Toyota Mirai Reviews – Toyota Mirai Price, Photos, and Specs – Car and Driver
Toyota Mirai
Car and Driver
Tested: two thousand sixteen Toyota Mirai Fuel-Cell Sedan
2016 Toyota Mirai Fuel-Cell Sedan
- Aug 2015
- By DON SHERMAN
- Photography By SEAN RICE
Mirai is Japanese for “the future.” This is Toyota’s way of telling that its sedan most resembling SpongeBob SquarePants on a skateboard runs on hydrogen and produces no emissions. The Mirai is the very first fuel-cell car suggested for sale, not just lease. (The conceptually similar Honda FCX Clarity and Hyundai Tucson FCEV remain corporate property through and after the duration of their leases.) The standard rap on fuel-cell vehicles—that the technology is always five years away—expires when eight California dealers produce two hundred Mirais before the end of the year, followed by another two thousand eight hundred cars over the next two years. The $58,325 base price isn’t much of a comeback on the twenty three years of development and five thousand six hundred eighty patents that Toyota invested in this future, but milestones never come cheap.
To test not only the Mirai but also the very first phase of infrastructure that supports it, we visited hydrogen packing stations in the greater Los Angeles region and drove north to the Mojave Desert for spectacle measurements. Toyota engineer, future thinker, and fuel-cell authority Jackie Birdsall served as chaperone and tour guide without whining about our preemptive range anxiety, barrage of tech questions, or blind-curve photographic maneuvers.
Versus the Ten,000 or so gasoline stations in California, early adopters will have no more than twenty locations via the state to refuel their Mirais. We began our L.A. Basin infrastructure assessment by topping off the Mirai’s two hydrogen tanks at a Shell station conveniently located across the street from Toyota’s Torrance, California, headquarters. Hydrogen delivered at Ten,000 psi gave us an indicated two hundred seventy miles of range. This station is fed by an Air Products pipeline that has served nearby oil refineries for twenty years.
Operating the filler nozzle takes patience and a hard grip; thrust in smartly, yank to verify a secure connection, then squeeze and latch the treat to meter. Birdsall’s coaching helped. To increase its density, the hydrogen gas is chilled to just above zero degrees Fahrenheit. However the nozzle cascades with condensation, it’s not cold to the touch.
Before our side journey for testing, we topped off at a municipal services yard in Burbank, home to Disney, Warner Bros., and many classic TV shows. This pump was hidden, but once we located it and entered Birdsall’s secret free-fuel codes, our tanks were total in four minutes, resetting the range display to a healthy two hundred seventy miles.
The Mirai is at home in the L.A. sprawl. It’s comfy, isolation-chamber quiet, and a pleasant means of bearing clotted freeways. Taking advantage of this car’s eligibility for the city’s high-occupancy-vehicle lanes, we cruised at the speed limit past the creeping CO₂ producers.
While the Mirai’s capability to reach sixty mph in 9.Four seconds and eighty mph in the quarter-mile is adequate to keep up with the Priuses and pool cleaners’ pickups, it’s unlikely to accelerate any enthusiast’s heart. When you penetrate the right pedal, there’s a gentle bellow and the nose rises impatiently, providing a false sense of acceleration. But with only one hundred fifty two horsepower propelling a Camry-sized car weighing more than two tons, this is no Tesla.
Other character traits are more satisfying: Michelin Primacy MXV4 215/35R-17 tires and a nicely tuned suspension supply crisp steering response. Little of L.A.’s pavement ripple reaches the driver’s seat, and assets roll is well damped. The Mirai stops from seventy mph in one hundred ninety four feet, only three feet longer than the last Prius we tested.
Pumps at the South Coast Air Quality Management District headquarters in Diamond Bar meter hydrogen cooled to -40 degrees F with sufficient accuracy that they can charge credit-card holders $13.99 per kilogram ($6.35/pound). We need 0.664 kilogram (1.46 pounds) of hydrogen to pack the tanks, for a total cost of $9.29.
Near Newport Beach’s Style Island shopping mall, a sparkling Shell station’s pumps were closed for updates. Moving on, we raced a gorgeous Porsche nine hundred twelve from a stoplight . . . and won. At the next light, we suggested a rematch. After calling the Mirai ugly, the Porsche driver declined with the excuse that he had only sixty horsepower on tap.
Toyota Mirai Reviews – Toyota Mirai Price, Photos, and Specs – Car and Driver
Toyota Mirai
Car and Driver
Tested: two thousand sixteen Toyota Mirai Fuel-Cell Sedan
2016 Toyota Mirai Fuel-Cell Sedan
- Aug 2015
- By DON SHERMAN
- Photography By SEAN RICE
Mirai is Japanese for “the future.” This is Toyota’s way of telling that its sedan most resembling SpongeBob SquarePants on a skateboard runs on hydrogen and produces no emissions. The Mirai is the very first fuel-cell car suggested for sale, not just lease. (The conceptually similar Honda FCX Clarity and Hyundai Tucson FCEV remain corporate property through and after the duration of their leases.) The standard rap on fuel-cell vehicles—that the technology is always five years away—expires when eight California dealers supply two hundred Mirais before the end of the year, followed by another two thousand eight hundred cars over the next two years. The $58,325 base price isn’t much of a come back on the twenty three years of development and five thousand six hundred eighty patents that Toyota invested in this future, but milestones never come cheap.
To test not only the Mirai but also the very first phase of infrastructure that supports it, we visited hydrogen packing stations in the greater Los Angeles region and drove north to the Mojave Desert for spectacle measurements. Toyota engineer, future thinker, and fuel-cell authority Jackie Birdsall served as chaperone and tour guide without whining about our preemptive range anxiety, barrage of tech questions, or blind-curve photographic maneuvers.
Versus the Ten,000 or so gasoline stations in California, early adopters will have no more than twenty locations via the state to refuel their Mirais. We began our L.A. Basin infrastructure assessment by topping off the Mirai’s two hydrogen tanks at a Shell station conveniently located across the street from Toyota’s Torrance, California, headquarters. Hydrogen delivered at Ten,000 psi gave us an indicated two hundred seventy miles of range. This station is fed by an Air Products pipeline that has served nearby oil refineries for twenty years.
Operating the filler nozzle takes patience and a rock hard grip; shove in smartly, yank to verify a secure connection, then squeeze and latch the treat to meter. Birdsall’s coaching helped. To increase its density, the hydrogen gas is chilled to just above zero degrees Fahrenheit. Tho’ the nozzle cascades with condensation, it’s not cold to the touch.
Before our side tour for testing, we topped off at a municipal services yard in Burbank, home to Disney, Warner Bros., and many classic TV shows. This pump was hidden, but once we located it and entered Birdsall’s secret free-fuel codes, our tanks were utter in four minutes, resetting the range display to a healthy two hundred seventy miles.
The Mirai is at home in the L.A. sprawl. It’s convenient, isolation-chamber quiet, and a pleasant means of bearing clotted freeways. Taking advantage of this car’s eligibility for the city’s high-occupancy-vehicle lanes, we cruised at the speed limit past the creeping CO₂ producers.
While the Mirai’s capability to reach sixty mph in 9.Four seconds and eighty mph in the quarter-mile is adequate to keep up with the Priuses and pool cleaners’ pickups, it’s unlikely to accelerate any enthusiast’s heart. When you plumb the right pedal, there’s a gentle scream and the nose rises anxiously, providing a false sense of acceleration. But with only one hundred fifty two horsepower propelling a Camry-sized car weighing more than two tons, this is no Tesla.
Other character traits are more satisfying: Michelin Primacy MXV4 215/35R-17 tires and a nicely tuned suspension supply crisp steering response. Little of L.A.’s pavement ripple reaches the driver’s seat, and assets roll is well damped. The Mirai stops from seventy mph in one hundred ninety four feet, only three feet longer than the last Prius we tested.
Pumps at the South Coast Air Quality Management District headquarters in Diamond Bar meter hydrogen cooled to -40 degrees F with sufficient accuracy that they can charge credit-card holders $13.99 per kilogram ($6.35/pound). We need 0.664 kilogram (1.46 pounds) of hydrogen to pack the tanks, for a total cost of $9.29.
Near Newport Beach’s Style Island shopping mall, a sparkling Shell station’s pumps were closed for updates. Moving on, we raced a gorgeous Porsche nine hundred twelve from a stoplight . . . and won. At the next light, we suggested a rematch. After calling the Mirai ugly, the Porsche driver declined with the excuse that he had only sixty horsepower on tap.
