The Toyota Prius: Car or Land Yacht

"Hooker" (Hooker) 08/04/2013 at 20:43 • Filed to: None

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Hear me out.

(Full disclosure: Toyota wouldn't want me to drive this car if I had several thousand dollars in my zipper. I am the wrong person from the wrong audience. I am all for practicality, however, not for practicality with a cost. This car costs more than it's dollar amount.)

This weekend I was volunteered to help a good friend of mine move. That first part is important. Good friend. I only help people move who I genuinely care about and only if I get to drive the truck. These guidelines were agreed to and off I went to help move. We loaded up all the vehicles (for reference: Small manual tranny truck, Ford Fusion, Honda Odyssey, Chevrolet Equinox, Chevrolet Tahoe and the aforementioned Prius.) After all the vehicles were loaded, we divvied up driving/riding responsibilities. Having already been moving most of the heavy things (my dad and I were the only heavy lifters) I was content with riding. That wasn't going to happen. The woman's mom needed to rest and I was elected to drive the Prius.

Cringe.

I decided that I would not be the car snob that I so often find myself being and give it a chance. Can't be that bad, right? Wrong.

Exterior

I don't have much to say about the exterior. It's a function over form design. The wheels are too small for my tastes and the overall design is completely without inspiration. That said, the coefficient of drag is just 0.26. That's great and all but a Tesla Model S looks sexy and has a drag coefficient of 0.24. That doesn't seem like a huge difference but not only does the Tesla have a lower drag coefficient, it's arguably better looking. Maybe Toyota was trying to keep costs down by not over-styling (perhaps not styling at all?) but from where I sit, it was too conservative. Even for Toyota's standards.

Interior

Let me put my 2004 shoes on for my take on the Prius interior. I love simple, well laid out, high quality interiors. This interior is simple which is nice. It has clean lines and seems to be well put together at first glance. After just under 40,000 miles, however, this car has more rattles than a rattlesnake. The faux suede-ish center arm rest and door rests are rock solid under that material. After an hour of driving, my elbows hurt. I drove a newer Yaris once that had similar issues but it was a Yaris, I expected it.

Then there is the steering wheel. It's oval. It threw me at first, however, it was easy to get used to. When it returns after a sharp turn, the driver sees it seemingly bounce due to its shape. It's weird but it does work. Controls are located on the steering wheel for everything from radio to climate. It's handy once you get used to it but I spent a good ten minutes trying to change the mode to the FM radio. I just wanted some music. The mode button, for those who care, is one of the million buttons on the oval steering wheel.

The view through said oval steering wheel is actually pretty good. Actually, sight lines around the whole car are pretty good. For example, the rear window is split into two sections. The higher section terminates about where I feel my Cruze window does without the lower window section. Visibility is excellent in this generation. The gauges are legible but I couldn't shake the thought they were being magnified by magnifying glass. I didn't research this but it just didn't look right. The interior is spacious and swallows a bunch of crap. It's a hatch, after all.

The Ride

At first, the ride seemed compliant and smooth. At this point, I had only driven the car, in a straight line, for less than 500 feet over one pot hole. I turned the car and it pitched like a boat on the ocean. I once owned a 1988 Lincoln Town Car that had an air suspension. It drove better than this car. Hence, the land yacht descriptor. I am not one to get motion sick but after taking a few turns in this car I wasn't feeling great. I currently drive a 2011 Cruze which isn't exactly the pinnacle of handling prowess either. The best I can say about the handling is what the owner said: "When you point it right, it goes right. The same for left." When turning this car it honestly felt like a delay between turning the wheel and the car actually taking the turn. Understeer has never been more prevalent to me in any other car. It was awful.

From what the owner tells me, the car gets excellent gas mileage. That's good, because the car itself is questionable on most other levels. If this is how Toyota builds cars, why do people keep buying them? Toyota has been cheapening their cars for years while other automakers have been stepping up their game. Do people compare vehicles anymore? Are they that brand loyal? If so, I have to give Toyota props for convincing the buying public that their cars are the best even when they aren't.

Burrito de EJ25 > Hooker 08/04/2013 at 20:55

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I've driven a Prius. It's no canyon carver, but in no way would I call it a land yacht.

Body roll was on par with most economy focused cars I've driven.

Mind you, this was a 2011 model.

Hooker > Burrito de EJ25 08/04/2013 at 21:00

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It's highly possible that Toyota mad the Prius more dynamically sound for the 3rd gen. All I am saying is that this was the worst handling car I had driven in over 10 years.

Corey CC97, MAZDA DPI IS STILL BAE JOESTACTIV JOESTACTIV JOESTACTIV JOESTACTIV VISIT FLORIDA RACING LIVES FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS > Hooker 08/04/2013 at 22:07

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I feel bad for all the people out there that are convinced that Toyotas are the best cars money can buy.

Hooker > Corey CC97, MAZDA DPI IS STILL BAE JOESTACTIV JOESTACTIV JOESTACTIV JOESTACTIV VISIT FLORIDA RACING LIVES FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS 08/05/2013 at 10:32

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Me too. I drove the current gen Corolla when I was looking to replace my aging Saturn Astra. Back to back against the older Astra it was still horrible.

AddMustard > Hooker 08/05/2013 at 10:39

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You've never driven a New Beetle?

Hooker > AddMustard 08/05/2013 at 10:41

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I have. This was worse. And the Beetle I drove was a convertible no doubt. To be completely honest though, the Beetle was at least a stick so it was mildly engaging.

AddMustard > Hooker 08/05/2013 at 10:46

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Yea I only drove the convertible, too. Uuuuugh. Never driven a Prius though. I intend to keep it that way.

Hooker > AddMustard 08/05/2013 at 10:53

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Wish I could say the same.

Casper > Hooker 08/05/2013 at 10:58

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Prius are awful. They handle like they have blown shocks with overly weak springs, steer like you are issuing orders second hand to semi-deaf Dwarves who are actually moving the wheels, and have brakes on par with a vehicle that has done 50,000 miles through sand and gravel - when new. Then there are the crappy high mileage tires. All these new crappy fuel efficient cars have these terrible tires that might as well be made of plastic. They single-handedly cancel out all of a cars other safety features.

I can honestly say, after driving one for a few hours, I understand why people in them are such awful drivers. I would be to if my car made me forget it was a car and made me think I was piloting a tiny garbage barge.

Hooker > Casper 08/05/2013 at 11:42

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"All these new crappy fuel efficient cars have these terrible tires that might as well be made of plastic. They single-handedly cancel out all of a cars other safety features."

Yep. Agreed. My Cruze came with them and the lighter wheels and I replaced both. I lost maybe 1 mpg.

"...piloting tiny garbage barge" <— This made my day.

timateo81 > Hooker 08/05/2013 at 12:19

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I added LRR tires to a 2000 Civic and went from 30.1mpg to 33.1mpg (calculated). Which is enough to break-even over the life of the tires. I think that's an OK trade-off.

timateo81 > Hooker 08/05/2013 at 12:52

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First, your wheel time is in a car fully-loaded to move your buddy across town (or state???). How do you think that affects handling on a Prius, or basically any sedan? Does not help.

I owned a '79 Coupe deVille, considered an austere down-sizing of peak-land-yacht America. nevertheless, that car was a yacht. it rolled over bumps like a waterbed and despite a curb weight of 4,000+lbs, only required a single finger to turn the steering wheel.

They don't make land yachts like that any more. Moreover, the Prius is no different than any other appliance car you can buy today. It jitters a bit at the limit over uneven pavement. The steering feels weird at first because it's electric assist. It accelerates and brakes differently too. And it's boring to drive compared to a Miata or V6 mustang or whatever "car guys" are buying these days.

But it's a good car. They hardly ever break down, they're cheap to operate and maintain, and you can put a bunch of stuff in it. Insurance is practically free. The acceleration and braking are fine - you have everything you could ever need (again, like most other econoboxes) but it sounds like the nuts and bolts are falling off when you reach the limit of either.

I was in the market for a Fit and did some math - if I could get better than 44mpg (at $3.50/gal) in a Prius over the life of the vehicle, I'd be in the hole at most $1,000 compared to the Fit. So I went Prius. 30,000 miles last year, 46mpg. On average, I'm driving 2,500 miles in a month for about $200. What's wrong with that?

At the end of the day, people see what they want to see in a Prius. The truth exists somewhere between the tree-hugger and the smug police.

Hooker > timateo81 08/05/2013 at 13:24

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The car didn't have any more extra weight in it than the equivalent of two extra passengers and it was distributed rather evenly. It wasn't fully loaded by any stretch of the imagination. I have driven many different econoboxes in my life and never one as poor as this. I have owned several cars with better calibrated electric steering than the Prius. And yes, it bobbles worse than most cars I have driven. All I am saying is based on my experiences with cars, it was pretty bad. You may be right, it may not be that bad, however, it's certainly not that great either when compared to the competition in it's size and content class. I hear from others that the 3rd gen was much better though I have not had the chance to drive one. I would love to compare the differences between the generations.