Using the 12V 18AH Batteries in a car

[Mr_V]

So…being a hybrid has little to do with how much mileage it gets, eh? But I expect that depends on your driving habits, if you don’t do a lot of stop-and-go then you aren’t really taking advantage of the hybrid system.

I think it’s kind of humorous that most folks don’t seem to “get” the fact that we can make cars get really good mileage using old technology…the hard part is getting people to want to buy tiny cars with tiny engines.

sorry for the thread hijack

Not much old tech in these Insights.

Weight: They did everything possible to make them light, magnesium oil pan, lots of aluminum in the structure, tiny 12v battery (270cca from the factory) to the thinnest thing to ever pass for carpet.

Aerodynamics: Taken to the highest level from the fender skirt style rear wheel openings, under body skirts, to the wheel design.

Finally the power train used lots of tricks too. One compression ring instead of the standard two. Lean Burn mode, as high as 22 to 1 AF ratio (5sp federal emissions version only) that required the use of a special catalytic converter and a Lean Air Fuel sensor instead of a conventional O2 sensor, not to be confused with the modern wide band O2 sensor. Finally, variable valve timing to allow it to operate in a Atkinson mode to reduce pumping losses.

So I’d say they got good MPG despite the (heavy) Hybrid system. Remove the IMA motor/generator and battery pack and you could actually get better hwy MPG, provided you didn’t encounter hills and kept the throttle opening and rpm down so it stays in lean burn mode.

[Rusttree]

…the hard part is getting people to want to buy tiny cars with tiny engines.

This is one of my biggest frustrations with the current mindset of the average car buyer. When I tell people my car has a 60HP engine, I sometimes get a very sincere follow up question of “oh wow, can you drive at highway speeds with 60HP?” If the car has less then 120HP, people sincerely believe it doesn’t have enough power to operate. With this misguided assumption, people buy cars with WAY more power than they will ever use (with the exception of people who buy performance cars with the intent to use that performance). So the entire car market is shifted towards oversized engines - which means lower fuel economy.

[Racer26]

I’ve had my insight at speeds in excess of 100mph (160km/h). It can operate in excess of the speed limit on every road in North America. The highest north american speed limit I know of is 85mph on parts of I-10 through Texas.

However, wind resistance increases with the square of speed. Fuel consumption increases dramatically after about 60mph. I strongly suspect with a long enough straight, flat road, that the insight could exceed 200km/h. Gearing is VERY tall in the insight’s 5MT. ~60mph (100km/h) at the redline of 2nd gear. When I started slowing down from 160km/h, it was because I was running out of road, not because I ran out of acceleration. IIRC, I was still in 3rd gear.