Prius as backup generator with midnight classic as voltage converter possible?

[SunEagle]

even with the inefficiencies I bet it's still a better use of your gasoline then running a normal generator

I would think you have to understand how well the engine is tuned to run at peak performance. Some generators are pretty smart and will throttle the engine based on the load. That will save fuel and improve efficiency.

If the same is true with the Prius and it has been "tuned up" then that could be a more efficient way to charge your batteries. Although nothing stays the same so you need to baby sit the entire system to see if it is performing as efficiently as possible.

[bcroe]

My own experience with small air cooled engines, is the flywheel driven ignition has a fixed
advance. This means you only might get best fuel economy at one rpm and throttle setting.
By converting a small tractor engine to electronically controlled advance, it was easy to map
out advance for about half the minimum idle speed, far better torque over the entire rpm
range, and about 15% better fuel economy overall. Check out your generator. Bruce Roe

[travissand]

You’re probably right. What app do you use to watch fuel consumption? I am using Dr. Prius to watch the hybrid battery but I’m wondering about the other details now.

There's a lot of apps that will probably do it. I am using torque pro. It was cheap. And it's very popular. if you go into the real-time information and then you hold down on a blank area you can make a custom graph/chart. Scroll down through the hundreds of options find the fuel section, add & place where you want it. After you've put it there hold on the graph and change its settings. Change the minimum and maximum values to something reasonable.

Somewhere in the Priuschat website there is instructions and a file to download to make torque show all of the battery voltages as well. I tried it with not so good luck. Maybe I didn't know what I was doing I don't know.

[Carmat76]

Well... in all my excitement, I ran the Prius out of fuel and didn’t realize it. I went to check on my ‘experiment’ and the dash was lit up and the car was calling for fuel. I didn’t have any and the long story short, I now have a car that won’t turn on. Dash lights blink once on power up (less than 1 second) and that’s it. Added fuel... 3 gallons or more. Can bus is not available to connect to... it won’t link up. I’ve been googling this one but I’m stumped. 12v battery is up and I also tried boosting. I remember before I shut it down, the HV battery was around 5 bars but I have not yet checked that voltage. I do not have access exposed to those terminals yet.

travissand, any ideas?

[travissand]

Well... in all my excitement, I ran the Prius out of fuel .

travissand, any ideas?

Have you tried clearing the codes with Doctor Prius?
I I recently rescued somebody who was ran out of gas in their Prius. I removed the high voltage cover and check the voltage and it seemed high enough to me but I went ahead and jump started at the high-voltage battery anyway which was very sketchy using standard 12 volt jumper cables. if I had to do this again I would have drove home and got some high voltage cable and crimped on the correct diameter lugz. it didn't seem to be working until I cleared the codes and I have a feeling that it didn't need a jump at all. It probably would have worked fine if I just used doctor Prius to clear the codes. You can also clear the codes by disconnecting the 12-volt battery for a few minutes.

[travissand]

I've seen a thread I think it was titled on priuschat it was titled ran out of gas now what? I did not read it though

[Carmat76]

I’ve tried to connect to OBD but the vehicle will not link up the CAN bus... dash lights just flash for a second and then it’s all dead. The power button blinks orange about 8 times and then the vehicle is off. One press of the power button turns on touch screen display and radio and power windows work but no dash lights at all or wipers or park button light or climate. Upon second button press it flashes as described above. I have continued to add fuel in case I was low.... nothing.

[travissand]

The lights flashing and then turning off doesn't sound familiar to me. I don't think that's what I experienced with this person's generation 2 Prius that ran out of fuel. Try resetting any possible trouble codes by disconnecting the 12-volt battery?

[travissand]

Maybe it didn't actually run out of fuel. maybe it's a different problem like the 12 volt converter got overloaded and went bad or blew a fuse? Try searching priuschat forum about 12 volt converter problems and see if anything looks familiar to the symptoms you're having.

[travissand]

How long has the Prius been running this time? Was it the longest time so far? Maybe your charger was pulling more power out then the 12 volt converter could handle. So it was draining the two 12 volt batteries you had hooked together. converter could not keep up. Eventually the 12-volt battery voltage got so low it was practically shorting out the converter?

I've heard if the 12-volt battery has any sort of issue that it causes all kinds of weird problems and most of which are corrected when the 12 volt battery gets fixed. I'm not sure how many of those people really understand what their problem was and when they take the battery out and put a new one they're essentially resetting the codes so maybe some of their problems where just that they needed a code reset after the battery was charged back up.

[Carmat76]

In other news... my Classic 250 has shipped so I have some incentive to get this little car back up and running

[Ampster]

...... You can also clear the codes by disconnecting the 12-volt battery for a few minutes.

That is what worked on a Fiat 500e whose charging software didn't work. In this day and age, reboot seems to be the magic word..

[Carmat76]

I found the issue with the Prius no start... AM2 fuse for inverter cooling pump. The pump is bad. I disconnected the pump and replaced the fuse... back up and running. As I do not drive the car I don’t imagine the inverter will need to be cooled. It makes me wonder about the high voltage AC coming off this inverter and my overall goal of making a stationary off - grid generator out of this Prius? Is that AC single phase?

[Ampster]

........Is that AC single phase?

Many EV inverters are three phase multifrequency motors. A quick Google search did not shed any further light on the subject. There may be external cables from the inverter to the motor and if so look for three orange colored ones which might confirm my assumption.
NOTE: One source did suggest that the Prius motor might be a permanent magnet syncronous motor (PMSM)

[Carmat76]

Thanks! I’ll check that cabling out.

travisssand, how’s the Classic 250 working for you by now? Mines supposed to arrive tomorrow afternoon. What mode have you settled on?