Won't coast on battery

Abnormal, are are driving with parking brake on? If not that, check brakes for sticking. If not that I don't know what but could be expensive to fix.

 

To coast, take your foot off the accelerator and while watching the HSI screen slowly feather the pedal until there is no regen or EV bars showing. For less than 46 mph, you can either coast or keep the bar to the left of the center line to keep ICE off and running on EV.

The slight regen is to simulate engine drag of an ICE only vehicle.

 

Sounds defective to me too. Mine will float along on battery under 40 mph on many occasions. Trust your tyres are the correct type and up to correct pressures as drag could slow your car down. Is your alignment ok? Is the 12v ok? Has it been sitting on a dealers lot for months and run flat causing it to fail? That would/could cause the car to continuously try and charge it up using the HV battery charge and thus not allowing it to move the car forward. Are you hammering the a/c?

You've not said what your miles are? Is the car a high mileage abused example?

 

coasting is much more difficult in gen III, as the software does much of the work for you. as stated above, you have to really feather the pedal around the regen line. a scan gauge might help, but you'll get better mpg's than the gen II without as much p&g.

 

Easy check of the 12v if you don't have a multimeter is to leave the car over night and in the morning (when you don't need the car) is to put the car in Acc mode (NOT into Ready as that will start to charge the 12v) and then wind all 4 windows down at once and then back up again. If they're quick as normal then your 12v is fine, if they go painfully slowly and the interior lights go dull or out, then the 12v is your issue. To compare, put the car into Ready mode afterwards and try it again. If they whizz up and down nicely this time but slowly slowly before, then it's the 12v. Normally they last about 5 years or 70/80k miles, and sometimes more if looked after. But it's a small battery and doesn't need much to kill it such as been run totally flat on a dealers lot and left like that.

They're not that expensive here in the UK at about £90 fitted. I understand they're about $300 in the US which sounds expensive.

Don't worry too much about your HV battery being at different charge after being parked. It's temperature dependent (holds much more when warm compared to cold etc) and the car will tell you if it's not happy. You're also under warranty in the US so even if it is knackered, it's not a problem.

 

Maybe a borderline battery, and the regen's coming on excessively in an attempt to charge more, hence the poor coasting? How many miles on it?

(That said, GrumpyCabbie's response sounds a lot more upbeat, I'd go with his guidance.)

 

59,000. hopefully your hybrid battery is okay. i would take it in and have them look at it, everything is under warranty. all the best!

 

BOTH the GII and GIII will regen a bit to simulate engine braking when you release the throttle pedal. The GIII, with tighter coupling, will give a bit more engine braking. It will also do it down to a lower speed. Use of "B" (which you already posted you were not) adds -real- engine braking.

I don't see anything wrong here, but if you are still suspicious, use your hand to check wheel temps after you drive a mile or two with minimal use of the brakes. If any wheel is warmer than the others, you may have dragging brakes on that wheel. Keep in mind, if one side of the car was in the sun those two wheels -should- be warmer than the other two.

Also, keep in mind the GIII uses the traction battery quite a bit more than the GII. Because of this, you can begin to wonder if anything is wrong when switching from a GII to a GIII. You will see different charge levels than you are used to, and the car will switch to EV mode more often and for longer periods, no matter what mode you have selected.

One reason the GIII gets slightly better mileage than the GII, and perhaps one reason the traction battery may not last as long, though that is still being hotly debated.

 

Try touching the gas pedal, just enough to dispel the regen?

 

Assuming you've got a good feel for how it should typically coast, from your gen 2 experience, something's gotta be dragging then. I know, brilliant observation.

Brakes? Jack up the rear with parking brake released (chock the front) and see how the rears are turning.

 

this is your problem, pulse and glide is not about maintaining speed. it's about using the ice to accelerate to speed (your choice) then gliding to minimum (your choice), then pulsing again.

 

Based on my understanding of the gen III power-train, I don't think coasting in neutral is a good idea. The drive wheels are connected to the gas engine and motor-generator at all times through a planetary power-differential. There is no clutch. For the car to seem to coast in neutral, one or both of the motors must be running to compensate for forward motion. In other words, you're using energy, instead of capturing it from regeneration.

 

maybe a bad 12v and ice is trying to recharge. please keep us posted, all the best!

 

That's possible, but an aux battery in such bad shape probably wouldn't start the car.