Camry HybridDiscussion area for the Toyota Camry Hybrid. Topics of discussion range from fuel economy, safety, modifications, performance all involving Americas favorite family car, the Toyota Camry.
Camry Hybrid. Anyone know of a plug-in conversion kit for the camry?
My name is Andrew. I own a 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid. I have seen all these people who own Priuses adding a plug-in conversion kit to them. I was wondering if anyone knows of a plug-in conversion kit made for the Camry Hybrid. I am interested in buying one and having it installed as I want to as electric as I can...please advise if you can refer me to a product and installer who does this. Oh and I live in the Washington, DC area.
AFAIK no one makes a kit for the TCH. And the ones that do exist for the Prius are only for the second gen models.
All that being said, IMHO it's a significant monetary investment (on the order of $10k for the Prius version) for questionable gain for the majority of users. Most Pruis' with this kit achieve somewhere around 25-30miles of all electric low speed ( below 34mph ) driving before reverting to conventional Hybrid operation.
The additional battery pack weighs close to 200lbs which puts a 2-3mpg dent in fuel economy when in conventional hybrid mode. The battery pack for the Camry will probably have to weigh more...
And i'm sure Toyota would like no better reason to void your Hybrid Component Warranty if this system is installed.
If your goal is to be as electric as possible, a better choice if you don't really need the room of the Camry is a Nissan Leaf, or you could just wait for the Plug in Prius coming out in a little while.
we had this discussed here before, and it keeps coming back like bad penny. financially, it is not worth it. total cost does not warrant install, even if you drive TCH until wheels fall off. not enough mpg gain and realistically speaking, car will be sold way before kit pays for itself. plus, there's a lot of negative feedback on those anyway. it's hip, but ain't worth it.
My name is Andrew. I own a 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid. I have seen all these people who own Priuses adding a plug-in conversion kit to them. I was wondering if anyone knows of a plug-in conversion kit made for the Camry Hybrid. I am interested in buying one and having it installed as I want to as electric as I can...please advise if you can refer me to a product and installer who does this. Oh and I live in the Washington, DC area.
Based on a report I saw the all electrics get around 9 MPG because of the cost of electricity to charge them up. So think about it, the cost of electricity ( not always green if it comes from coal) depending on where you live, VS gas & electric.
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Based on a report I saw the all electrics get around 9 MPG because of the cost of electricity to charge them up. So think about it, the cost of electricity ( not always green if it comes from coal) depending on where you live, VS gas & electric.
I think your report was written by an above average ape. Calculating cost of electricity for miles driven, it is typically under $1.00 per gallon equivalent. If it were really 9MPG equiv, NO ONE would buy an electric (unless they were an above average ape, of course).
There are several Hybrid Camry's running this kit.
Any more info on TCH (2012 model even... but I know its too much to ask) battery mod add-on? Plug In or not? I am not just looking at this from the driving electric only for longer distacnes. I also want to get that monster electric motor (105KW or 141 HP) fully powered to add to the 156 HP gas engine. Right now, the 1.6KWH battery is what limits the total gas+electric power at 200HP (new 2012 Camry Hybrid Toyota spec, adding just 34HP as the electric motor contribution, vs. 40HP in previous TCH gen). So the battery limits the electric motor's power. Otherwise, we may get a 300HP car (yes, needs different tiers etc but)... for a very cheap price.
Going to get a 2012 XLE hybrid with convinience and Entune/nav packages (no moonroof!). Thinking as an experiemnt, when the current battery ends its life (warrenty here is 10 years/150K miles so quite a long way to go), trying to mod this car as above.
Thanks for any info
(new to Toyota and to Camry coming from Pontiac - this site is great!).
I believe the inverter would also need to be enhanced, since it is only designed to handle the ~200 combined system HP. I'm sure the inverter is underrated for reliability reasons (especially in high-heat areas), so I wouldn't be surprised if it could handle ~250 combined HP. Of course, you'd need to somehow decrypt and modify the computer code to allow this extra power (impossible so far), or augment the computer with a custom computer like the highest capacity Enginer system does (I think...). I wonder if you could somehow hijack/modify parameter data in the CAN BUS to trick the car into allowing more power to the inverter... Risky, but interesting.
I believe the inverter would also need to be enhanced, since it is only designed to handle the ~200 combined system HP. I'm sure the inverter is underrated for reliability reasons (especially in high-heat areas), so I wouldn't be surprised if it could handle ~250 combined HP. Of course, you'd need to somehow decrypt and modify the computer code to allow this extra power (impossible so far), or augment the computer with a custom computer like the highest capacity Enginer system does (I think...). I wonder if you could somehow hijack/modify parameter data in the CAN BUS to trick the car into allowing more power to the inverter... Risky, but interesting.
You are right about the Enginer system (it has its own computer to supervise the higher capacity/plug in LiIN battery). There are few other makers of batteries, but the Camry Hybrid has none (it was not a popular model only few sold vs. the Prius).
Honda used hybrid before for more power (peak power on a temp bassis) where they did combine fully electric motor power, their aim was not the MPGs. However, one needs both MPGs and power and of course cost - that is the challange for Toyota. Maybe we will see it in a future model.
As for the current hybrid, once the life of the battery is done (10+ years as per warrenty in CA following states in the USA), and the value of the car will no longer be high (no one will do this on a new car of course), it will be interesting to experiment with such platforms.... they have less moving parts, and the hybrid system other than the battery is even warrented for 15 years/150K miles.. so Toyota must have made them quite reliable... I am not a mechanical engineer to be able to tell you if the mechanics will support 300HP vs 200... I think it will give above reliability, but yes its an experiment. Everythign being designed has a life span, and for Toyota to offer 15 years warrenty they had to do it a bit stronger... Interesting experiment indeed.
I do not suggest doing this on my own of course, and I have this topic as what I would like to see in next gen Camry Hybrid - 2016-2017 or so. But given Toyota is slow.. it may only come in Gen 9 ....
Last edited by CamryHybrid2011; 10-31-2011 at 02:35 PM.
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TCH battery mod for higher total combined power: 300HP?
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