How to maximize the battery charge?

Not sure how much this actually saves, but I did go from 10.5 to 14+ miles EV by doing this.

Turn off fan and AC
Turn off MFD
dim MID to lowest visible setting
Keep MID on hybrid system indicator
ride the brake on downhills to maximize charge bar
keep acceleration below the EV symbol whenever possible

I play music pretty loud though, I could turn that off. And again I am not sure if anything beside the A/C has a significant power savings.

 

Charging the battery up is fixed, You can't maximize that. But you can maximize how many miles you can get per charge. I did get 15.4 miles on my trip odo before my ICE kicked in. I did that by accelerating very gently and maximizing my speed to about 10 to 12 mph. I also live in an area that is flat, (no elevation in the road) Also when approaching a stop sign I would coast to the stop sign, coming to a complete stop with minimal braking.

 

11.2 is misleading you to believe you aren't getting "maximum" capacity. That number is just an estimate based on your own particular recent driving, not a reflection on how much electricity comes from recharging.

Measured with an aftermarket gauge, like Kill-A-Watt, you'll see roughly 3.1 kWh is used regardless of who & how. It's the same quantity of actual electricity for all from fully depleted. Only the distance estimate is different.

Factors of travel itself are entirely other matter... stuff like speed. That has nothing to do with charging though.

 

You pose a good question, nobody has figured out how to control or increase this EV charge #, in the interim I'll echo Johns reasoning. However you can measure the actual EV range you are getting, it usually exceeds the estimate. Glad to hear you are enjoying your new toy-0-ta.

 

I got my personal best EV range of 17.0 miles just yesterday. Usually I get around 14 to 15, and on two occasions 16, in driving around town in traffic, at low speeds. But on this particular trip, I started out with 14.8 estimated, and other than a brief run up and then down a fairly steep hill on the freeway, drove on country roads at 45 to 50 mph, obeying the speed limits. I had made a note of my odometer starting out, and was watching when the EV light went out and the ICE started. I'm not by any means an expert hypermiler, but I do try to time signals, etc, in order to regenerate as much EV as I can. I do notice that my estimated EV range varies, usually between 13.6 and 14.6, depending on how much of my driving is in town vs. on the freeway. Yesterday was the second day in a row in which my range read 14.8 over six months of keeping track after each charge.

 

that "brief" run up the steep hill, did ICE come on at any point?

 

did you leave your car plugged in longer than the 3 hour recommended to get such a big charge?

 

lol, gud wan

 

Did nothing special re the charging, just set it for finish time as I usually do. However, Saturday evening I had made a 10 mile, in town, round trip on HV, having run out of EV earlier in the day. Maybe that helped?
As to the brief fwy hill, the ICE did not come on, but I didn't get much over 50 mph. It was uphill beginning on the onramp, and then downhill to the next offramp. I don't usually get on a fwy for such a short run, but this is a weird connector we have in order to get from one two lane country road to another.
Then yesterday I again had 14.8 showing, used about 3.5 miles of it, charged as usual and had EVR of 14.7 today. All in town driving today, and had .1 EVR left after 14.7 miles, no ICE.

 

yeah, that explains a lot. When I drive, I drive in all EV, no HV at any time, so the variable of HV mixing into the EV calculation is not my EV range. Make's a difference.

 

PK, what is your ratio of EV to HV? Mine is 24/76% after 8k+ miles. I have occasional long freeway trips, up to 90 miles one way. Really eats into the ability to maximize EV driving.
Just noticed in your signature you were at 63/37 at 1820 miles. Is that current? No pun intended.

 

last time I recorded it, it was EV=63% HV=37% After 1820 miles. About once every couple of months I travel the freeway 50 miles, one way. My commute to work is 2.7 miles

 

A Volt might have actually worked better for me, but I wanted HOV access, and didn't know about the Volt coming out with an eligible version until after I had decided to order the PiP.

 

Last time I had a commute that short was when I worked in a funeral home and lived in an apartment upstairs.

 

lol, don't work in a funeral home but do live in an apartment

 

It was very convenient, and rent-free. If my wife hadn't been driving to work, we wouldn't have burned much gas at all. Moved out when our first child was about a year old and needed a yard to play in.