-it-out.84493/page-2

Don't cut in front of the highway traffic when leaving the acceleration lane, you idiot!

The rule on the acceleration lane is not to interfere with the traffic already on the motorway. Make sure your speed is the same as the traffic already on the motorway. Mirrors and signals must be used correctly to avoid interfering with the following traffic.

This is very obvious and simple rule, but it needs to be reminded over and over. Please repost, retweet and share.

Route Frankfurt -> Le Grau du Roi

Strangely the route Frankfurt -> Le Grau du Roi (1000 km) toll costs less than the route Le Grau du Roi -> Nice (300 km).

• Frankfurt -> LGDR: 31.40 EUR
• LGDR -> Nice and back: 44.30 EUR
• LGDR -> Frankfurt: 37.10 EUR

Just FYI.

Augmented Reality for Car Drivers

Like I have envisioned in one of the previous posts, there is already AR for car drivers. It's not a full windshield projection monitor, it's just an Android app, but hey, it's just the beginning.
iOnRoad

ALL of the 2010 Toyota Prius How-To Youtube Videos

http://www.eurocarblog.com/post/1820/new-toyota-prius-videos
+

Head-Up Display: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyyHp3GI3X8 (very cool)

Eco Driving Analytics

Eco Driving Analytics

Isn’t that a cool car? I wish it would be possible to export the data on a USB stick and review / analyze on my own PC. That would be analytics nirvana. :-D

Prius driving on it's own

As Google is involved - it must be getting somewhere.

Car Driving Styles

There are different driving styles. Novice drivers tend to be overly careful and slow. Some drivers remain in that state for their whole life. Most, however, evolve and become overly confident in themselves.

Such drivers drive too fast and hate every driver that's driving slower then 200 km/h.

Only the selected cultivated highly experienced people evolve into something bigger - serious, responsive, polite, friendly to other drivers, and best of all, remain as such even when in a hurry. They value not only their own time but also the time of others, understand and truly share the idea that the overall time of all travelers needs to be minimized and not only your own driving time on the price of time of others.

It took me a couple of months to outgrow the first novice stage. It took me 9 years of daily driving to glorify up to the responsible driver level.

Which level are you currently in? Make a comment below.

Automobile Traffic Trains

Now that Prius III (they call it Prius 2010 in US) and some other new cars has the Lane Keep Assist (Wiki), Pre Collision System (Wiki) and Dynamic Radar Cruise Control why not combining them into a Active Dynamic Traffic Follow up System which would allow the driver to snore (joking) while driving as GPS navigation will know the route, LKA will keep your car straight and DRCC will make sure you follow the car in front of you?
Many cars equipped with Active Dynamic Traffic Follow up System would be chaining to each other, switch the lanes automatically (Blind Spot Assist) and get you to your destination without your effort.

This system doesn't require a lot of investment into the highway infrastructure itself, the road remains passive. It raises the safeness of the driving a lot - no risky maneuverers, it will keep the safe distance in all circumstances and will react in a split second instead of 1.5 seconds human reaction time.
One important thing to note: there must be a loud buzzer to wake the driver (can he be called a driver still?) when approaching the highway exit ;-).
It doesn't seem like a lot of work to me, all the components exist already - they only need to be combined in a central car computer.

Repost of the GPS navigation software ideas I had in 2007

About

This site is about a new PDA GPS navigation system called we-go. Why having another when there are already a lot? Read on...

Disadvantages of the existing navigation software

I started working on we-go because the existing software didn’t satisfy my needs:

• They cost money
• Their user interface is far from being user friendly
• They are mostly 2D even when they display it on the pseudo-3D perspective
• The maps get rarely updated
• No way to use bitmap maps (aerial map of the region - Google Maps) or if there is one, then the combination of vector and bitmap data on the same screen is not possible.

Key features of we-go

I think navigation software can be much better:

• It should be free
• Maps should be updated as frequently as possible
• 3D view is not a cool feature; it’s a visual aid for navigation. Think of a highway intersection where there can be even more than three lanes over each other. See how it’s displayed in pseudo-3D compared to the real 3D view.
• User interface should be skin-able to allow for customizing the user interface for each individual user. This is the most important for navigation software because it’s used during the intensive traffic and the time necessary to perform an operation should be minimized.
• Bitmap maps like those found in Google Maps could be layered over for even greater navigation hints.
• A desktop version of the program with all the features of the PDA version should be available (.NET can help with it) for managing the data, route pre-planning and transfer of the collected GPS data (see next topic) to the server.

Three Prius Tricks

I'm am an owner of European Prius II (2006) and want to share some tips which I find useful, but which took me some time to grasp.

1. You can go as fast as 182 km/h on Prius if you step on the accelerator (driving at 180) and then the road starts going downhill. It takes the system several seconds to adjust to reduced necessary torque and until then it keeps accelerating as if you're going up-hill leading to 182 (I did this several times already).
   You can get 181 km/h on the plain road by stepping on the accelerator, but that's not as interesting.
2. Don't use "B" mode to regenerate more energy (I was doing it on every traffic light for half a year because of many contradicting posts in the forums). Read this and apply brakes gently to regenerate more. Use "B" mode only when going down-hill (that's the rare case when you should follow the manual and you will do it right).
3. If you don't like Pulse&Glide technique then at least use Glide mode to reduce the breaking force when approaching a distant red light.
4. Navigation without GPS applies to Prius II as well! I noticed it in the underground parking and the system information screen has some kind of bearing information (displayed in degrees) which, combined with distance traveled, can replace GPS for some short distances.
   
5. How to get to the system information screen in Prius II - get to the display screen and follow the instructions here (it's not on the Navigation Voice screen, at least not in Prius II).

Car of the nearest future

Recently I've been driving some couple of thousands km in a couple of days (from Frankfurt to Zadar to Scalea to Frankfurt) and you might know that 37 hours driving can be very boring. It's during this long boring time I was dreaming of what my car could become in the near future.

Here are my dreams listed in no particular order. Now that own Prius II and like it, I've taken Prius III as a base (pretty advanced vehicle, BTW) and thought of some extra features.

A couple of futuristic features which make Prius III a good base candidate for “the car of the future”:

• It has a “Lane Assist” feature keeping you in the middle of the lane.
• It has a “Smart Key” feature allowing you to open and close the car without touching you car keys.
• It has a “Pre Collision System” which applies brakes when you’re about to crash into something.
• An “Intelligent Parking Assist” which can park the car in the relatively narrow space automatically.
• “Head-Up Display” like in the Jet Fighters.

Prius as service car in Frankfurt

I'm a fan of Prius and live in Frankfurt. Fan pictures of service-Prii (Priuses).
Location: Alte-Oper Frankfurt.

Location: Sandweg.