QUOTE: (sever-ug @ 20.11.2013, 12:19) Google translator is good enough. I typed " дет" instead "лет ". (дети - children, лет - years) д & л are close on the keyboard. Sorry, it was my fault. No doubt all our friends understand it as years (not children), do not worry about it. The cheapest Prius here is about 1 200 000 RUR ($36 000). The loaded is about $ 48 000 (but not as loaded as in USA, f.e. here it is without solar roof, etc). To be honest it is difficult to save money on fuel (to drive Prius) here. For example my fuel economy on my previous Prius NHW11 (4 years, around 100Kmiles with me) only about $2000. Prius is very expensive car: I paid about $17 000 for it (used , not new NHW20 from Sweden. With delivery and customs tax. But I like silence, comfort and reliability of it. As far as I know Prius is very very popular vehicle in Siberia. No one (other vehicle) can start engine when temperature is minus 58F. About roads: somewhere our roads so so, somewhere russian says: there are no roads but only directions. It depends on... because we are special breed most of us can repair own vehicle, even to replace valve seals well, about questions: what do you know about engine oil for Prius? Which kind of it do you use? As far as I know usually engines (and interior of the vehicles ) of used vehicles from USA have very bad condition. Because in the United States use the cheapest engine oil. Is it true?

In answer to what oil do i use, I use synthetic oil. Some Toyota engines have trouble with oil sludge (engine runs too cold) while other Toyota engines have trouble with varnish (engine runs too hot). I don't want to find out which in my car, so I use synthetic oil, the brand Castrol Edge or Mobil 1. My car runs like new. I started using it at the 15000 mile on the odometer.

As for the other USA drivers, they FORGET to change their oil. The oil itself never wears out, but the additives get full of gunk (carbon and the by products of combustion. Its kind of like washing dishes with the same soap over and over. Sure, you can get them wet, but the water is full of food stuff. It needs to be changed more often. Here, most Toyota engines can go 5000 miles between changes. Some go too far on the same oil. Then when the car doesn't start, people say "Toyota makes a bad car, it doesn't start in the winter time". Stupid Americans, car maintenance is the last thing on their list, so it never gets done. Fram oil filters has a commercial on TV that says "Pay me now, or pay me later". So folks even trade cars every year, just to keep from spending money on maintenance.

Cheap cars are not the normal in America. Worn out cars, vehicles with 200000 miles are more the normal. People tend to get a vehicle and drive it until it stops.If it cost too much to fix, then they buy another worn out car and drive that one until it drops again, it becomes a cycle.

I am beyond that now, I buy or lease a vehicle then drive it until the lease is up then lease another one. Or, if I like the vehicle I buy it at the end of the lease. I have a 2010 Toyota Camry Hybrid that my daughter drives, since her Honda Accord had transmission problems. It would have cost $3000 to $4000 to replace the transmission. I believe it would not be cost effective to put that much money in a 13 to 14 year old car. We traded it for the Camry Hybrid 2010 model.

We got our 2013 Toyota Camry Hybrid because our lease was up on our 2011 Toyota RAV4. We test drove the Venza, the new RAV4, the Prius V, and the new Prius. The new Camry Hybrid fit my wife the best. We drove from Indianapolis,IN to Daytona Beach, Florida stopping only once for fuel at about the 600 mile mark.
This was a vehicle with less than 400 miles on the odometer. At 70 mph, it gets 40 mpg. Not bad for a car loaded with all our luggage, and three people riding in it.

Finally, are you saying that the Prius does start in Siberia at -58F? If it does, that is amazing, it makes me wonder what oil that they use in their engine? I saw a program on TV by National Geographic showing kids in Siberia playing (it looked like recess) in the super cold conditions. The group had a big army like vehicle that they built a fire (!) under the differential at both ends of it. The announcer said if they did not put the fire under the diff, the bearings would starve for grease/oil and would fail since there was no lubrication. Yikes, we never have anything that cold here in Indiana. Lowest temp ever recorded here was -23F. I remember driving to work that day. My breath was freezing on the windshield as I drove my 1987 Mitsubishi Mirage to work. I can tell you it was the coldest I have ever experience. I have not had a cold day like that since. Occasionally, we get down to -10F but it does not last. We get hot summer days, the temp will go to 95F to an unbelievable 105F. Then we have drought to flooding. One year we have a drought of 10 to 15 inches of rain that never came. The following year we got 6 to 10 inches above normal. Why am I telling you this? Indiana has extremes of all kinds. Last weekend, the counties to the North of us had 42 tornadoes hit Lafayette to Kokomo. It wiped houses off the map. Do you ever get tornadoes in Russia? I would hate to have a car lost to a weather thing. That would be horrible.

So my comrades, I have written too much, again. My apologies for taking up so much space. I love chatting with all of you. Sincerely, Janstheman (JTM2955) and my Prius I named her Zoey after zoetrope which was a toy in the 19th century that you turned to see a scene changing. The root words Zoe- meaning life and trope- meaning changing. So Zoey is my life changing vehicle, I don't know where I would be without her. JBS

QUOTE: (sever-ug @ 19.11.2013, 0:03) JTM2955 it is a joke irony. it means your post need to be translated after that it will be understandable for all. any way a lot of thanks for your opinion. It is interesting story. I think all of us have own story "how I met Prius". As for me I have a question about Prius in USA. Is it true about smug of Prius's drivers in USA? I mean South Park Smug Alert! To be honest (nothing to say about quality of our gas, engine oil, roads and others) we are really envy of you. Because the cheapest Prius 3 here cost from 40 000 USD (Toyota oficial dealers)! Prius 2 did not sell from dealers at all.

As the years have past, the price of the Prius in the USA has increased, too. In 2004, you could purchase the stock Prius for $19995! My car was just a little over $28000, which was high even for me. Now, a stock Prius is $24995 and a loaded Prius is $34000. Inflation has struck even the Prius. My apologies, to all, but Machine translation can only do so much. I will still do my best to answer question about the Prius in the USA.
I watched the episode of "South Park" which said Prius owners breathed their own Smug. I laughed because nothing could be further than the truth. The owner that I have met are just normal people, we just don't like spending $75 to $100 to fuel up any vehicle. It cost me $35 to $45 to fill the fuel tank. That is much better than my next door neighbor who spends $75 every two weeks to fill his RAM pickup truck. A Prius is all about economics. I imagine I have saved $35000 is fuel cost over the past ten years. We, my Russian comrades, share a common belief that the cost of driving can be very expensive. The Prius can help once you get past the initial purchase. How are the roads in Russian? Does the cold really bother your vehicles? It seems that the heat in the Southern states have made the HV battery die early. So far so good with my own HV battery. Did you know that the fan for the HV battery has TWO speeds? Most of the time, the battery fan runs so quietly you would never know it is on. On extremely hot days, 90F or more, the battery fan goes into hurricane mode. You can hear something back there, and you may not be able to know what you are hearing at first. As the interior temp drops, the fan speed drops.
To all of my Russian friends, Prius drivers are a special breed. We know that this truly is a better way to drive. I just hope that Toyota will continue to produce the Prius well into the future. I hope that the machine language get the translation right. I use Google Chrome to translate Russian to English. Do you all have access to Google Chrome? Maybe if we all use it, we can understand each other better. Goodbye for now, sincerely Janstheman P.S. thanks to the translator, I can understand your translation better; why can't the machine (IT) translator get 9 years instead of 9 children; English is a weird language sometimes,JTM

Gosh you guys in Russia must have trouble with longevity of your vehicles. Before 2003, I had never heard of a Prius, the Honda Insight was the only hybrid that was readily available. The Insight, at that time, was only a two seat vehicle so I passed it up. We test drove a 2003 model NHW10. It was small, like a Honda Civic. It was quiet and very unusual. It was roomy for the driver and front seat passenger. But we passed on the purchase because the trunk was so small.
It was September 2003 when I saw the 2004 (NHW20) Prius for the first time on the Miss America Pageant. All I could say was " I want one ". We went to all the local dealer and no one had one to even look at or sit in to drive. We went to the North Side Indianapolis dealer and ordered one. That was November 2003.
So we waited, no one could get one, we never saw a car carrier that had any Prius on them. In February 2004, we got a letter from Toyota stating that our order had been received and they were working on it. It seemed that Toyota had under estimated the number of orders that they were going to get. The main hold up was getting batteries from Panasonic. They were cranking them out as fast as they could do it.

April 2004 we got the call from the dealer, are car was on the carrier heading our way. The car made it on the 15th of April 2004, Salsa Red Pearl with Package #9 all the bells and whistles, Navigation and Bluetooth with JBL stereo 6 Disc CD player AM-FM. This was the first car I ever owned with this much equipment. It was awesome. She drove it home and I played with all the equipment. This was fun, great and well worth the purchase price.

Now I am approaching the ten year mark and I still love this car. The vehicle is wonderful on gas, it always goes and stops like it was brand new. I have never had any electrical issues. I have had three, yes I said three, inverter water pump replaced on this car. All were replace free of charge by Toyota. I had my first major service at 140k miles. They changed all the fluids, cleaned the rear brakes, did a four wheel alignment and included a tune up with a check out with Tech Stream. Nothing bad was found. So nine years and 146,000 miles later I still brag about the reliability, mileage and dependable car that it really it. If I would have purchased an American or European vehicle, I know I would have spent more on maintenance, fuel and even insurance.

No car is perfect, but I believe the Prius comes as close to that perfection as it can. Would I buy another Prius? Not a 2010 and up, I don't like the flying buttress in the middle. It makes me feel claustrophobic. Hopefully, the 2015 Prius will be different inside, who cares what the outside looks like. Just my opinion.