Comments by "Be Low Below" (@toyotaprius79) on "Kirk Kreifels" channel.

  1. Kinda relieved, kind of, that this new pick up is getting a hybrid. It's both long overdue and unexpected for Toyota.
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  2. 25kW at 48volts, a bit different than Honda's old IMA. I was hoping that Toyota could supply a 3 cylinder hybrid like the Aqua's/Prius C and fit it in longitudinally somehow. Their torque, efficiency with a light weight chassis would be really desirable
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  3. And the Wagon
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  4. Here's the thing, automakers made profits by using tooling and parts for decades such as engines and transmissions. It's a +100 year old industry that's now being outpaced in a rapidly evolving marketplace globally. EVs like computers are advancing so quickly that if Nissan focused on mass producing and reducing the cost of its first generation battery cells, it would be left far further in the dust by other competitors. That's why every automaker from VW (pre dieselgate) to Toyota pushed back against any electrification because they lack the ingenuity to change business model, especially investors and executives, and it's why for so long they lambasted that there's no market for EVs until Tesla and legislation globally said otherwise.
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  5. Hey Kirk. Shouldn't Toyota not consider shipping in the Aqua back to Western markets? Of course there's the Yaris in Europe but they're two complete different cars. Most manufacturers have dismissed small cars out of market projections from 2018.
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  6. Their attempts to comply with new emissions regulations have been less faithful than it was in developing the Prius and hybrid drivetrains.
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  7.  @sundownfilms9058  I would love a rotary MX5 or kei car. I would doubly love a rotary hybrid (more similar to a Prius or Honda CRZ) that's more direct to the road wheels but helped greatly by an electric motor or two.
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  8. Cobalt is already used to remove Sulphur in the refinery process. For god's sake 🤦
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  9. This is the macroeconomic result of an industry that relies in crossovers to maximize profits. Maximizing profits begets inflation. Inflation reduces the value of profits, and you get the picture
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  10. Yaaaas! But it can't just leave the entry level market. My ongoing disappointment with Toyota will persist (i rather it not), given how they treated the Prius here in the EU market since the 2nd gen. The US and Japan had base levels, even the UK, but many places such as Ireland they didn't understand who would be in the market place foran affordable "alternative fuel vehicle", so they exclusively sold it as a posh item , a base Lexus by price. Gen 3 Priuses were only top spec and badly priced at 30 grand, a stone's throw from the CT200h. But they had no problems pushing turbo diesels.
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  11. You're getting warmer. What you can identify is that the demographic of car buyers is growing older, smaller and wealthier. That's the demographic for profitable premium crossovers that incidentally creates inflation, reducing the value of profits, creating price hikes and do on. Not only does that alienate more people, especially under the age of 50 years away from new cars, it pushes more pressure on the much larger second hand market which has been exploited to no end. If your government (and markets) can identify that most young people can't afford a lease on a second car let alone want one - then that can scare your economy into a crisis
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  12. This honestly makes me sad for the years these options have been deprived across the US market. There's a Wagon Corolla hybrid in the EU that virtually unknown, especially with a 2.0l engine. Imagine, a Corolla hybrid station wagon with eAWD, possibly as a PRIME? Something is dead wrong with Toyota's executions on consumer interest and market speculation... By mid decade what we saw were short term actions like axeing the Prius C and Plus and complying with market regulations which thankfully brought us the PRIME plugin hybrid It's like Toyota wasted time and sat on its laurels throughout the 2010s. The eAWD hybrids are the more desirable hybrid in the US interior. An eAWD small/mid size pickup hybrid would be the holy grail, hence the Ford Maverick. Has nobody seen all the Prius-truck conversions? The car alone is a proven workhorse. The lack of awareness from Toyota is infuriating. It's maddening for what the hybrid synergy engines could actually do. The eAWD existed in Japan since 2015
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  13. The MallFinder
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  14. In case anyone had forgotten LG Chem/Energy and General Motors had quite the firey relationship with the Chevrolet Bolt.
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  15. Not a hatch. Come on.
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  16. Remember, the economy we live with creates its own contradictions. Such as eventually creating an oversupply in anticipation to achieve maximum growth and profit. Especially when said maxium growth means crossovers and premium across every competitor. And consumers are increasingly priced out of the market, infaltion helping that divide too, especially driven by an industry wide pursuit of maxium profiteering. Have they not learned from the last crash?
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  17. The more upmarket and expensive it goes, the further it moves away from the whole point of the Prius.
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  18. American market (and now the Europeans) are chasing the diminishing pie of profitability. Why cars are growing into premium crossovers and SUVs is because inflation is reducing the value of profits, so those who actually run the car companies decide that small, entry cars are not viable, while believing Audi and Tesla competitors are what people actually want? There's only an economic crash and burn at the end of this road.
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  19. 10 years not enough
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  20. No ePower in the US. That's a problem worth noting
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  21. Imagine a PRIME Truck like the Ford Maverick hybrid if it plugged in... Opportunities are being wasted left and right by these giant automakers.
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  22. They're missing out on a crucially easy and lucrative market. "Soft roader" camper priuses and pick up priuses/hybrids.
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  23. Give it up If California didn't have it's vehicle emissions regulations in the 90s, there would be no Prius and Toyota would be more happy to not make hybrids, let alone EVs Even with a monopoly on hybrids Toyota has squandered the 2010s. Don't hold your breath for Toyota
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  24. That was back during the 2nd Gen Prius. German cars from the 2000s definitely don't age or last as well or as long
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  25. Annoyingly something they could've done since the 2000s, but market emissions regulations didn't force them to.
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  26. It's helped by the fact that a lot of BEV news are dominated by Executive and Exclusive cars and SUVs. It sucks. The best EV news are affordable, efficient, sustainable, attainable and practical EVs. Looking forward to a big surprise from the 5th generation Prius that really does perform as a strong all rounder - hopefully for Toyota just before Aptera starts cranking out their cars which may steal their lunch.
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  27. Doesn't Toyota know that there's a whole community of Prius drivers that like to upgrade their cars? And to keep them running as long as possible? "Outlanding" suspension lift kits, camper conversions, antiroll bars and braces, battery balancing chargers and PHEV kits. On board inverters to power air fryers and appliances. Anti theft Catalytic converter shields. ...
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  28. A man could dream
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  29. Now if only Nissan made an EV Note or Micra. Or a PHEV ePower
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  30. Nonsense. Mitsubishi iMiEV was re engineered for 4 star crash safety. Smart cars were always wrongly shamed as unsafe. Modern Kei cars are as good as any A and B segment car in crash safety.
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  31. Why is it so hard for Toyota to make a 1.6l tubro or superchrg 3 cyl hybrid with stronger batteries anf shove it in a sporty Yaris GR, Prius, anything?
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  32. The electric cars that people want are options that you can only find built in China. Europe is having the same problem. If you told someone back in 2005 that there would be a €50,000 Hyundai or KIA as a mid range car in 2020 they'd laugh. Even regular combustion engine cars like before 2008 have grown in an unsustainable fashion where there's an oversaturation of the samey kind of vehicle while making (advertising to) consumers believe they're being spoiled for choice.
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  33. It comes as an all electric version, but not a Prime?
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  34. Far far too late to be implementing "cost effective" electrification. BMW and Mercedes have been doing this since 2016. It's not going too well ...
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  35. It's nice that the i-MiEV does have a successor now, I do miss the jellybean shape, whether that old 2005 design is more efficient is a thought for another day. The absence of any other kei EV car in the JDM market was most strange. More surprising is that there isn't a Nissan e-power hybrid kei car, a shrunken down Note. Imagine, a tiny light little thing with a 63hp electric motor and God knows how much torque.
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  36. A tale as old as time lol. I always liked the Prius (in receipt of the iconic American hate) but it definitely had an issue with design inconsistency. It's neither evolutionary or revolutionary. It's a mix n match of details that some of us "Prius fans" just put up with. There are good elements in each, but they're never kept. Gen 1 was cuute but frumpy. Gen 2 had a new millennium sleekness about it - but also boring and a not so good rear (rounded off, chrome lights instead of tint wrap around), the interior was spacious in design, but it was also cheap/quickly designed. Gen 3 tried to be mainstream for the wrong reasons in the interior (cabin bridge) and its front fascia attempted the cuteness of Gen 1 but botched it, keeping the baby mustache under the badge. The gen 3's rear spoiler and light cluster were sharp 👌 Then gen 4 came along which was a mix and match of everything. Despite being so polarizing (and more similar looking to Lexuses in 2015-2017) and angry faced, the design language had nore effort in it, the rear tail lights are beautifully mad at night. The lifting beltline at rear windows and lack of a C-D pillar window sucks. Some design choices were too much than what they're worth; The rear tail lights were vulnerable to getting it; especially in the Prius Prime the fascia's acrylic nose and LED clusters are very expensive to fix - as well as the bubble rear hatch made of carbon fibre.
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  37. Toyota is kinda infamous for never listening to Prius owners. Their PR team especially Prius owners were making DIY plugin kits since 2006, chopped Prius truck memes everywhere and the lifted Priuses with 8" ground clearance and +1000W inverters for cooking while camping grew popular in the last 5 years.
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  38. What's with all the alpha advertising with so many ebikes? Especially for the US market
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  39. They already did. Toyota should've made the Ford Maverick hybrid a decade ago.
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  40. Hate to break it to you but there is plenty of demand. If you don't know where the EV infrastructure is then you simply don't care to know.
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  41. It's been a long while. It can depend on state by state, normally at just a few hundred dollars or a grand.
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  42. Learning that the aero Cd increased to 0.27 and the cargo capacity reduced, I'm still biting my nails that the Prius was formed to appease market tastes rather than make a clever, ergonomic and practically designed car.
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  43. 1st off: why can't Toyota fit a "normal" power split device hybrid in any of its trucks and vans? Should've been done 10yrs ago Second: 40K base😬😕😒🙄 should we feel surprised by this?
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  44. What would happen if those lithium salt deposits are nationalised in the domestic nation? Like what happened to Bolivia?
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  45. Not little
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  46. ​ @Hallowsaw but you can spend 45 grand on an ICE crossover? C'mon
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  47. What will Electric Viking say?
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  48. I would not entertain the segment either car competes in, but I would favour the Nissan Aria. It has active cooling now...
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  49.  @1985toyotacamry  They still produce and advertise diesel only commercial vehicles , not anything to do with concrete differences between oil burners and hybrids, but simply due to confirming to blanket commercial law and tax exemptions; diesel is still tax deductible for many businesses in many eu countries. Logically it would be unnecessary to invest in making a Prius if there weren't going to be any industry laws dictating otherwise. Toyota is simply running as a business 🤔
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  50. Pity. The Mirage needed more variety. The sedan comes from its prevelance for the south Asian markets it's built in. If only western markets were offered a wagon Mirage, manual , hybrid or EV could've been interesting if the will power were there. It would be the closest thing to a Dacia.
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