Why don't we get the Toyota Prius Prime in Australia?
It’s a Prius hybrid - only with the Prime, you can plug it in to the grid to recharge the bigger battery, and operate it for longer in ‘EV-only’ mode. So how come we can’t get it in Australia?
QUESTION
One of our family cars has been a Toyota Prius, which has been one of the best ‘A-to-B’ forms of automotive transport I have ever owned. The Gen 4 actually handles quite well too!
I know you like objectively, so I bought this second hand (Gen 4 2016 version) and it is now over 100,000km and has been faultless. The economy (real world) varies from 3.7 L/100km in the city to just under 5 L/100km on the motorway, driving normally at 110 with AC on etc. OK, the last owner ditched the 15-inch tyres and rims in favour of 17-inch, which whilst looked good, but buggered the economy form what it could have been and worsened the ride but we won’t go there…
The thing is there is fundamentally nothing to go wrong in terms of belts, gearbox etc. There are no belts in the engine, there is a solid planetary gearbox, the AC is driven from the battery by electric pump and the brake pads last for what seems forever as the regeneration slows the vehicle and the pads only operate to physically stop the vehicle at the last moment. Plugs, filters, oil and some long life coolant that is it.
So the crux of this is that this is (as the stats play out) is a strange but very underrated car. So much so I wanted to buy a Prius Prime. All the great elements of the Prius but being a PHEV has a usable real world electric range, can charge from engine (so no range anxiety) and for a price (in the USA anyway) that does not require Tesla cult $ membership!
I wrote to Toyota Australia and got zero response. They have been on records saying that nobody wants this as there is not enough infrastructure in Australia. It’s just a normal hybrid with a bigger battery and plug in function.
Would you be willing to able to at least mention this in one of your vids and see if those ‘monther-lovers’ in Toyota Aus will give a statement as to if it will ever come to these shores. I think (priced and marketed right) it would be a hit or at least worth the effort to show Australia that Toyota are serious about their PHEV technology. - Piers Cunningham
ANSWER
It’s a little unfair to say ’nobody’ wants the Prius Prime.
Toyota Australia has done the research (at least to its own satisfaction) and decided that an insufficient number of people would be prepared to purchase a Prius Prime in our market, and the price they’d need to sell it to be profitable, given all the regulatory compliance and product support (parts inventory and logistics) costs.
Bear in mind it’s easy to use phrases like ‘bigger battery’ without due care and consideration to what that actually means and involves. Battery capacity is expensive.
To put this in perspective, the Hyundai Ioniq Hybrid offers a 1.56kWh battery pack, while the plug-in version of the same car has 8.9kWh. The price increases by $6500 (this also includes an increase in electric motor output from 32kW to 44.5kW). The pure electric Ioniq jumps up to 38.3kWh and the price increases (above the Plug-in) by another $6000 - despite the elimination of all the internal combustion aspects of the design.
Conclusion: Batteries are expensive.
The Prius Prime (PHEV) is a nice idea - but how many people would actually reach into their wallets and stump up another $6000-$8000 simply for the pleasure of being able to plug the car in at home, like their phone? Probably not that many when, as you say, the regular Prius is so good at what it does.
It’s probably just another one of the hundreds of nice vehicles for which the business case just didn’t add up, here in Shitsville. This happens all the time mate.