We lost power in the storms that hit California and were down for 2 1/2 days.

I have a 2014 Plug-in Prius, which is for all intents and purposes is a big ol' battery. I plugged in a 800w AC inverter, connected it to the 12v battery, and ran a long extension cord to my refrigerator.

I ran it for probably 6 hours over 2 days, and barely moved the gas guage. The engine would turn over and run for a minute every 10 minutes or so to keep the 12v charged, and it all worked well.

It's time for my 175K mile visit to my hybrid repair shop. Usually, I go to a quickie-lube place for oil and tire rotation. This time, I'm going to look into cleaning the EGR system, replacing the coolant, and checking the brakes.

With regenerative braking and careful driving, most of the braking is done by the engine and goes back to charging the battery. I'm running on the original brake pads!
--- SBBSecho 3.15-Win32
* Origin: http://realitycheckbbs.org | tomorrow's retro tech (1:218/700)