Honda Civic Hybrid rant

[Skimask]

<snip>.....She ended up with a 2005 Toyota Matrix. Probably the most comfortable long road trip vehicle. Only complaint is side mirrors give extremely poor side situation awareness. It gets 36 MPG@70MPH.
....<snip>....
I owned a 1987 Chevy Sprint (100% Suzuki), 3 cylinder 1 L, it got 54MPG with a carburetor. It weighed 1400 lbs, zippy.
syncro in the first gear failed.

The 1998 Chevy Metro replacement (built in Canada with too much Detroit engineering) gets 42MPG. They added 700 lbs to improve crash safety. A dog. Throttle body injection (3 cyl. 1L engine). Still running, but rust is causing structural failure.

Holy crap Dude!  Are we twins???   I got my wife an '05 Vibe (same, same, different badges), same MPG, although with the front end wore out, it's not as comfortable as it should be.
Same thing with the Sprint (inlcuding the 1st gear synchro breakage), except I still got an '88 Chevy Sprint Metro (the Metro replacement with the fuel injection started in '89).  Crazy mileage, ~54MPG summer (~46MPG winter).  Not comfortable, not warm in the winter cold, not cold in the summer heat, but for $300 back in '98, I still can't beat it with a stick (and I have:) )

[VK3DRB]

I almost bought one of those but thought they were a bit gutless. I ended up buying a non-hybird Civic in 2008 and I have never had a problem with it.

But some Japanese companies still make rubbish. I once owned a Mitsubishi Magna - a lemon that Bitsamissing would not or could not fix. More recently a Toyota Corolla a family member owned was 1 week out of warranty (the mirror had failed in warranty) and it appeared there was a fractured wire in a loom for the passenger side mirror. They quoted $1100 to fix it. Like Mitsubishi, Toyota has lost a customer for life.

Honda seems to provide excellent service, despite being a bit pricey. At least I have no worries now. Touch wood.

[ignator]

Quote from: Skimask on Today at 01:00:57 AM>Quote from: ignator on Yesterday at 09:29:26 PM

<snip>.....She ended up with a 2005 Toyota Matrix. Probably the most comfortable long road trip vehicle. Only complaint is side mirrors give extremely poor side situation awareness. It gets 36 MPG@70MPH.
....<snip>....
I owned a 1987 Chevy Sprint (100% Suzuki), 3 cylinder 1 L, it got 54MPG with a carburetor. It weighed 1400 lbs, zippy.
syncro in the first gear failed.

The 1998 Chevy Metro replacement (built in Canada with too much Detroit engineering) gets 42MPG. They added 700 lbs to improve crash safety. A dog. Throttle body injection (3 cyl. 1L engine). Still running, but rust is causing structural failure.

Holy crap Dude!  Are we twins???   I got my wife an '05 Vibe (same, same, different badges), same MPG, although with the front end wore out, it's not as comfortable as it should be.
Same thing with the Sprint (inlcuding the 1st gear synchro breakage), except I still got an '88 Chevy Sprint Metro (the Metro replacement with the fuel injection started in '89).  Crazy mileage, ~54MPG summer (~46MPG winter).  Not comfortable, not warm in the winter cold, not cold in the summer heat, but for $300 back in '98, I still can't beat it with a stick (and I have:) )


I'm curious how many miles your Vibe lasted?
Her Matrix is at 116Kmiles. All paved roads so dust and mud are minimal.
Agree the Matrix could be more comfortable, but then you would be in some behemoth SUV that gets 18MPG.
Any suggestions on something more comfortable?
It was her choice, as she replaced the 97 Honda Civic, wanted the 5 door. It sits up higher, so with her arthritis, it's easy in and out. Sort of like medium pickup truck height. My parents have a Subaru Forester, which you have to do pretzel movements to get in and out of the driver seat.
Everything rusts here in Iowa, they don't plow if it snows less then 1", they salt, and salt. Right at the freeze line of snow and rain throughout the winter.

[reagle]

There are many ways to fix the pack-you can get a used one from a junkyard, condition all cells and swap it in. Or you grid charge/discharge the one in a car using a bunch of isolated power supplies strung together and in series with a current source like an LED driver to keep current low. I can certainly do that but the car is 7 years into 10 year/ 150k warranty, so this should not be my problem. Hence the rant
Now, as far as giving them an IMA light, I suppose you have to cause greater imbalance in the strings. One way I can see that happening is to let the car sit for a while, which is a bit of a pain as it is being used all the time.

[nctnico]

Speaking of Honda batteries...  my other car is a Honda Fit (regular ICE), also a 2007, it also has battery troubles, and dealerships also give me the run-around.  They had a similarly low threshold on replacing them, but after the battery dies once, it won't even hold a charge overnight so .  amusing tidbit: trying to track down the cause was my "get into electronics" first project.  I'm on battery #5 now, and it's "scheduled" to die in a few months.  We'll see if my last round of modifications make it survive or not

Your problem is probably the alternator overcharging the battery.

[NiHaoMike]

IIRC, with the way the Honda hybrids work, you could use the service switch to disable the battery and still be able to drive the car. The city MPG would basically be that of a non hybrid, but the highway MPG should be almost as good as originally.

[Skimask]

I'm curious how many miles your Vibe lasted?
Her Matrix is at 116Kmiles. All paved roads so dust and mud are minimal.
Agree the Matrix could be more comfortable, but then you would be in some behemoth SUV that gets 18MPG.
Any suggestions on something more comfortable?
It was her choice, as she replaced the 97 Honda Civic, wanted the 5 door. It sits up higher, so with her arthritis, it's easy in and out. Sort of like medium pickup truck height. My parents have a Subaru Forester, which you have to do pretzel movements to get in and out of the driver seat.
Everything rusts here in Iowa, they don't plow if it snows less then 1", they salt, and salt. Right at the freeze line of snow and rain throughout the winter.

Bought it with 60K miles.  ~123K on it now.  Due for all new suspension, including front strut bearings.  Run Mobil 1, change oil&filter ~7500 miles, air/gas filters every other year, coolant every 3.
Watch out when it hits 300,000 miles though.  The odometer stops counting up.  There's an 93-series eeprom on the instrument panel that holds the odometer setting and won't go past 299,999.9.  Have to pull the eeprom and reset it to zero-ish when it gets close to it.
More comfortable?  I equate comfort with fuel mileage.  My Sprint is the most comfortable thing I've got...eg. still sitting on that wad of cash in my wallet that isn't going into the fuel tank.
Other than that, I bought an '09 Odyssey LX about year and a half ago for use in my business.  Gets ~22MPG with my light foot.  If that thing has anything it's a lot of snort.  Amazing what kind of power they can pull out of a 3.5L V6.  But by far the most comfortable ride I've ever had, even if it isn't the gas sipper that the Vibe is.
Past that, have you looked at the Honda Fit?  They sit a bit higher than the Civic.  The short wheelbase makes it a bit bouncy of some of those roads with perfectly spaced expansion joints, but goes pretty good over washboard gravel.  Have a friend that has one, spent some time in it.  I kinda like it.  Gets about the same mileage as the Civic & Vibe.  BUT...you've already got the Matrix, so, can't spend money (on a new car) to save money (on gas).

[cimmo]

Speaking of Honda batteries...  my other car is a Honda Fit (regular ICE), also a 2007, it also has battery troubles,...

We don't drive it enough is their refrain.

Have you considered a simple float charger/battery maintainer? You can buy them but why not just make one using a random plug pack and one of the switch mode boost or buck converters you can find on ebay for a buck or two? You only need around 13.3 v @ 50ma to maintain the charge and offset self discharge and quiescent loads. If you use a switchmode plugpack/wallwart, then you're only looking at a few watts of mains, so it's way cheaper than buying new lead-acid batteries every year or three.

I only use my vehicle about once a week and mostly for short trips. I have almost always had a float charger connected (originally just with alligator clips, now I have installed a hardwired weatherproof $2 plug/socket). The original vehicle battery (which was a cheap and nasty built down to a price POS) lasted 7 years.

[ConKbot]

Speaking of Honda batteries...  my other car is a Honda Fit (regular ICE), also a 2007, it also has battery troubles,...

We don't drive it enough is their refrain.

Have you considered a simple float charger/battery maintainer? You can buy them but why not just make one using a random plug pack and one of the switch mode boost or buck converters you can find on ebay for a buck or two? You only need around 13.3 v @ 50ma to maintain the charge and offset self discharge and quiescent loads. If you use a switchmode plugpack/wallwart, then you're only looking at a few watts of mains, so it's way cheaper than buying new lead-acid batteries every year or three.

I only use my vehicle about once a week and mostly for short trips. I have almost always had a float charger connected (originally just with alligator clips, now I have installed a hardwired weatherproof $2 plug/socket). The original vehicle battery (which was a cheap and nasty built down to a price POS) lasted 7 years.

You can float charge a lead acid battery at a fixed voltage, but you wont be helping it as much as youd think you are. A 13.x V float charge wont overcharge the battery, but it wont get it to a 100% SOC either, and it wont help prevent any initial sulfation.   If you're going though the hassle of plugging in a charger into a car, get a proper 3 (+) stage charger that will do a cc/cv peak/cv float charge.  And as suggested earlier, it could be related to overcharge issued.  A voltmeter on the system while the car is on would be telling. 14.5v would be a good peak charge, but cook the battery if its operated for long periods of time (but most arent) 13.8 or less wouldnt even be a good charge unless operated for an extended period of time, and 15+ while good for a balancing  a flooded lead acid battery, cooks it if done constantly.   

Despite all their facepalmworthy news GM actually has their stuff together with their alternators (at least on the modern ecotec engines)  a DMM on the electrical system shows it peaking to ~14.6 volts after starting, and then after ~2-3 minutes of being at that, it drops down to 13.8v, giving the battery a proper 3 stage charge.  7 years later on my OEM battery, and still starting just fine even in winter which is admittedly not super harsh in the mideast seaboard of the US . (obviously one anecdote is not of statistical significance though... )

[NiHaoMike]

I once had an old Belkin UPS that pulse charged the battery with a clever circuit that used the inverter transformer in reverse. (In comparison, the similar sized APCs just used a linear supply.) The battery ended up lasting 5 years or so (compared to 3 for the various APCs) but the peak currents inside were sufficient that analog audio equipment too close to the UPS would buzz every once in a while.

BTW, 13.8V is around the best float charge voltage if you had to keep it constant. Which really means that the optimum is really more of alternating between something like 14.2-14.8V and 12.8-13.5V every few days or so. The high peak voltage inhibits sulfation while the lower "hold" voltage avoids positive plate corrosion.

[cimmo]

Speaking of Honda batteries...  my other car is a Honda Fit (regular ICE), also a 2007, it also has battery troubles,...

We don't drive it enough is their refrain.

Have you considered a simple float charger/battery maintainer?

You can float charge a lead acid battery at a fixed voltage, but you wont be helping it as much as youd think you are. A 13.x V float charge wont overcharge the battery, but it wont get it to a 100% SOC either, and it wont help prevent any initial sulfation. 

Agreed. And if I NEVER drove the car then I'd certainly want a more sophisticated setup. But all I am doing and recommending is to maintain the battery SOC/condition, ie; cancel out the self discharge and vehicle quiescent loads. A fixed voltage float charge after the car has done a bit of fast charging is fine - ideally slightly adjustable to compensate for ambient temperature variations.
Remember,  you only need a vehicle 'standby' load of ~41ma to reduce the SOC by 1Ah per day, and vehicular batteries really are NOT designed for deep discharge at all. A car sat idle for a fortnight, then driven less than an hour, then sat idle again etc.. will kill a battery in less than 2 years.
Been there, done that.

Also, FWIW, I used to set the float at 13.8v but gassing and water loss became an issue, so the lower voltage 13.2v -13.5v (depending on season) minimizes gassing but still prevents a reduction in the SOC.

[Stonent]

I've heard this same complaint from 2 coworkers about Prius. After software updates they complained of MPG loss. These complaints were back a few years.

I see no value in owning a hybrid. For much less money I purchased a Nissan Versa manual transmission. It cost $12K, and gets better then 40MPG (36MPG highway advertised). The CVT was too mushy performance to want to drive, and I don't trust they will get 80K miles before failure.

The $12K-$20K extra cost of a hybrid will never be recovered unless you drive it ~140K to 235K+ miles more then a conventional non hybrid, in the same size class (based on 47MPG hybrid @$4/gal, $12K=3000gal, $20K=5000gal). It will be shot before that ever occurs. You may have a better figure of merit to compute a value difference between hybrid/nonhybrid. I do try to be as 'green' as possible, but those batteries are not green when original manufacture and disposal are included in the amount of toxic waist created.

That and hybrid owners are always passing me, and I'm running the speed limit. No way they are getting their advertised MPG. You may be different.

The Versa has 'gitty up and go' with 1.6L engine displacement. With AC as standard. I'm 6'2", and sitting in any of the Versa seats (front seats to full back position, 4 door with big trunk) has extra leg room. Only complaint is ergonomic comfort on long road trips (as driver, mainly pedal distance to leg length issue, plenty of head and shoulder room).

The CVT in my jeep which is the same kind Nissan uses had to be replaced at 50k.

[Galaxyrise]

(sorry if I've hijacked this thread.)

Speaking of Honda batteries...  my other car is a Honda Fit (regular ICE), also a 2007, it also has battery troubles,...

Have you considered a simple float charger/battery maintainer? You can buy them but why not

It's not parked near an outlet.  We did try a solar powered kind, but it didn't seem to help.  The driving pattern when it was dying the fastest was weekday commuting, 15 minutes each way (which my previous car had done for years.)

Your problem is probably the alternator overcharging the battery.

A voltmeter on the system while the car is on would be telling. 14.5v would be a good peak charge, but cook the battery if its operated for long periods of time

I do still have the voltage logs from my little Teensy-based logger.  (It's only a 10bit ADC, but it can tell 14.7 from 14.6.)  I've attached a graph from the current commute, sampled at 60Hz.  Before the car was started, the Teensy was showing 12.8V and 81F (it crudely measures its own temp; it's in the cabin.)  The battery is about a year old at the time, I think.  The dips down below 14V last less than one second; like 40 samples.  My guess had been those correspond to the compressor coming on.  I can't find the logs I made from when the battery was new.

I disconnected some "extra" electronics the last time the battery died, and the commute is pretty long now. So I'm in a "wait and see" phase...  If it can survive the next winter, it may be in good shape.   If it doesn't, I'll probably be asking for your help on what to do next

[corrado33]

Aside from dishonesty, (which seems to be coming mainly from Honda's part) why not artificially drain the crap out of the batteries till they're really dead? I mean, it can't be that expensive to buy a nice power resistor (and some sort of high voltage clamps) rated for whatever voltage the batteries are. Heck, drain one set of those D batteries and the rest of the sets will probably go very soon.

I bet the batteries have some sort of monitoring that Honda could look at, so you'd have to drain it relatively slow, but if you kept it sitting for a week draining slowly, I'm sure they wouldn't assume foul play.

In my eyes, the car is pretty much useless to you now, so why not give it a try? If it fails you can always turn off the hybrid bits like someone said above.

And for the record, I also think hybrid cars are, for lack of a better word, useless. Clean diesel cars get almost as good of gas mileage using a MUCH more simple system. (But diesel has the stigma of being "dirty".) Plus hybrids are more expensive than their non-hybrid counterparts, often for only a few more miles per gallon.

[tom66]

After 250,000 miles, Roadster batteries achieve >80% capacity (projected from real world data, not Tesla's data):

http://www.pluginamerica.org/surveys/batteries/tesla-roadster/PIA-Roadster-Battery-Study.pdf

That  means the Roadster which did 240 miles to the charge will still do about 180 miles after 250k.

[ConKbot]

I do still have the voltage logs from my little Teensy-based logger.  (It's only a 10bit ADC, but it can tell 14.7 from 14.6.)  I've attached a graph from the current commute, sampled at 60Hz.  Before the car was started, the Teensy was showing 12.8V and 81F (it crudely measures its own temp; it's in the cabin.)  The battery is about a year old at the time, I think.  The dips down below 14V last less than one second; like 40 samples.  My guess had been those correspond to the compressor coming on.  I can't find the logs I made from when the battery was new.

I disconnected some "extra" electronics the last time the battery died, and the commute is pretty long now. So I'm in a "wait and see" phase...  If it can survive the next winter, it may be in good shape.   If it doesn't, I'll probably be asking for your help on what to do next

That looks reasonable enough, and 15 minutes should be about enough to charge the battery back up from starting the car, and 12.8v with the battery at rest is generally a 100% SOC, so parasitic loads aren't drawing it down while the car is off
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/charging_the_lead_acid_battery 
Are you sure on the calibration of the logger? even a 0.1v difference could push the battery from charging a bit on the harsh side, to overcharging. 
There is only one battery, and it is a flooded lead acid, not an AGM right? If its an AGM then I'd second overcharging killing it.

[Skimask]

And for the record, I also think hybrid cars are, for lack of a better word, useless. Clean diesel cars get almost as good of gas mileage using a MUCH more simple system. (But diesel has the stigma of being "dirty".) Plus hybrids are more expensive than their non-hybrid counterparts, often for only a few more miles per gallon.

Ain't that the facts!  ...and the 'green wanna be yuppies' and soccer mom's will never get that thru their thick skulls either.

If I were to have a hybrid in my fleet (and I don't see it happening anytime soon), it would be a series hybrid rather than parallel.  I guess you might call it a range-extended electric vehicle.  A diesel powered ICE, running at around it's most efficient RPM vs load point, driving a generator, which drive the electric motors, with a small battery pack somewhere in the middle.  I don't think that battery pack would be exclusively LiPo or NiMH.  I think I would want the bulk of the fast charging/discharging to be done by a small handful of Pb-acid batt's "near" the electric motors, mainly because you can comparatively beat the shit out of Pb-acid batteries and when they're done, they're almost 100% recyclable.  Then maybe "behind" those Pb-acid batt's, you put another handful of LiPo's or NiMH that charge/discharge a bit more slowly, feeding the Pb-acid batt's, at charge/discharge rate that the LiPo's or NiMH's can handle without degrading over time as fast as if they were the sole source of electric power.
But that's me thinking again.  Sure it's a complicated setup, but think of how people thought real fuel injection system were complicated when they first started to hit the market really heavy back in the early 80's.  I'm sure there will be a massive breakthru in battery and/or motor technology eventually.  Probably not in my lifetime, but eventually.  I'm not holding my breath.  But I am holding onto my $$$ in the meanwhile...

[SeanB]

I was on the road last night and saw ( eventually) a BMW 5 series diesel, that had a minor engine issue. At least I was able to see the silver grey vehicle when I went past it, as before it was hidden by the fog of paraffin flavoured smoke it was generating. I think it last saw a service before the current driver got it. Typical here that vehicles are serviced on the " when it carks and wont move at all" method, rather than on the recommended service intervals.

Not helped that it was twilight ( actually after sunset) and the driver was merrily driving without lights, though it is possible that none were working on the vehicle in any case.

[Skimask]

Typical here that vehicles are serviced on the " when it carks and wont move at all" method, rather than on the recommended service intervals.

Ya, I think that's typical around the world.
The moronic masses just aren't that bright...

[gildasd]

Got a Citroen C4 Grand Picasso last year.
It's a diesel hybrid "light",that simply use two starter/alternator/ motors and a higher capacity battery.
I did not expect much (the test drive was not good) but the C4 has won me over:
It's comfy, nippy, easy to parallel park, can seat 7 etc...
And is returning 4.6l average (city + highway) so far, that's more than 60mpg driving normally.
This how hybrids should be done.

[SeanB]

French engineering at it's best? Is this the Nissan design or one of those weird designs that seemingly are designed to be serviced by people with extra joints on the arms. You also get to know all the varieties of "Tool, Special" needed to just change the oil in it.

[gildasd]

Nissan is Renault, the "other" manufacturer.

I wanted to like the new Renault, but it felt like sitting in Jaques Chirac's frontal lobe. Not nice.
Did not even go as far as a test drive. Even the Dacia felt nicer inside (and that's as bare a the walls of a Romanian prison).

The similarly specked Opel, Nissan, Toyota and Mercedes were either smaller or/and used 1L per 100Km more for no gain.
As this is the wife's company car, and the only thing we pay is fuel, this was important.
We were limited to a max of 115gr of Co2, so that also eliminated a lot of models.
In the end we choose the C4 because it was the last one standing.

But it's not perfect:
- I can only put a max of 500Kg in the back before it sags too low, my previous bargain Fiat Doblo would max out at 1200Kg. Or load 600kg and still be driven on the motorway.
- When in first gear from a start, you need to wait a milli-instant fro the ICE to catch up to the instant EE before lifting the clutch... Or you stall it. Bad coding.
- The Iphone thing works great, but sometimes decides you need to listen to a certain thing, so  you need to stop on the side of the road and delete it or it will go back to it grrr.
- The motor does not stop if you take the key out.
- The tire pressure sensor was probably a grammar troll in a previous life, and will  annoy you if the pressures are out of a stupid narrow range. Smaller than the difference of pressure between night and day (I'll take it to the garage for this one).
- The wheels are in the corners, that's great for handling and space. HOWEVER, to parallel park, you don't hug the car you're parking behind to reverse into the spot. You need to be 80/100cm away, great. except drivers behind don't get that you are parking and think you are reversing... So you get honked, then a "i'm sorry wave".

Yet, overall, it's by far the best car I've ever driven this side of 50 000 Euros (never driven above that, come to think of it).
When I first got it, I took to uni to our mechanic class. This professor used to own a garage and did not really want to check under the bonnet of a Citroën...
But when I managed to get him to do, he called the head of the lab over (our lab is filled with engines) and pointed.
The first thing they had noticed, is that after 40 years of shitty connectors, this C4 FINALLY had proper, modern wiring...
The engine is set low and back with space in front, you can actually put touch the carter from the bonnet,so unless you need to change the exhaust manifold, it"s pretty good.
It seems they hired someone who actually works on the cars to design some of it... FINALLY.

Hybrids for regular Joes should be all like this:
Just as good as a "normal" car, but using 20 to 25% less fuel for the exact same driving.
Not filled with mistakes/bad compromises that the manufacturer can't fix pissing people off (like the original poster).

[corrado33]

Pollution from cars in traffic at low speed is particularly bad for people, but a hybrid can spend much of that time running on battery only.

I can't disagree with you there. Hybrid cars (actually, fully electric cars) would be great for most if not all cities. (Screw it, just design cities without roads for cars and make people bike everywhere, that'd actually be a really cool social experiment.) However, I'm not talking about just city driving. Yes, a few MPG will add up over the years, but how long will it take you (using that few MPG) to pay off the extra money you used to buy the hybrid in the first place? If you're going to tell me that you bought the hybrid to help the environment, you're better off donating the extra money to research that aims to help reduce pollution.

Some simple, back of the envelope calculations. (All #s taken directly from honda's US site)

Honda Civic Hybrid Price: ~$24,500
Honda Civic Normal Price: ~$18,500
Hybrid Avg MPG: 45.5 (I averaged the highway and city MPG)
Normal Avg MPG: 34.5 (I averaged the highway and city MPG)

That extra $6000 will buy you 1500 gallons of gas at $4.00 per gallon.

Let's assume you drive 20,000 miles per year.

Hybrid gallons consumed per year: 439.6
Normal gallons consumed per year: 579.7

Difference: 140.1 gallons/year

To pay off that extra $6000, you'd have to drive for ~10 years (200,000 miles), assuming that the hybrid keeps it's high MPG its entire life (which, as we've seen, isn't true.) If you assume that you're JUST driving in the city, the #s aren't much better.

Also, 10 years is much longer that most people keep cars now-a-day.

Of course, the number above scales inversely with miles/year driven, so if you double that then the number of years will be reduced by half, but even if you drove 40,000 miles per year (which is a lot), it'd still take you 5 years (that's 200,000 miles on the car mind you) to pay it off.

If you'd repeat this calculation with a clean diesel, the results would point even more in the direction away from hybrids, especially since diesels CAN last a quarter of a million miles or more, whereas hybrids don't stand a chance.

The only way hybrids will ever be effective at reducing pollution is if you force everyone to buy them. I don't think big oil or most people (especially gun-toting, big truck driving, americans) would let that happen. (Since I'm from the US, and work with gun-toting, big truck driving americans I'm allowed to say that. And yes, we do refer to ourselves as "Americans.")

[dannyf]

With regular cars, you pay for high fuel prices over time.

with hybrid cars, you pay for high fuel prices up front.

in the end, you end up the same place financially.

[corrado33]

in the end, you end up the same place financially.

I don't think you would personally. As per my calculations above, it takes a while to recoup costs from buying a hybrid, even if you increase prices to $4.50 or $5 a gallon, it still takes quite a few years to recoup the costs. Since gas around here hasn't gone up in the past few years (beside yearly winter-summer variations), I don't think $5.00/gallon gas will be around here anytime soon. I can't speak for other parts of the country though.

I'm also guessing that service visits would be more expensive for hybrids as well, but I can't be sure. A properly serviced gas/diesel car will last a very long time, whereas hybrids have a set lifetime due to the batteries. You could make the same argument for cars in areas that use salt on the road or near the ocean, but again, "properly serviced" includes looking for rust.