I am an owner of a 2006 Prius, of course, I will recommend you for considering Pirus. I have driven Prius for more than 1 year, mileage is over 8000 miles. The regular maintenance was oil change for two times and tire rotation.
The main battery was designed for the whole car life, you don't need to worry about it. People talked about the failure of battery, because they even may not know there are two batteries in Prius. There are more than 13 computer chips to control Prius. The main battery (201V NiMH) is carefully controlled by computer for the charge and discharge between 40~80% of battery capacity as well as its temperature (electrical fan for battery). That is No deep cycles of battery charge and discharge. And according to the national lab test and actual road test, the battery would last for the whole car life.
If you want to know accurate information, please visit www.Priuschat.com or http://john1701a.com/
Wrong, both the gas engine and electrical motor are synergetically working. They can combine together or work alone.
Yes, 24 KM/L is the possible normal value for Prius
"我還是覺得油電車是過渡時期的產品 在台灣他應該算超級冷門的車吧"
In Taiwan, people may not have too much information about Prius. However, there were more than 5000000 units of Prius sold in the world since 1997. For the past month (March 2007), there were 19,156 units of Prius sold in US.