Another Newbie

[Ed the Ted]

Hello everyone……. Like Charlie Alder I also have changed from a CT200h to a UX250h. The wife and I wanted something with a higher ground clearance (both of us in our 70’s and not so nimble these days) for getting in & out. Collecting the car on Monday 14^th from Lexus Stoke. It’s 15mths old UX250h Premium Plus pack, Graphite Black with Ivory leather interior. Loved the way it drove and the general layout of the interior. The CT has been a great car and the UX brand IMHO is an Ideal replacement with similar handling and MPG.

[PCM]

17 minutes ago, Ed the Ted said:

Hello everyone……. Like Charlie Alder I also have changed from a CT200h to a UX250h. The wife and I wanted something with a higher ground clearance (both of us in our 70’s and not so nimble these days) for getting in & out. Collecting the car on Monday 14^th from Lexus Stoke. It’s 15mths old UX250h Premium Plus pack, Graphite Black with Ivory leather interior. Loved the way it drove and the general layout of the interior. The CT has been a great car and the UX brand IMHO is an Ideal replacement with similar handling and MPG.

Happy days!

[Charlie Alder]

Welcome to the UX lot as well Ed the,Ted. I will give a report after I have driven her for a good few miles. I have noticed that the traction Battery takes a lot more regen braking and engine input to stay charged than the CT did. One question for those with more experience with the UX: how does engine braking work when decending a hill? The CT had a specific engine braking function but there is no equivalent on the UX. Any help here folks?

 

[EvilRacer329]

Welcome! Definitely seeing more and more of these on the road, at least compared to my partner's Honda CR-Z. She wins the exclusivity competition...

The UX has no "B"-mode, and there's no way to crank up the engine braking - a mild frustration, but a real one. Instead, even on very steep hills, I basically use the brake pedal to increase engine braking, careful not to push it beyond the indicator on the regen and so apply the actual brakes. It works pretty well, and means you can modulate the engine braking just like you modulate regular braking, while putting all of that energy back into the Battery.

Alternatively, you could put the "gearbox" into Sport/Manual mode and then pull the shifter down through the artificial ratios, keeping the engine higher in the rev range. It'll keep your speed down just like in a regular car, but you'll be turning all that potential gravitational energy into noise and heat rather than electricity, so Lexus don't recommend it as the most efficient solution.

Hope that helps!
Nick

[EvilRacer329]

I was thinking about this again yesterday and remembered that I had discovered a workaround, of sorts. I noticed that the cruise control seems to be able to use more regen than the driver is, so I did some experimentation. If you set the adaptive cruise control to the lowest speed it will take (around 15mph I think), it will attempt to slow down quite aggressively using the regenerative braking whenever you let off the throttle - far more than the default "engine braking" effect. Of course, this only works if you never touch the brake, as that cancels cruise control entirely. But in certain circumstances it might be useful!

Nick

[Thackeray]

On 9/28/2020 at 11:51 AM, EvilRacer329 said:

you could put the "gearbox" into Sport/Manual mode and then pull the shifter down through the artificial ratios, keeping the engine higher in the rev range. It'll keep your speed down just like in a regular car, but you'll be turning all that potential gravitational energy into noise and heat rather than electricity, so Lexus don't recommend it as the most efficient solution.

I think you can use engine braking while you're in Drive too, by just using the steering wheel paddles. (This is how it works on the IS300h anyway). You don't need to select Sport for this to work.

But if you do select Sport, you can also select lower ratios for acceleration as well as engine braking. Whereas in Drive you can use the paddles to select a lower ratio for engine braking but as soon as you accelerate the car takes over choosing the right ratio.

On conventional cars, I have always used engine braking going down hills to help save wearing the brakes. But I've realised on a hybrid car I should use the brakes going down hills for as much regenerated power as possible (checking the power meter.) As you say, if you use engine braking you might be just throwing away energy as heat and noise.

[EvilRacer329]

That makes sense - until someone told me to change the gearbox mode I'd given up on the paddles because the engine kept ignoring me! But yeah - plan ahead while driving and you can get down most hills using the brake pedal but without ever putting pad to disk. It's a great feeling to cruise all the way through the next town using electricity you captured by feeding the batteries all the way down the last hill!

Nick