Hypermilers in Clarity?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Eddgie
  • Start date Start date
  • Replies Replies 67
  • Views Views 15K
E

Eddgie

Active Member
Anyone do any hypermile runs in the Clarity in HV mode?

I am pretty impressed with the car as a hypermiler. I am getting a solid 65 MPG in my central Austin area. I seem to do great on the surface streets, getting as much as 65 MPG on a 20 mile segment. On the highway, running 55 to 60, I am getting around 55 MPG without working too hard. (95 degrees, mild hills, surburban type traffic).

The car costs well, but it is tedious to hold it at in a cost. The Gen 3 Prius was easier to hold in a coast, and (to me anyway) pulse and glide is a vital part of squeezing miles out of the car.

I do like the paddles for regenerative braking. I am generally pretty good with judging my glide but the paddles make it easy to adjust if I look like I am going to over undershoot my mark.

I have not seen much on hypermiling the Clariity. Anyone care to post their result an tips???
 
With the Prius I used to do a lot of Hypermiling; coasting to a stop, pulse and glide, etc. When we first bought the Clarity I tried a few things but now just drive it like any normal car. The car does a fantastic job all by itself.

We drive for weeks at a time without the ICE coming on. So it's all EV, and then we charge the car 100% with home solar. So there is no MPG measurement to be made. I do try not to accelerate too quickly to save charge but to be honest I do like the rapid acceleration feeling.

On the highway in HV mode we know we're using gas but it happens so seldom we don't even consider trying to save gas. We are so grateful for the gas engine backup and no range anxiety.

I look at it this way. When we bought the two previous Prius cars we would not return to buying a regular gas engine car again. Now with the Clarity we've turned another corner. At this point I can't see going back to a standard hybrid; its PHEV for us until batteries improve (under 15 minutes charge time) at which time we might once again take a step forward. No looking back.

There is big resistance to electric cars in this country. I believe it is almost totally out of ignorance. If people would drive a Clarity it would change their minds.
 
Eddgie said:
Anyone do any hypermile runs in the Clarity in HV mode?

I am pretty impressed with the car as a hypermiler. I am getting a solid 65 MPG in my central Austin area. I seem to do great on the surface streets, getting as much as 65 MPG on a 20 mile segment. On the highway, running 55 to 60, I am getting around 55 MPG without working too hard. (95 degrees, mild hills, surburban type traffic).

The car costs well, but it is tedious to hold it at in a cost. The Gen 3 Prius was easier to hold in a coast, and (to me anyway) pulse and glide is a vital part of squeezing miles out of the car.

I do like the paddles for regenerative braking. I am generally pretty good with judging my glide but the paddles make it easy to adjust if I look like I am going to over undershoot my mark.

I have not seen much on hypermiling the Clariity. Anyone care to post their result an tips???
Click to expand...

That's fantastic. How much charge did you have and have you tried that with a depleted battery? From my own experience and the posts, there seems to be a correlation between poor HV mileage and a depleted battery. it would be really useful for the community if we could nail that down.
 
I’m getting EV range estimates of low to mid 60s with 1 person, and AC set to 72 as the only non-motive drain on the battery with normal driving (moderate acceleration and no running up to red lights and jamming on the brakes) and 75/25 city/hwy.
Before hot weather hit, I was getting high 60s to low 70s. My actual miles per charge by the odometer were about 3-4 miles less. Of course winter and resulting heat/defrost usage will significantly reduce the range.

Our Claritys reward moderate driving without having to hypermile. Besides, true coasting is impossible because the car is always in 1 chevron regen even when no chevrons are showing.
I think hypermiling and strategies like trying to baby the battery will yield only a few % improvement at best because Honda really engineered the you know what out of this car.
 
I am actually asking about mileage in the HV mode.

You can coast by using the accelerator to keep the power bar on the bar between power and regen. This is the same way to coast the Prius. No power going into the motor, no power going in or out of the motor generators.

You can hypermlle any car. Hypermile is far more about (as in physics) conservation of energy and judicious application of energy (accelerating evenly and gently, coasting where possible).

Anyway, I was hoping to hear from other hypermilers about mileage they have achieved in every-day driving in HV mode.
 
Eddgie said:
I am actually asking about mileage in the HV mode.

You can coast by using the accelerator to keep the power bar on the bar between power and regen. This is the same way to coast the Prius. No power going into the motor, no power going in or out of the motor generators.

You can hypermlle any car. Hypermile is far more about (as in physics) conservation of energy and judicious application of energy (accelerating evenly and gently, coasting where possible).

Anyway, I was hoping to hear from other hypermilers about mileage they have achieved in every-day driving in HV mode.
Click to expand...

I'm not a hypermiler but I got 52 mpg (actual, using pump fill ups and actual miles driven) on two 200 mile loops in the spring in HV. The outside temp was about 55 degrees both times but I left the heat off. It was a country road with gently rolling hills and speeds at 50-60 mph. There was two of us and there was a significant charge in the big battery (over 50%). That's the best I ever got. I didn't do anything special for that mileage other than driving smoothly and leaving the HVAC system off.
 
Reformed hypermiler here. I'm like @jdonalds - after a few meager attempts at maximizing both EV and HV mileage, I have just given up and let the vehicle do its own thing. With at least 50 miles of normal in-town EV, I just don't think about it anymore. On the highway (out here in West Texas), the posted speeds are 75-80, and traffic is ALWAYS running over you at least +10, so I try not to get hit and usually average right at 40mpg, and for a 4000 plus pound f-seater i feel is PDG.
 
I’m one of the @dstrauss reformed hypermilers too. I tried some hypermiling tricks in the Clarity but like dstrauss found out they weren’t worth the effort considering the meager gains obtained.
I’m now kind of semi-hypermiling. On Long HV trips, I use Econ and moderate instead of jackrabbit acceleration and don’t let the ACC brake the car. I always start with a nearly full battery so that the car can utilize its full range of energy flows for the best efficiency and drive ability. And I’ve never heard the angry bees even on steep hills (but I’m at 1,000 ft elevation). I think the ACC will do just a good a job of “coasting” as GTO tries to do by keeping the power meter exactly on the no power line (which is difficult to do without looking away from the road too much). When there’s little or no traffic on the Interstate I found the ACC and ECON does pretty good at not wasting energy on fast acceleration or too hard braking.

The Clarity is so well engineered that it is hard to do true hypermiling like coast or pulse and glide. I think the best hypermiling strategy is to only drive in EV!

In reporting HV MPG, it is misleading to report anything other than actual milage and pump fill up on the same pump since some cut off sooner/later than others. Also, you have to account for any battery usage and it has to be a round trip to account for elevation and wind direction. So please add any battery depletion into your MPG to make it accurate. (Maybe use the 31kW per 100 miles from the Mulroney sticker or 33.7kW = 1 gal) Have I got this right??

My only HV trip has been with the AC on and on a 500 mile round trip at 70 mph, I got 49 MPG.
 
When you have Regen it makes gliding to stops irrelevant because you are storing your energy back in the battery. The purpose of coasting is to not waste energy by using the brakes. Clarity doesn't have that problem.
 
JCEV said:
When you have Regen it makes gliding to stops irrelevant because you are storing your energy back in the battery. The purpose of coasting is to not waste energy by using the brakes. Clarity doesn't have that problem.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately (though I may be wrong) I think coasting is better than regen, and they are not quite the same. If regen was perfectly efficient in storage and return, they would be the same. But some of the kinetic energy sucked i to the battery during regen is wasted as heat during the process; and when the battery energy cones back out to be converted to kinetic energy again there is more loss.

I’m not knocking regen—it’s still much better than friction brakes—but best of all is not to use it, and coast, from an efficiency standpoint.
 
The idea behind the hypermiler's "glide" is to go as far as you can on the last "pulse." A skillful hypermiler will always do better with well-timed glides than trying to recoup energy through regen because regen isn't efficient enough to power a pulse that would provide another glide equivalent to a regen-free glide.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AaD
Akinto said:
How do coast without a clutch? (Recent driver of 2005 Matrix with standard transmission)?
Click to expand...
You can't really coast--unless you're really good at keeping the accelerator balanced on the tiny transition between using power and regen (without continuously and dangerously staring at the instrument panel). That's why I wish the Clarity's right (+) paddle could be used to get to 0 chevrons (ie. zero regen, coasting, freewheeling, soapbox-derbying, or surfing the momentum wave). I assume Honda didn't include that capability because it would freak out unsuspecting drivers. I'd accept having to pull the + paddle 10 times in a row to get to zero regen. That would make it unlikely an unsuspecting driver would find themselves in that mode by accident.
 
insightman said:
You can't really coast--unless you're really good at keeping the accelerator balanced on the tiny transition between using power and regen (without continuously and dangerously staring at the instrument panel). That's why I wish the Clarity's right (+) paddle could be used to get to 0 chevrons (ie. zero regen, coasting, freewheeling, soapbox-derbying, or surfing the momentum wave). I assume Honda didn't include that capability because it would freak out unsuspecting drivers. I'd accept having to pull the + paddle 10 times in a row to get to zero regen. That would make it unlikely an unsuspecting driver would find themselves in that mode by accident.
Click to expand...
recent 250 mile trip- going 70 mph on average on relatively flat highway- started with full EV but used all during some local driving- with AC- 58 overall mpg after refilling tank. without EV 40-50 miles- overall ~40 mpg on pure HV- I have found I enjoy the assisted steering on long trips- I don't think of it as steering for me but assisting steering adjustments I make- its a pleasant experience because you feel the car is anticipating all of your upcoming moves on the highway.
 
PHEV Newbie said:
That's fantastic. How much charge did you have and have you tried that with a depleted battery? From my own experience and the posts, there seems to be a correlation between poor HV mileage and a depleted battery. it would be really useful for the community if we could nail that down.
Click to expand...
So I deplete the battery [emoji367] to almost 0 (2 bars) every day. I charge on l2 at [emoji537]. I'm only getting 46-52 MI charge. I live in northwest Florida. (high temp & high humidity)
 
About 80 mile round-trip daily work commute. Not able to charge at work. Vehicle computer ranges estimates from about 120 to 180 mpg. Rarely drive Clarity when not to work and “proof at the pump” fill-up today was 130 mpg average. Drive on “HV” mode to work and “EV” on return. Always in “Sport” mode also for the extra pick-me-up.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top