[jsanford]

Yesterday we had a strong windstorm and it broke one of the two major floating bridges that people use to get from Seattle to all points east, right at the start of rush hour. Locals: I was in downtown Bellevue at the time, and I spent two hours driving two miles to I-90. Yes, that's right: on Bellevue Way at 4:45 and entered the freeway at 6:45.

Anyway, so the car was sitting a LOT, and then inching up in little increments. After an hour I noticed the IMA pack was down to three bars. I also happened to be a little light on gas. So I tried leaving a little gap between myself and the car in front when traffic would move so I could actually brake and recharge, but any time that distance was greater than the length of a MINI someone would pull their car into that space.

Since I had time on my hands, I called up the dealership and asked their advice. Other than taking the climate control system out of ECON mode, they really didn't have any ideas...didn't know if this was normal for parking-lot style traffic after this amount of time.

The car didn't go into forced-recharge until I was down to ONE bar, and then handled like I had the parking brake pulled: slow to start up, slow to stop. I've had similarly-themed problems trying to find parking, and like before, once I got the car moving (decided to risk a ticket and took the HOV lane on the onramp) the pack charged up halfway in three miles of faster-than-walking speed.

What else is new? Over the weekend I finally installed 6" rear Eclipse speakers into the stereo system, but that would only draw on the standard battery. Tires inflated that morning to 40psi all around. 22,400 miles.

Needless to say, I don't make it a habit to sit in traffic like this, nor roadhog in the HOV lane (I wouldn't have argued a ticket if called in) or even use my cell while driving. :shock:

 

[Herm]

Here in L.A. there are such things as traffic, too, and inching along (or even moving by meters at snails pace) will drain out the battery (in far less than 2 hours for me). All the accessories, wipers, defrosters, radio, ipod charger, etc., as I understand, will use the dc-to-dc converter to suck off the big battery, not the 12v battery. Ordinary surface street stop and go traffic on a long gradual incline (5 or 10 miles) will also do that. Mine goes out of auto-stop mode around 2 (or sometimes 3) bars, not often down to 1.

(But I'm often in Seattle, and imagine that the 405 any 8am from Renton to Redmond would also drain out the battery?)

 

[Guillermo]

That happened to me once in the worst and slowest stop and go traffic I have ever experienced.

 

[dont have one yet]

That happened to me once in the worst and slowest stop and go traffic I have ever experienced.

Keeping the headlights on really did the trick for me. I'm always at full or one 1 bar off. If I can help it always try to avoid using assist. I figure the less I use it the less I have to worry about the IMA light comming on.

 

[Valiant118]

FWIW, the guy who originally owned my '04 Insight commuted from Riverside to LA and back every day and constantly complained about bad mileage and the pack being discahrged. (It registered something like 39 mpg lifetime on the odo when I bought it.)

When I spoke to him he said he complained to Honda a number of times, and they always pronounced the car perfectly fit every time they tested it. He complained the IMA pack was always being slowly discharged in traffic and that the eventual forced recharge was killing his mileage. He'd added a funky window film to the glass that was supposed to reduce the A/C cycling and keep the temp down. Nothing worked and he finally traded it for an Accord or something.

Anyway, the day I bought it I drove it home from Phoenix, up the 5000 ft or so to Flagstaff and then across I40 to Colorado. That trip was the worst mileage it ever got and it was around 54 mpg. The pack never got below 1/4 charge during the long climb up to Flagstaff. Since then I've driven it over a number of mountin passes, topping out at 10-11k ft. The pack has never gotten below 3 bars. Where I live requires little stop & go the thing behaves better than advertised, averaging 60.1 since I reset the lifetime MPG indicator the day after I brought it home. It got 64.9 on a round trip to Albuquereque, cruising 65 mph. During that trip the pack never got below 3/5 charge going through the mountains.

It appears maybe communting can be aided by bypassing auto stop and a light foot on the accelerator to avoid using assist.

 

[kari]

I noticed something like this driving in NYC on sat. I usually am in NJ with lots of highway driving, but city driving there really sucked up the battery. Plus, it was a gorgeous day so the autostop was going on and off frequently. I didn't know that the insight would do this, but when the battery got really low it would rev the engine to charge the battery while I was stopped at a light.

edited to add: I don't think I had a recal, because I did notice that the charge indicator was slowly dropping and I just couldn't maintain enough charge to get it up again. But I hadn't read about forced charge, and it surprised me!

 

[jsanford]

So it sounds like it was normal and the car was just doing what it does. I'm glad driving in such conditions isn't normal for me (kept waiting for the senior in the walker to shuffle by the window ala Office Space...).

Mine has fleet daytime running lights configured so the headlights are on all the time. :roll:

I bailed on my service appointment. The hit on the tank's mileage wasn't so bad in the end--gassed up this morning and it still did 43.8mpg.

Silly Riverside guy. Now he can take a hybrid in the HOV lanes. :wink:

 

[Valiant118]

Silly Riverside guy. Now he can take a hybrid in the HOV lanes. :wink:[/quote]

Indeed! He was some kind of activist and covered the bumpers, right front fender & entire left side of the car with with political stickers. The adhesives eventually ruined the paint. The dealer painted it then got a lot of resistance from folks who figured the car was crashed. He ended up selling it through the Riverside auction, which meant I got it cheap. 61 mpg? Hey, paint it pink & orange for all I care!

 

[Braxus]

I would say this is normal. Had it happen a couple of times on my CVT (and the SOC is usually at least 75%+!). Had fans blowing and the radio on if I recall, just inching along at a local street and my battery meter got down to 20% or so which I thought was wierd. Guess we can all say that the Insight does not like to be kept in parking lot style traffic.