Went for the test drive of the Prius and the Prius C today.
I wanted to test the Prius C first before the Prius but because the Prius C was taken for a test drive by another person, I have to test drive the Prius first.
I drove the Prius for about 25km with combine city, highway and a very steep hill with all the driving mode including EV. The Prius have very impressive Synergy Drive which I can hardly tell when is the engine or electric motor, or both and it just switch seemlessly. The different driving mode offer very different driving characteristic. Power mode offer plenty of power for pickup which is comparable to a Camry 2.0 or better with the least fuel economy. In normal mode, the Prius is good for normal day to day driving although I feel it a little on the slow side. On Eco mode is where I find I need lots of patience as it really slow on the pickup but this is where the most savings come from. I did drive on EV mode for about 1/2km and its quite tricky on the EV mode. I little too hard on the peddle will take you out from EV mode to normal mode. So the EV mode is really for certain situations like looking for parking, or stuck in jam. I manage to get only 20km/litre during the whole test drive but I believe I can get more mileage because during the test drive there are times I was heavy footed to test the acceleration and I also push the car to 140km/hr just to test the speed.
One more thing about the Synergy Drive is that it offers very unique driving experience as the engine completely shut off as I release the gas pedal. This result in very quiet cabin as only the aircon is running.
One thing really good about the Prius is the cabin sound proofing. It is really very good as it is very quiet in the cabin and the engine is very quiet because I am not a heavy footed driver. My friend who was sitting at the back seat was very impress with the quiet cabin. The engine will roar a little bit when push but nothing really loud.
Cabin size is very good with plenty of head room for the rear passenger too. The rear seat is comfortable but slightly smaller than the Camry.
After driving the Prius, I test drive the Prius C. Surprisingly the C offer very solid acceleration and it never feel slow. The engine noise is louder because I just drove the Prius which have very good sound proofing and that is within expectation.. I did drove the car to about 80km/hr but did not notice much wind noise and the tyre noise is very minimal too. Most of the noise is from the engine when pushed. Overall the sound proofing is sufficient (not great but not bad either). Suspension is OK too.
The driving experience is exactly the same as the bigger Prius as the tech is identical. I manage 18.5km/hr for the Prius C.
I was expecting better fuel consumption during the test drive but only manage 20km/litre. So I believe I can achieve better mileage but that really requires a some changes in driving behavior.
Overall, both car offers impressive hybrid performance but you need to be green minded to really take full advantage of it.
Concusion...I place my booking for the Prius Luxury instead of the Prius C because Prius is a more complete package which can be used as my main family car while the C is limited to a city car which I cannot use for traveling long distance.
don you mind let me know which center you test the car?i like to test the prius c also..hehe
Mar 26 2012, 03:42 PM
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maybe we should move our Prius. Discussion to the official Prius thread here 
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