DETROIT — Toyota Motor Corp. finally lifted the veil from its completely redesigned Prius on Monday morning in Detroit at the North American International Auto Show. The big news: 50 miles per gallon.
Spy shots of the car were leaked not long ago, but Toyota’s Bob Carter, group division head and general manager, did titillate the standing-room-only audience with a few details about the new car, due out in the U.S. and Japan this spring.
Carter said the third-generation Prius would beat its predecessor by 4 mpg, a 9 percent improvement in fuel economy, thanks to a more efficient engine and smaller, lighter components. At the same time, this Prius boosts the engine-only juice to 98 horsepower thanks to a new 1.8-liter four-cylinder engine, and the combined electric-internal-combustion hybrid potency is up to 134 horsepower (the second-gen Prius pumps out 76 hp and 110 hp, respectively).
Rumors of a solar roof option proved to be true, but not as people had imagined. Instead of a solar-powered air-conditioning system, the new Prius has a solar-powered ventilation system. Carter explained that this would take some of the load off the air-conditioning system by pre-cooling the interior of the car on hot days.
Apparently it takes quite a bit of juice to run an air conditioner. But because the A/C typically draws on the engine thanks to belts, Toyota has invented another cool feature: beltless air conditioning. Instead, the new Prius will have A/C that runs entirely on battery power, which Carter called the first of its kind.
To reduce parasitic drain on the engine further, the Prius’ water pump is also electric. Without all the hindrances, the Prius is able to drop its zero-to-60 time to 9.8 seconds from 10.4 seconds, “on par with a midsized sedan,” Carter said.
The new car will use the same battery as the old one, but Carter said it would be able to operate in a pure-EV mode as well as “economy” and “power” settings. No word on how much range it will have on battery power alone.
Carter said the new Prius’ coefficient of drag drops to 0.25, which is one-hundredth of a point better than the current model. Interior volume increases by 5 cubic feet.
Toyota sold about 160,000 Priuses last year. In its first year of sales, Carter predicts, the new model will move about 180,000.
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