Though I still have about a month before getting my Prius, Hollywood Toyota has graciously let me take the silver demo for the weekend. I picked it up this morning (Friday) and will return it Monday. I remember someone's posts about placing the car in PARK that made the engine start right before turning the key off. I found you can turn the key off before placing in PARK. This works fine.<br>I'm taking a little weekend drive and will report any new findings, though everything is pretty well covered in this group. BTW, the guy at the dealer was impressed that you could just give a quick flick of the key to the start up position and let go. Just as his hand reached for the key to show me that I did it wrong, the engine came to life seemingly on its own. I'm averaging about 49mpg overall, but I only have 80 miles on it, half in Los Angeles freeway traffic. My favorite surprise was stepping on the pedal at 70mph. This thing has some serious torque. I was at 85 in no time flat. One thing I must make clear to those who have not driven this thing yet. Its not only the easiest car to drive, but the most fun!<br><br>What the "B" position seems to do is change the ratio of the CVT to spin the "generator" faster. Its not engine braking like in a regular car, so in some cases when you know you are going to stop and have a lot of momentum, you can get more re-generation from this position than simply applying the brakes.<br>-Jim Alden<br><br>P.S. I gave a ride to my client who had asked about the new car in the lot. After two blocks and some explination, she was sold. She's off to order one today.

&gt;&gt;&gt; What the "B" position seems to do is change the ratio of the CVT to spin the "generator" faster. Its not engine braking like in a regular car, so in some cases when you know you are going to stop and have a lot of momentum, you can get more re-generation from this position than simply applying the brakes. &lt;&lt;&lt;<br><br>Regenerative braking does not use the generator, it uses the main motor. Also, the CVT never changes ratios. It's a completely fixed planetary gear set that acts as a power splitter.<br><br>The "B" position of the mode selector seems to be one of the most confusing aspects of the Prius. Toyota's goal was to make the car drive like a normal car. Most cars with an automatic have a "2" position after the "D" position. Some even have a "1" or "L" position, but not as many. The main purpose of these positions is to use the gasoline engine's braking action to slow the car while travelling on an extended downhill roadway. This reduces the risk of the brakes overheating (fading), and reduces the amount of wear on the brakes (but slightly increases the wear on the engine). The other use is for starting on ice/snow, by forcing a higher gear than first, the torque to the wheels is reduced. The Prius automatically does the latter by detecting wheel slip and reducing power from the electric motor (poor man's traction control).<br><br>So the quick answer to what to use the "B" position for is that you should use it in those driving situations where you would have used the "2" position in a regular car with automatic transmission when going downhill (but not when starting on ice/snow).<br><br>To maintain similarity to other cars, Toyota wanted a "2" or "L" position, but since there's only one gear configuration, they didn't want to call it "2", "1", or "L" since that implies changing gear configurations in the transmission.<br><br>They also couldn't easily use the gas engine as a brake and besides, they wanted to use regenerative braking as much as possible. So they labeled the mode selector position as "B" and managed to really confuse the Prius buying public. Still, within a few months, the "B" position will seem a lot more natural and even more sensible. Just like the engine shutting off at stop lights is initially confusing and disconcerting, but eventually becomes the most natural behavior you could expect from a car.<br><br>Robert Snyder

&gt;&gt;&gt; P.S. I gave a ride to my client who had asked about the new car in the lot. After two blocks and some explanation, she was sold. She's off to order one today. &lt;&lt;&lt;<br><br>That's great. I showed my car to several friends at a party last night. They had heard about it and were slightly interested already. After seeing and driving around in mine, they're much more interested. There's a very high likelihood they will buy this kind of technology as their current cars need replacement. I told them about the 6 month wait on this model and the rumored plans for other cars using this technology in the future, so waiting seems the right choice in this case since they weren't really ready for new cars this year anyway. They were really glad I had purchased one and let them try it though since it gave them much more confidence that these are "real" cars.<br><br>So Toyota, crank 'em out, we're ready! Oh, yeah, and Bill Powell is over-ready.<br><br>P.S. to Bill, I know the wait is horrifying torment now (and it sure seems like your order is taking much longer than it should given delivery times for others). But as tough as the wait was for me, it all seemed to fade into the distant past within a day or two of actually owning the Prius.

From Prius "New Car Features", which you can order directly from Toyota for $38.80 plus tax and shipping as Toyota Part Number 00400-NCF18-2U. Toyota will accept credit card telephone orders at 1-800-622-2033. (This 194-page heavily illustrated book is a must for any tech-headed hybrid enthusiast. Thanks Bill Powell!)<br><br>P. 84: Hybrid Transaxle, Deceleration Driving:<br>"If the SOC (state of charge) of the HV (hybrid vehicle) batteries is within the specified value during deceleration, electricity is generated by MG2 (the big motor-generator) to recharge the HV batteries. If the SOC is excessive, the apportionment of energy to the hydraulic brakes is increased. However, if the shift lever is in position B, the engine is started by MG1 in order to apply the engine brake."<br><br>As with a conventional car, when you "downshift" to B, the engine is used as a brake to keep from overheating and thus losing the friction brakes on long, steep declines. Your energy goes into heating the engine and its exhaust, not just the brakes. That's why B costs mileage if you use it when it's not needed. Just use it on those long, steep hills and mountains.

&gt;&gt;&gt;If the SOC is excessive, the apportionment of energy to the hydraulic brakes is increased. However, if the shift lever is in position B, the engine is started by MG1 in order to apply the engine brake.&lt;&lt;&lt;<br><br>Does the second statement hold true in all circumstances, or only if the SOC is excessive? If in all circumstances, then a lot of us have been wrong in assuming that using B is a good way to recapture energy.

Bottom line:<br>Drive in "B" only when going down a long, steep hill, in order to save on brake wear. "B" does not provide more regenerative energy than "D".<br><br>Sam Williams

Thanks, reconfigurable_logic, for the latest reference to the "New Car Features" manual. If the market doesn't continue its recovery before my early August order arrives I may be reduced to virtual ownership via the manuals :(<br>Re: the use of the "B" position, I believe jsmith in message 2164 reported that patent 5,914,575, describing how the "B" position works, said that when motor/gen MG1 is used to drive("motor") the ICE that the fuel injection is turned off. In this case, when the battery is fully charged, using "B" should not use fuel and reduce your mileage.

I retract my original post that "b" seemed to recapture more energy. The manual even states the rate of charge is consistent; therefore it makes sense that it?s simply a means of keeping the car under reasonable control when descending a steep hill. I also noticed during my "testing" that the programmers were very conservative in the rate of discharge of the batteries. With slightly different programming, climbing a hill would be better on slightly more battery power than is available. Especially if the car knew a decent was just 30 seconds away. Currently even when climbing a fairly good grade, the car goes into re-charge mode when not accelerating. This of course is crucial on a very long drive up a mountain so you have the reserves always ready. A "mode" button would be great though. That, and the ability for the system to "learn" your driving habits and adjust to a slightly less conservative setting in some situations.<br>Lastly if in the future GPS was installed on every car, and the "system" knew what hills and drops you were approaching (database), it could radically reprogram as you drove. i.e. drain the majority of the battery on climbs knowing plenty of re-gen is just ahead as earlier mentioned. This would take road database with altitudes. The technology is there. If it improves your economy even 3 or 4%, it will probably happen one day.<br>-Jim