[gasik1417]

The oddest thing happens to my Prius. I'll drive it for the day like normal. I'll pull into the garage, turn off all of the lights and accessories, and turn off the car. 12 hours later, I get in, and after driving ten feet, the battery goes down 1 bar. After driving 100 feet, the battery goes down two bars. I didn't gun it or anything. It bothers me as it kills the gas milage. Once it got down to only two bars, and that scared me because what if I go into the garage with only two bars. It doesn't do it any other time when I drive it, and park it outside. The garage is at 65 degrees, so I doubt its that. Anyone have any ideas?

 

[mikepaul]

The battery has a sense of humor.

A few weeks after I first got mine, I cancelled a road trip when I noticed the battery had dropped to about 3 bars and showed no signs of recharging even when I sat for a while with the engine on and running. I thought something had failed. I was advised to just ignore it, and once I ignored it the car went back to doing what it normally does and all was fine.

About that time, I switched over to Consumption from Energy and rarely look at the battery state anymore. Less anguish...

 

[Victor]

The oddest thing happens to my Prius. I'll drive it for the day like normal. I'll pull into the garage, turn off all of the lights and accessories, and turn off the car. 12 hours later, I get in, and after driving ten feet, the battery goes down 1 bar. After driving 100 feet, the battery goes down two bars. I didn't gun it or anything. It bothers me as it kills the gas milage. Once it got down to only two bars, and that scared me because what if I go into the garage with only two bars. It doesn't do it any other time when I drive it, and park it outside. The garage is at 65 degrees, so I doubt its that. Anyone have any ideas?

Sounds normal to me.

 

[mrv]

1. remember that it's the hybrid battery taht actually starts the gasoline engine. if you parked the car at the cusp of a changeover, the indicated charge level could drop when you restart your car.

2. the car did some recalibration when you restarted it, and decided that the battery level was different than it had last calculated

3. the Prius will run the gas engine anyways for at least the first 5 minutes when started cold (longer if it is really cold or windy outside), to warm up the emissions components and itself, so don't blame the low battery.

4. If the battery level gets low enough (depending on what gear you are in) it'll turn on the gasoline engine to recharge it. Don't worry about the level. The levels shown to you are only then inner percentage of the battery's full charge anyways. The icon is just eye-candy, and gets people worried for no reason.

 

[galaxee]

my advice: ignore the energy screen. watch the consumption screen. the car knows how to take care of itself and nothing you can do will override what the car is calculating needs to be done...

 

[Astrowoman]

Galaxee's controversial statement aside :lol: I think the "energy" display sometimes seems to get "stuck" as if it misses a few updates and then catches up. For example, it often continues to show MPG numbers that are inconsistent with the rest of the display (e.g., I stop at a light and the display shows everything inactive, but there is still a nonzero MPG which drops, but rather later than the rest of the update). I've seen other similar behaviors on numerous occasions. It isn't a big deal, and on average it seems to be correct, but it does look as if it sometimes shows stale data. This doesn't seem as prone to happen on the "consumption" screen.

Is this a known feature?

 

[Tideland Prius]

Even when the engine starts to do the warm up check, you're still running on battery. If you were holding the accelerator steady, you'll feel a surge of power when the engine finally chips in and then you'll hear the engine rev up. I can lose up to two bars just by driving up the alley to the residential road since it's uphill and if I press a bit harder, more battery power is used.

 

[gasik1417]

Alright. That makes me feel better. I thought that would be a problem, but I guess not.

Thanks!