Very steep hills

[Jazzdriver]

I hope to visit the Lake district soon.  I would love to drive the Wrynose and Hardknott pass again.  I imagine the B mode would greatly help when descending and would generate plenty of battery power, but how is the Jazz/Crosstar at climbing steep (up to 1 in 3) inclines?  (There would be three of us on board.)

No gears (other than D/B).  No clutch.  Just relying on the motor to pull you up.

Has anyone experienced steep inclines in the Mark 4 Jazz/Crosstar?

Thanks.

[Worthingmike]

I have been to Italy and Switzerland twice with the jazz. Although I don't think I have been up a 1in3 I have been up some very steep hills with no problems. The problem I had was coming down as once the battery is full charged which didn't take long then the engine started to try and slow the car. It made a lot of noise. No idea what reves it was at. Needed to use the brakes a lot. 

[Yusaku79]

Yes,

I got the same type of problems, big noise and big vibrations, but it's the normal way of use of this tecnology (I raised the issue during the last service and the service guy told me that there is nothing wrong)

I don't know how other Hybrid cars handle the problem of the battery full during an descent from the top of an hill

[sportse]

I've had other hybrids, they both did the same thing.

Once the battery is full the engine started up with no fuel and ran as an air brake to provide braking - like the brake on a truck, it makes lots of noise as it is just wasting energy to keep the speed down.

The Jazz battery does fill up very quickly though, so it's likely to happen more.

There are a few steep hills where I can fill the batter gauge on the Jazz whereas I only ever had the full gauge once on the Auris hybrid.

You can also fill the Jazz battery up quickly when braking on motorway slip roads too.

[shufty]

...I've found that even on something not remotely hilly that if you accelerate from a slowish speed that the engine 'revs' soar, speed increases but not drastically and the engine sounds like its trying to 'change gear' but never does. Even if you ease off the engine sound doesn't quell even though you are not really going anywhere.

[Kenneve]

Yes, in that situation the EV action is reversed, in that the  EV motor becomes a generator, driven by the wheels to generate power, to rotate the engine, to thereby provide the required retardation.
Very much the same, as changing down to a low gear on a manual gearbox.

It would pointless to simply lock the dog clutch, to connect the engine to the wheels, since the overall gear ratio would be far too high (equivalent of 5th or 6th gear) to provide any significant retardation.

[sportse]

Yes, in that situation the EV action is reversed, in that the  EV motor becomes a generator, driven by the wheels to generate power, to rotate the engine, to thereby provide the required retardation.
Very much the same, as changing down to a low gear on a manual gearbox.

It would pointless to simply lock the dog clutch, to connect the engine to the wheels, since the overall gear ratio would be far too high (equivalent of 5th or 6th gear) to provide any significant retardation.

Yes, in the Auris/etc it runs the engine without fuel as it's directly connected through a type of gearbox.

In the Jazz, maybe the engine is generating electricity to power the motor backwards to try and provide braking?

[Expatman]

Yes,

I got the same type of problems, big noise and big vibrations, but it's the normal way of use of this tecnology (I raised the issue during the last service and the service guy told me that there is nothing wrong)

I don't know how other Hybrid cars handle the problem of the battery full during an descent from the top of an hill

Doesn’t that make for a stressful journey? It seems that a problem with the Honda (and other) hybrid systems are the excessive noise while climbing and descending steep hills; okay if you live and drive somewhere flattish (Easy Anglia) but less so in hillier parts of the Country. I am seriously considering a Crosstar or HR-V but don’t know whether I could live with the noise/vibration issues I keep reading about.

[sportse]

The noise/vibration is only when going down hills with a full battery, so won't happen very often at all.

Going uphills is fine if you set the accelerator and keep the setting, I have had 5 people in my Jazz with luggage going up a motorway hill no problem maintaining 70 with not much engine noise at all.

I drove 150 miles on the motorway yesterday at 70mph and rarely had lots of noise from the engine.

I've found I only have one accelerator position now for accelerating - about 1/3 to 1/2 way down, just press it there and keep it. You get good acceleration (maybe 80% performance) with not much noise.

If you want absolutely 100% of the performance then you will get noise - the car will hold 6,000 revs the whole time and add some fake gear changes to break up the noise.

[Jazzdriver]

Thanks.  I was only thinking of challenges going uphill.  I hadn't thought much about going downhill.  Wrynose and Hardknott are often up and downhill, so often the battery would soon get used up again after getting fully charged.  But there are some long downhill stretches too.

[Saycol]

Thanks.  I was only thinking of challenges going uphill.  I hadn't thought much about going downhill.  Wrynose and Hardknott are often up and downhill, so often the battery would soon get used up again after getting fully charged.  But there are some long downhill stretches too.
[/quote
Well, I appear to be in a minority if I relate my own experience of going up steep hills. The sort of gradients you get on A roads or motorways, absolutely no problem, plenty of torque. But on say a 20% uphill incline B road it seemed to struggle and it was the only occasion after a year's driving I have ever felt the car was underpowered. It did get up the hill ok, but glad I wasn't in a hurry!

[Bazzzer]

To give some context for those who have not driven Hardknott and Wrynose, here's a graph of my journey over there in my MGBGT in 2012, travelling eastwards.  The average descent gradients in that direction are approximately -17% and -14%.  Of course, the graph doesn't show the bends... the highest speed (shown by the blue line) was approx 31mph.

The other photo is the western descent from Hardknott.

[Kenneve]

I just don’t understand the term ‘excessive engine noise’ when negotiating steep hills.
It is no different to a manual gearbox in such conditions.
You will be in a low gear and the engine will be revving to provide the power required for such hills. Or of course in a low gear to provide engine braking.
It is just something you live with in such situations.

[shufty]

...I get excessive engine noise at 15mph on a slight incline, minimal throttle. As mentioned it feels as though the 'gearbox' wants to change up but just doesn't and can't make its mind up and decides not to.

[Bristol_Crosstar]

The engine noise is worse going up a steep hill if your battery is low at the start as all the electricity has to be generated by the engine, if the battery is fairly full before you start the incline it helps reduce the engine revs when ascending.