Toyota Prius drive blog: Future imperfect?

Read our Toyota Prius news report here.

Putting six Carsales Network employees to the task of assessing Toyota's latest Prius was an interesting exercise in itself, but one that didn't quite capture all the nuances of discourse with our guest reviewers.

That's the problem with asking questions and listing the answers in a set format; you're not casting your net very wide. The review process was more product-focussed (Prius), leaving little room to discuss the future of the car, hybrid technology and alternatives to that.

A couple of our reviewers posed challenging arguments and posited interesting opinions concerning the Prius as they drove the car, and -- rather than leaving those issues 'on the cutting room floor' -- we're now presenting them here in this article.

The two men were driving enthusiast Paul Dossett and family guy/car nut Brett Wakeman.

Dossett, for all his hot-hatch orientation -- he currently owns a Mazda3 MPS -- is open to EV (electric vehicle) and hybrid technology, as long as it can be had without necessarily casting aside driving satisfaction. That and the purchase price appear to be his principal issues with the Prius.

"I bought [the Mazda3 MPS] because it was the fastest front-wheel drive hatch in the country," he explained.

"I was doing a different job where I was driving a car all day long and I thought 'if I'm going to drive a car all day long, I'm going to drive something fun'."

For him, the Prius removes some of the rawness of driving, both by its hybrid nature and by Toyota's design. But it's the price that seems to be the main stumbling block. It's almost as if Dossett has decided that there's little value in spending $40,000 or more for a car that still uses some fuel. Certainly, he admits to a greater appreciation of cars like the Chevrolet Volt.

"I was looking more at the Chevy Volt system and I thought that seems to make more sense," says Dossett, who also mentions that American Prius owners are replacing the petrol engine and fuel tank with more batteries to extend the car's electric-drive range. In other words, some sort of band-aid technology is available right now, to convert the Prius to a full-time electric vehicle.

"For what I'm doing, if I had that [the Volt], I would not be using petrol at all," says Dossett, who is no longer spending as much time commuting from home to work or on the road during the day. His situation is common to many of us.

Dossett touched on the disconnect between Toyota's Prius strategy and the expectations of consumers, who are perhaps more worried about saving money than saving the environment. Even the consumers most anxious about the environment aren't in the target demographic for Prius, Dossett argues.

"The problem with the 'deep green' people is that a lot of them tend not to want to spend this sort of money. They'd rather drive an old Peugeot.

"It seems to me that if you're after fuel [economy], it makes a lot more sense to spend 40 grand on, like a Jetta diesel -- and then spend the rest on the fuel," he said, taking a consumer's advocate position.

"It kills the idea of [the Prius] being something that you would buy as a way to save money. So you're just pretty much [saying]: 'I want to save fuel', not 'I want to save money'."

But the pricing of the Prius -- at an entry level at least -- is not that far removed from what Dossett considers would be a good starting point.

"If it was like 35 grand, you might go 'well, okay'..." he mentioned. That's a price that may well be in the ballpark for the Camry Hybrid which is due next year. Perhaps that's Toyota's aim; raise consumer expectations of what a hybrid is worth to buy and then undercut those expectations with a cheaper, volume-selling hybrid-drive offering.

Dossett accepts that the Prius as it stands is bound to be an expensive vehicle to build.

"I look at it as well, [with] what's happening with the batteries? The batteries are costing something, plus you have two systems in the car, instead of one -- which makes it twice as difficult to service and twice as likely to go wrong -- as opposed to just your engine."

Dossett agrees that while the Prius is not an elegant solution to the need for fuel-efficiency and low emissions, he admits that there aren't many alternatives to the Toyota.

"I do like the Tesla approach," he admits, wearing his enthusiast's hat.

"What they're waiting on is more sensible battery technology. Once they do that, I don't see a point for this [the Prius] to exist. The thing about Tesla, when they bring the sedan out, is you'll be able to go: 'Okay, I'll spend US $55,000 on this -- and then in five years time, they bring out a battery pack that doubles my range, because technology's pushed further ahead -- whereas this thing's never going to get any better.

"It's always going to have the same petrol engine in it. The petrol engine is going to keep wearing out and doing all the normal things that petrol engines do.

"If they could bring that Tesla sedan out, over here -- even if it was say, 70 or 80 grand -- I'd see that as a better buy than this, because you'd be able to have the performance people interested as well."

Brett Wakeman observed that being green is fashionable and the Prius possibly suffers from its Hollywood associations and society's tendency to chop down tall poppies.

"It's probably copped a bit of flak about people being conspicuously green..." he said.

It was, in fact, his perception that the Prius is a 'celebrity cause' car that led him to volunteer for the review of the car. He wanted to establish for himself whether there was more substance to the Prius than just its 'car of the stars' status.

"You see all the Hollywood celebrities have the Prius and it's a statement about 'I'm being environmentally conscious' -- and all the rest of it," he explained.

"[It's] an opportunity to compare that image that I've always had of the thing, against what it really is like as a car. Is it something that's practical and useable and real, as distinct from just being a fashion statement or accessory?

"There's certainly a bit of curiosity about driving something different -- seeing what it's like."

Since Wakeman approached the Prius with a preconception -- further boosted by the purchase price of the Toyota -- that the car was a rich person's toy, he was pleased to note that the new Prius seemed more practical than he expected. He admitted that he had a blind spot in respect of the hybrid Toyota.

"I haven't really studied up on it hugely, because I always felt the Prius was a little bit irrelevant to me. I guess [with] factors of cost and so forth, I've always looked at the Prius as a bit of a gimmick. It's less of a real car, but as they go on, it feels like a normal car to me -- to drive."

Reading between the lines, it appears that Wakeman foresees hybrid technology improving further over time. But he perceives the hybrid-drive vehicle as 'electric' -- part of a solution that would see the eventual end of dependence on fossil fuels, despite the Prius remaining reliant on petrol for its internal combustion (IC) engine. So the path of progress in improving hybrid technology -- which is known to include plug-in hybrid vehicles with range-extending IC engines -- leads to a fully electric vehicle as its ultimate destination.

"It's obvious that electric is going to be the way of the future; whether that's plug-in or hydrogen fuel cell-type arrangements..." he mused.

"It will be interesting to see how the Volt goes," he said, before comparing the Chevrolet concept with that of the Tesla sports car, describing the Tesla as "the extreme other end of the scale".

Like Dossett, Wakeman believes that hybrid-drive technology has to appeal to people for more than just its potential to reduce global climate change -- or even just to save money.

"The evidence is also that there's a lot of people out there who care about how their car performs and handles," he says, arguing in favour of alternative energy systems in cars that haven't lost their sense of fun.

Another point where Wakeman shares a point of view with Dossett was the question of pricing. We asked Wakeman whether he could see himself owning a Prius.

"Certainly not the way they price it. That's the issue. You're paying a hefty premium for being environmentally friendly.

"For 40 grand, you could buy a Commodore and have seven grand change to go and buy solar hot water or something.

"If you were buying it to save money on petrol, you'd be fooling yourself. If you're buying it because you're committed to helping the environment, I wonder whether, given that cars aren't necessarily the primary source of greenhouse gas, there are so many other ways of making an impact in that respect; buying green energy or solar hot water or whatever else...

"The money that you're saving by buying a regular car -- and driving it a bit sensibly -- would be better spent on other forms of environmental friendliness."

For Wakeman, buying any hybrid would boil down to whether it could present a case for both the environment and the consumer's hip pocket.

"If they could price it in the same sort of league as an alternate car -- equivalent to the same thing -- you'd buy the green one," he said.

"Obviously they're putting a lot of clever technology in there; things that cost money to put in, but if you had just a basic set of functionality but with a petrol/electric [drivetrain]..."

So Wakeman seems to have arrived at this conclusion: the Prius is not the gadget much beloved by Hollywood celebs that he thought it was, but nor is it quite the affordable commuter car alternative he hoped it might be.

"It's kinda cool still for novelty value, but the price premium you're paying for it..."

He pays Toyota its due for picking an alternative energy strategy and sticking with it.

"You've certainly got to admire Toyota for having the commitment to putting the money into doing this sort of thing," he said.

But in what are still early days for hybrid-drive technology, he's prepared to wait for the cars to become more affordable.

"I'm the same sort of person that wouldn't buy an iPhone now, even though I'd love an iPhone, because it's pretty cool and all the rest of it -- but it's too expensive to justify.

"I'll wait a few years... and everyone will have one."

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