Turn your Prius into a UPS

[Andy Dingley]

"Richard Factor created a deep HOWTO on using a Toyota Prius hybrid automobile as an emergency Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) for your house. According to his estimates, it can be cheaper than buying a generator, as long as you already own the car."

(from

)

[Doctor Drivel]

Yep. There was talk of fuel cell cars being linked up to a house/grid powered by compressed natural gas or LPG, and all these cars would mean less power stations.

Calcars put larger Lith-Ion batteries into a Prius and a mains charging point giving over 100 miles range on batteries. As long as the cars is below 41mph the engine never cuts in. So on a commute over a week no petrol need be burnt at all. The cost of re-charging from the grid is pennies - if yiou plug it in at work even better. Initially Toyota scorned adaptations of the Prius, but now encourage it.

[Doctor Drivel]

"If the grid goes down - by dint of natural disaster, terrorist strike or a spike in demand - Richard Factor has a Prius that can supply power to his home. Factor, an electronics buff who lives in New Jersey, spliced a heavy-duty outlet right into the car's electrical system and wired his home's appliances to the Prius via a standard computer-backup system. When the car's own potent battery loses too much energy, running the engine recharges it. "If you are frugal, one tank of gas can power the house for a couple of weeks," he says."

[Phil]

...much better idea than driving the thing about with all those heavy batteries!

[Doctor Drivel]

The Prius battery is very light in fact. "It has a curb weight of 1254 kg. The Prius ... weight of the complete battery pack is 53.3 kg."

[Bob Eager]

I thought curbs were only used on horses? Speak English...

As for the weight, you're saying it weighs rather more than a hundredweight...

[Doctor Drivel]

Note the quotes. This is how in works in computers and the likes.

[Doctor Drivel]

That was the weight of the Mk 1 Prius. The Mk 2 battery has a weight of 45 kilograms of total battery mass. The more recent version were about 33 kg. New Lithium batteries much, much lighter still. The large battery pack installed to give 130mpg and charged from the grid are 81 kg above.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Now imagine the fuel consumption you'd get from a comparable performance diesel of the same weight saving build instead of the poor 24 mpg of a hard driven Prius?

Dribble doesn't speak but quotes...

And the tiny range on battery only could be replaced by a few pints of diesel.

[Doctor Drivel]

Richard Cranium is at it again. Our wonder tap fitter, is going on about tractors.

Is this 24mpg figure given to you by the people who sold you the taps?

Richard my Prius does about 60mpg, and zips along quietly...and I have proper taps too.

[Andy Burns]

I was reading up on

at the weekend, the planetary gear/engine/motor/generator arrangement seems quite clever

nice simulator at

?Country=GB

[Andy Burns]

?Country=GB

I can figure out what the "petrol pump" and "light bulb" icons mean, but what is the "galloping tortoise" icon all about?

Does it mean something along the lines of "I can't go any faster at the moment because I'm having to divert some engine power into the battery because you just drained half the battery charge by accelerating like a boy racer"?

[Phil]

And what do the useable battery packs weigh? And the motors/generator/other associated control gear (inverters etc.) Much better to ditch the lot & make it lighter & more economical to run. After all, electricity to recharge isn't e-friendly either.

Phil.

Doctor Drivel wrote:

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Yes - but don't mention its CVT here. ;-)

[Doctor Drivel]

He never because it is not.