We just purchased a 2019 Touring last night. We drove 350 miles to pick up the vehicle to get the exact color and trim we wanted. Of course the car is out of battery, we're about to head off to drive home in it. It'll be a combination of uphill and downhill with a stretch of 150 miles flat straight road. What's the best way to drive this thing on this trip? keep it on HV the entire way? Is it worth to stop and charge it up a little while we have lunch? Will the battery eventually charge itself back up on these long trips?
I'd probably put it in HV charge early in the trip for a little while if you have a stretch of slower speeds and flat. Other than that, keep in HV and if you do get a stop to charge it while at lunch, that could be helpful, maybe even eliminating any desire for HV charge if you also do that early in the trip.
It will be best to keep it in HV and even better if you can wait a few hours to put some charge in the battery. The Clarity will give you a much better highway experience in regards to noise, economy and power if you have some charge in the battery. This is especially true on steep hills, very high speeds, and when fully loaded. How many battery bars are showing? If it’s down to two, I would recommend waiting and putting some charge in. If you can find a Level 2 EVSE in the dealer’s town, it would be worth it to pay for one to two hours worth of charge. The battery will not gain any charge in HV. Only HV Charge will do that but is an inefficient way to charge and can be quite noisy. If you can’t find a way to charge before your trip home, it might be your last option. A lot will depend on if there are any significant hills on your trip home and how fast you are going to drive. You can start a conversation with me on this forum and I would be happy to talk with you over the phone. Your going to love then Clarity a lot more when it is not completely depleted. Ken
If it's hills and not mountains, just get in and drive it. Experience how it performs in HV mode because that's what it will automatically be in when the battery is depleted (two bars). It's not the end of the world if you hear the engine (ICE) running at high rpms on occasion. On the long stretch, you might want to see what HV+charge mode does (push and hold HV button till the indicator on the drivers display changes). It's not gas efficient compared to plugging in but level roads are the best opportunity to try it and that's what's recommended in the manual. Years ago when I got a Volt I ended up doing over 250 miles the first day on zero charge. Got real familiar with its generator that day!
Thanks everyone, were coming from a Leaf so this whole ev is new to us. Definitely a good time to learn how it works.
Since you have hills on the trip, I would recommend putting it into HV charge mode (long hold on HV) once you hit the freeway. This will help build up battery reserve for the hills. The engine will be louder, but I think still reasonable on a flat road. HV charge will turn into HV once you reach a certain battery level (57%?).
Drove 15 miles in LA traffic to our next quick stop on HV charge, the darn thing is almost 50% charge. Lol
Put it in HV charge mode until you have 10-15 miles of ev. Then ride in HV mode until your 5-10 miles from home; then drive home in ev mode. I'd then charge the battery until it's fully charged immediately upon arriving home.
I agree with all that you have done thus far. If the car is about 50% charged, I'd switch to HV and drive it just like @Geor99 recommended. Hope you enjoy the car. It is a completely different driving experience on battery and on HV with the battery with a good state of charge (not depleted). By the way, your gas mileage won't be quite as good since you had to use the HV Charge mode, but the trip back should be better since you did.
Starting the journey home, I had 22 mile range in ev. Drove in HV mode 90% of the way 10% was in Hv charge. I average 37mpg doing 75-80 mph, Ev range floats around 13-15 miles. We didn't buy this car as a long hauler but to know the option is there is very nice. We're very happy that we did not get the long range leaf or the model 3. The price to value is hard to beat IMHO. Before we the trip I got Honda hack installed which made it fun driving home. Only wish the headunit had more umph to it.
Any thoughts on using HV Charge while parked? On a recent trip EV range had gotten a tad lower than the 15 miles I was trying to keep. While wife was grocery shopping I used HV charge and watched the EV range gradually increase, maybe a tenth of a mile every couple of minutes, while also running the radio and air conditioning. Superficially, it seems like a good way to go, with almost all the engine’s idle power going to the battery. Of course I realize it’s quite inefficient overall, but once in a while it seems a decent tactic.
