So far so good

[2002]

Simple solution. Look up how to enter the HV Charge mode. It was made for this occurrence. When you are a few miles from home, change to the HV charge mode until you get to the part where you want to be quiet. Go back to the EV mode and drive up the hill as fast as you want with the few percent of battery that you just added before getting home.

I apologize, rereading my earlier reply sounds like I don't appreciate the suggestion. It's just that I have an aversion to charge mode! I know it has its place when driving in mountains but other than that I avoid it. I try and drive as much EV as possible, using up all of my EV range during the drive if possible and arriving home in HV. This works out just fine other than the annoying short incline located just a few hundred feet from my house. This creates an obstacle when I leave also, if I have a full charge I have to approach the incline slowly so that I don't gain too much speed on the way down and have to do heavy regen at the bottom of the hill where there is a stop sign. Heavy regen with a full battery can cause ICE to start up.

 

[ab13]

I've repeatedly begged Honda to offer an optional package that provides the kind of information involved drivers crave. I'd pay many hundreds of dollars for that app. The only downside for Honda would be enabling Clarity owners to better identify and classify problems Honda doesn't want to address.

I'd guess you would want something like the Corvette PDR , performance data recorder. Except, you'd want a HDR, hybrid data recorder.

https://www.chevrolet.com/performance-data-recorder

 

[insightman]

I'd guess you would want something like the Corvette PDR , performance data recorder. Except, you'd want a HDR, hybrid data recorder.

https://www.chevrolet.com/performance-data-recorder

There is so much more interesting info I would want to observe with a Clarity. No one wonders why their Corvette is doing what a Corvette does, just how fast it's doing it. I'd imagine Corvette owners would put a piece of electrical tape over the part of the screen that displays fuel economy.

I want to see a readout of all the factors that contribute to the Clarity's decision to activate the ICE. I want to see a readout of all the factors that contribute to the Clarity's decision to activate and deactivate the Engine drive clutch. I want to see fuel economy and electricity economy. I want to see totals of EV miles and HV miles. I want to know when the Clarity is activating the friction brakes. I want to know exactly how much electricity I'm putting into the battery when I use regen. I want to know how much energy A/C, heat, and every accessory is using. I want to see comparisons of my Clarity's fuel and electricity economy when I drive the same route using different driving techniques. And I want to know a lot more other data that would bore a Corvette driver to death.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

I want to see a readout of all the factors that contribute to the Clarity's decision to activate the ICE. I want to see a readout of all the factors that contribute to the Clarity's decision to activate and deactivate the Engine drive clutch. I want to see fuel economy and electricity economy. I want to see totals of EV miles and HV miles. I want to know when the Clarity is activating the friction brakes. I want to know exactly how much electricity I'm putting into the battery when I use regen. I want to know how much energy A/C, heat, and every accessory is using. I want to see comparisons of my Clarity's fuel and electricity economy when I drive the same route using different driving techniques. And I want to know a lot more other data that would bore a Corvette driver to death.

What you want is a user-selectable “Expert Mode”. I can see why Honda would want to “dumb down” the information available so as not to intimidate your “average” driver. But I also wouldn’t mind a few more options. “Persistent” drive mode, and auto-switching to HV mode at some selectable EV miles remaining immediately come to mind.

 

[MNSteve]

There is so much more interesting info I would want to observe with a Clarity. No one wonders why their Corvette is doing what a Corvette does, just how fast it's doing it. I'd imagine Corvette owners would put a piece of electrical tape over the part of the screen that displays fuel economy.

I want to see a readout of all the factors that contribute to the Clarity's decision to activate the ICE. I want to see a readout of all the factors that contribute to the Clarity's decision to activate and deactivate the Engine drive clutch. I want to see fuel economy and electricity economy. I want to see totals of EV miles and HV miles. I want to know when the Clarity is activating the friction brakes. I want to know exactly how much electricity I'm putting into the battery when I use regen. I want to know how much energy A/C, heat, and every accessory is using. I want to see comparisons of my Clarity's fuel and electricity economy when I drive the same route using different driving techniques. And I want to know a lot more other data that would bore a Corvette driver to death.

Thank you for listing this. Not that we will ever see it, but it's a nice list.

I believe that the fraction of Clarity owners that would like to see this level of detail is quite low. Honda has gone to great lengths to produce a complicated vehicle with all the complexity carefully hidden. Almost all the folks who buy a car simply want to get behind the wheel and drive it, and the Clarity achieves that goal quite well. One of the reasons that we see so little about the internal workings of the car is that they don't want to scare away potential buyers by confusing them with data they sincerely don't want to see. Another reason is that it costs money to design the display mechanisms we would love to see, but we're not a big enough factor in the buying pool to justify the expense.

And I wonder if there is a proprietary aspect. Honda has put a lot of investment into developing the mysteries under the hood, and if we can peek, so can their competition.

 

[MNSteve]

What you want is a user-selectable “Expert Mode”. I can see why Honda would want to “dumb down” the information available so as not to intimidate you “average” driver. But I also wouldn’t mind a few more options. “Persistent” drive mode, and auto-switching to HV mode at some selectable EV miles remaining immediately come to mind.

The thing about options is that they're, well, options. There are already a bunch of user-settable options on the Clarity, but I bet most owners just leave everything at the default. I do wish that they had provided us with a few more, including the ones you list.

 

[insightman]

The thing about options is that they're, well, options. There are already a bunch of user-settable options on the Clarity, but I bet most owners just leave everything at the default. I do wish that they had provided us with a few more, including the ones you list.

I'd guess that Honda's engineers drove the Clarity PHEV prototypes around with a laptop in the passenger seat to monitor the various systems. However, they could create a "expert" info display for the center screen that shows the info I want. If the Clarity was a big seller, perhaps they's have more nerdy owners like me requesting such information and would create an extra-cost app to deliver it. I'd pay hundreds of dollars for such an app.

On the downside, dealers--and then Honda--would then have to deal with "expert" owners claiming to have problems they've diagnosed with their "expert" information display. "My Engine drive clutch didn't engage until 50 mph! It's supposed to kick in at 45 mph!" "My battery had only a 96% charge and I was applying only a 1 kW regen but the ICE started up without a good reason!"