| ▲ | alistairSH 21 hours ago | |
The latest Honda Civic Hybrid (and its Prelude cousin). The ICE is a generator under most use cases - it's decoupled from the drivetrain most of the time. That said, the battery capacity isn't great - you aren't going to complete many trips out of your immediate neighborhood on EV power alone. | ||
| ▲ | jeffbee 20 hours ago | parent [-] | |
That's because hybrids aren't designed to do so. The battery is small in terms of both energy and power. Sometimes, if the car is initially pointed the right way, you could complete a very short downhill trip at low speeds without the engine starting. But hybrids are designed to run the engine often. The batteries are sized to capture approximately the kinetic energy of the moving vehicle when stopping, and discharge the same energy when starting to move again, and that's it. It's a great system, they all get 45+ MPG. | ||