Toyota Mirai review It looks like a melted Prius, but hydrogen tech has come a l
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00:00G'day, I'm Paul Stobbe. Don't close the review just because the car behind me has stickers all over it
00:05and it looks like a melted Prius.
00:07This is the Toyota Mirai and there is a much, much, much better looking version of this car coming in
00:142021, but what I wanted to do today was have a look at the Mirai because it's hydrogen-powered. It's something different.
00:20It's not just a conventional internal combustion engine.
00:23Now the reason this is covered in stickers is because these aren't on sale in Australia
00:28and they're currently on trial between Toyota and the government.
00:31So we've borrowed one quickly to take it for a bit of a spin to see exactly what it's like.
00:35Now, this car, if it was for sale, would be priced at around
00:39$115,000. That is a bucket load of money and that's because of all the technology under this car
00:45and I'll explain that shortly in a bit more detail.
00:48And it's estimated that Toyota loses about $80,000 for each time they sell one of these cars, which is absolutely crazy.
00:55This competes with cars like the Honda Clarity, which we also don't get in Australia, and the Hyundai Nexo,
01:00which we're about to get in Australia. That'll be the first hydrogen car on sale in Australia.
01:05Today, we're going to do a detailed review of the Mirai to see what this hydrogen tech is like.
01:10Now, you can skip ahead to other parts of this review by using the time codes on the screen there,
01:14or if you're on YouTube, just scroll down below and you'll see the chapters where you can skip ahead.
01:18If you haven't done so already, I'd love it if you could hit the subscribe button and also press the bell icon.
01:23That's going to tell you every single time we publish a review on what looks like a melted car.
01:28There are six colours available in the Mirai range, and no, none of them include all of the stickers all over this car.
01:34And no, this is not a sponsored review. Let's talk about the styling. It's interesting. I actually don't hate it.
01:40It's so futuristic looking and I think that's what you need with a car like this that has such a futuristic drivetrain.
01:46This was released around 2015, so while it looks futuristic now, set yourself back about five years when this first came out and it was sort of pretty full on.
01:55So, big LED lights here in those separate clusters. You have LED daytime running lights down the side and a full LED indicator.
02:03If we jump down the front here, you can see these air dams here and here. This is used to drag oxygen in for that fuel stack.
02:11I'll run through that in a little bit more detail later on.
02:13And of course, if you've seen our other Toyota Hybrid reviews, you can see there is blue inside this logo,
02:19which signifies there is an electric drivetrain in there somewhere in your Toyota.
02:24So, keep an eye out for that if you ever want to know if a Toyota is hybrid or not.
02:28We'll jump around to the side of the car. So, coefficient of drag of 0.29.
02:32This needs to be able to cut through the air with as little drag as possible.
02:36Have a look at this strafe down the side here as well. I don't know, it's just a really, really fascinating design.
02:41You have eco-friendly tyres here. How big are they? They look tiny.
02:44Two 15s, 55 profile on 17-inch alloy wheels.
02:49Fuel cell badge here. Let's travel down the side of the car.
02:53So, it's 4.9 metres long, which is pretty big for a car like this.
02:58It feels much bigger than a Prius. 1.8 or so metres wide.
03:02And the back is equally as funky. Check this out.
03:04You've got this LED strip that runs along the back there with integrated reverse lights,
03:08LED indicators and then LED taillights as well.
03:11So, let me know in the comments below, what do you think of the design?
03:14I find it interesting. I don't know if I love it, but it is definitely interesting.
03:18It stands out. A lot of people check the car out. I'm keen to see what you think.
03:21Let me know in the comments below.
03:22Let's talk interior. And just like the outside, this interior is very space-age.
03:28There's a whole lot of angles and all this sort of stuff going on.
03:31Similar to the Prius, you'll see these screens for the driver hidden under the hood.
03:34Generally, once you design a car, it takes like five years for it to go from pen to paper
03:39to actually designing and seeing this car in production.
03:44So, when you think that this car was released in 2015,
03:47this was probably designed in 2010 where stuff like this was still pretty cool.
03:51Today, it kind of looks a bit dated and doesn't look very modern.
03:54And if I'm honest, it doesn't feel like the interior that belongs in a car with a price tag this high.
04:00Obviously, the price is so high because of all the technology,
04:02but I think it would have been nicer to have something a little fancier inside.
04:06So, let's see how soft-touch the soft-touch dashboard is
04:10and some of these surfaces are using our durometer.
04:12It's a hardness tester that measures from 0 to 100, where 0 is soft and 100 is hard.
04:17Let's see what it's like on that dashboard.
04:21And we'll try our center armrest now as well.
04:26That's okay as well.
04:27So, there you go.
04:28What about build quality?
04:31Yeah, look, it feels pretty good.
04:32It's kind of built like a tank.
04:34It's all sort of really put together nicely.
04:36Now, I think this car has a lot of padding, a whole lot of noise insulation as well,
04:40because they want to make it as quiet as they possibly can inside the cabin.
04:44So, let's look at infotainment.
04:46This is the last generation of Toyota's infotainment system.
04:49It is still used in some cars, but the new one replaces this.
04:52So, I'm not going to go into too much detail here because there's no real point.
04:56If you do want to see a detailed review of the new infotainment system, you can click up here.
05:00But let's have a look at this.
05:01So, navigation, you know, this is all the stuff that we hated about the old infotainment system.
05:06It's a bit slow and just fiddly to use.
05:09Terms of audio, you have AM, FM, DAB plus digital radio, but there is no smartphone mirroring.
05:15So, no Apple CarPlay, no Android Auto.
05:18And then you have the ability to add apps into the screen as well.
05:21But really, there isn't too much to talk about here.
05:23What about the other features that you get here?
05:26There really isn't too much to talk about.
05:27You have dual zone climate control.
05:29And the interesting thing is, have a look at this screen.
05:31You get like a screen that shows you the climate control settings,
05:34but then you have these touch sensitive panels on either side to go up and down with the
05:39temperature on this whole piano black board with Mirai fuel cell written on it.
05:44So, I guess that is kind of cool the way they've set that up.
05:46And then this traditional gear lever, similar to what you'd find in a Prius.
05:50There's an auto dimming rear vision mirror.
05:52You have a wireless phone charger in here that I'll show you in a second.
05:55One USB port with an auxiliary outlet.
05:57In terms of safety technology, you have radar cruise control, blind spot monitoring.
06:02There really isn't too much to talk about.
06:04Now, what does the key look like for the Mirai?
06:06Here it is here.
06:07Pretty basic.
06:08You have lock, unlock, boot.
06:10And then on the other side, Toyota.
06:12It's a proximity sensing key.
06:14So you just keep that in your pocket, grab the door handle to unlock it,
06:17and then use the start button to kick things over.
06:19Okay, let's talk practicality and we'll start off with storage.
06:23Phone doesn't actually really fit anywhere.
06:26There's actually not a great deal of storage here.
06:28You do have that wireless phone charger, which lives in here.
06:32Doesn't actually fit my phone with a phone cover on it, which is a little bit disappointing.
06:36What about bottles?
06:38Bottle fits in there and then you have a couple of teeth to hold it in place.
06:42And then you have bottle storage in the door as well,
06:44with room either sides for bits and pieces.
06:47You have sunglass holder up here.
06:50No extra storage there, but you do have this glove box,
06:53which holds the manual and a couple of other bits of paper.
06:56What about comfort?
06:57The seats are really comfortable.
06:58They hug you in nicely.
07:00They have electric adjustment.
07:02There's memory as well.
07:03Steering column is electrically adjustable too.
07:06The steering wheel sits nicely in the hand.
07:07And in terms of reach, everything is easy to get access to.
07:10I would have just liked to see a head-up display.
07:13So second row of the Mirai.
07:15How much space is there here?
07:17So the seat is in my normal driving position.
07:20You can see here there isn't a great deal of knee room.
07:22I have no toe room.
07:23My feet are just literally wedged into there.
07:26Headroom, pretty disappointing as well.
07:29So this is a big car, but there just isn't much space back here.
07:32What about storage?
07:33So under here you have a 12-volt outlet.
07:36You've got air vents.
07:38Centre bin here for putting bits and pieces in.
07:40You'll notice this is just a two-seater in the back.
07:43And you have bottle storage.
07:46That fits in fine.
07:47There's no storage inside the doors.
07:48So this is the only place your bottle can go.
07:51What about the rest of it?
07:52Well, two ISOFIX points on these two seats,
07:55mat pockets, but really not a great deal to talk about back here.
08:00Yeah, I'm sitting on a hydrogen tank, one of two,
08:02so that's why it's a little cramped.
08:04The fuel stack is just ahead of us,
08:06and there's no access to the boot because the battery pack is right there.
08:09Let's talk cargo space.
08:10You have 360 litres available to you.
08:13It's not a big boot, is it?
08:15So beneath the floor you have a tyre repair kit,
08:17so no spare tyre, and that's about it.
08:20There's not too much more to report in there.
08:22Let's see how our bags fit.
08:24Let's see how the suitcase goes.
08:28Okay, that fits fine as well.
08:29So there you go, 360 litres of cargo space.
08:32Now, before we go for a spin in the Mirai,
08:34I wanted to run you through, I guess, just the basics of how this car works.
08:38It may look like a normal-ish looking car on the outside.
08:41Everything in here looks normal,
08:43but what powers this car is slightly different,
08:46and I'm still learning all this stuff myself.
08:48So I'm going to keep it as simple as I can,
08:50and hopefully it makes sense, and it's right.
08:51Let me know in the comments below if it's not.
08:53So what is powering this car?
08:54It is hydrogen.
08:55This is called a fuel cell car or a hydrogen car.
08:58Those two terms are interchangeable.
09:00But where does it come from?
09:01Well, it comes from here, H2O, water.
09:04There's a process called electrolysis,
09:06where you split hydrogen and oxygen to separate the two,
09:11and later on that comes back into this car
09:13to create a chemical reaction to create electricity.
09:16So you're kind of double handling it, but I'll get into that in a second.
09:19So we take the hydrogen out of this water and store it separately.
09:23Getting the hydrogen into the car requires a high-pressure process
09:27because cars use hydrogen gas as opposed to liquid,
09:30and that means when you pump it into the car,
09:32it happens at high pressure and needs to be stored at high pressure.
09:34That's why the two hydrogen tanks in this car operate at a crazy 10,000 psi.
09:40They're lined with carbon fibre to help save weight,
09:43and there's enough carbon fibre around those tanks to build a supercar.
09:48Now, 10,000 psi, I want to put that into context for you.
09:51This is a can of unhealthy soda drink.
09:54When this is refrigerated, this has 30 psi of pressure.
09:57The tanks in this car operate at 300 times the amount of pressure
10:02than this can of drinks.
10:04So you can see why it is so volatile and important to get this technology right.
10:09So what happens from there?
10:10Once the hydrogen is in the tanks, it gets transported through to a fuel stack.
10:15That is where the chemical reaction between hydrogen
10:18and oxygen drawn in from the outside takes place to create electricity.
10:23Now, this is kind of double handling because you use electricity
10:26to split hydrogen from oxygen to start with,
10:29and then you have to use it again to create this electricity once more.
10:33The electricity created from the fuel stack then powers a motor generator.
10:36That motor generator can send torque to these wheels,
10:38but it also runs a generator for the batteries,
10:41so you can store up to 1.6 kilowatt hours of energy within the batteries.
10:45And that's similar to a Prius.
10:46It means you can access that for torque boost later on.
10:49You can also charge it when you use regen braking as well.
10:52So that is the system in a nutshell.
10:54It's also worth noting that the byproduct of this whole process isn't noxious gases.
10:58It's actually water.
10:59The car will emit six litres of water per 100 kilometres,
11:03but you can manually purge it by hitting the H2O button.
11:06So what are the disadvantages?
11:07Well, the main one is the efficiency of creating hydrogen.
11:11You have to use a lot of electricity to create hydrogen,
11:14whereas with a battery-operated electric vehicle on the other hand,
11:17you're simply plugging it into the grid.
11:19Here you have to use the grid to create the hydrogen,
11:21and then transport it, and then put it in the car.
11:23So that is why hydrogen cars will make sense when you can
11:27use excess power supply overnight to create hydrogen,
11:30or perhaps use solar or wind energy,
11:32because then it's effectively free to create the energy that you're plumbing into this car,
11:36and you don't need big batteries to lug around at the same time.
11:40And I think over time, as hydrogen filling stations become more of a thing,
11:45these cars will become popular, especially for people who don't have time to charge,
11:48or perhaps live in a home where plugging up an electric vehicle isn't a practical option.
11:54So we've hit the road in the Mirai.
11:56What kind of power are we talking here?
11:58It's 113 kilowatts of power, 335 newton metres of torque.
12:04Doesn't sound like a lot, but keep in mind the car weighs around 1800 kilograms,
12:08so it's not a huge amount of power, but it's enough torque for a car that weighs this much.
12:14And that means when you're behind the wheel, it feels pretty energetic.
12:18Just in its normal driving mode, you can lean on the throttle,
12:22and it sort of just whisks you away.
12:23It makes the weirdest sound.
12:25It's like a distant scream or something.
12:30It's very quiet and subdued, but you can hear that it's doing something in the background.
12:34And that means it is good for a 0 to 100 dash of 9 seconds, and this is what that looks like.
12:54Now this is a little bit confusing, but 1 litre of hydrogen is equal to around 3.8 litres of fuel,
13:02and that means this car has a technical fuel economy of 3.6 litres of hydrogen per 100 kilometres.
13:11Let's talk about driving range.
13:13You have 500 kilometres of range.
13:16Realistic range though, if you drive normally, which is what we've been trying to do,
13:21is around the 350 to 400 kilometre mark, which is pretty reasonable for
13:26what is a first generation hydrogen car.
13:28The next gen of Mirai is rumoured to have almost 1,000 kilometres of driving range,
13:33which is a massive step forward.
13:35Now in terms of drive modes, you've got an Eco mode,
13:38which just makes the throttle sort of do nothing and makes the air conditioning die down.
13:43I'm more interested in the Power mode.
13:45We'll flick that on.
13:46So in the Power mode, everything sharpens up, and it does some more screaming,
13:51so it just makes even more noise.
13:54So the Power mode is pretty fun.
13:56There is also a BR mode, which is the mode that allows you to generate electricity from momentum,
14:02and that is plumbed back into that small battery that's occasionally used for boosting you along
14:08when the hydrogen motor needs a little bit of a kick along.
14:10These driver displays are interesting.
14:12So you have speed on one side, shows you how fast you're going,
14:15but in the centre you have a gauge that will tell you when you transition from Eco to Power.
14:20That's where you're getting that assistance from the additional battery pack.
14:23It's actually quite fun to just keep it in Eco mode,
14:26so you can take off as gently as possible and waft along nicely without
14:31upsetting any of the score gods there that give you a rating out of 100.
14:35And then you have a whole stack of other menus there.
14:37You've got your consumption record, further trip computer details, a compass,
14:41pretty much anything you want.
14:42And then at night time, it lights up blue on the left-hand side.
14:46All right, it's just an interesting looking display, I reckon.
14:49Now the thing that's most impressive about this car,
14:51if you look beyond all the tech beneath the skin, is the ride.
14:54The ride is fantastic.
14:56It is just gliding over everything.
14:58It's no sports car and I don't think it's ever meant to be that,
15:01but if you collect potholes and just nasty bits of road out here in the country,
15:05it just goes over it with no dramas.
15:07Out on the highway, it is dead silent in here.
15:10So all of that money has bought you a lot of noise suppression, so it is very quiet.
15:15You can't hear any of the engine or any of those components working.
15:18It is just silent as it wafts along.
15:20Visibility is good out the front, the rear, the side.
15:24You have that blind spot monitor built into the wing mirror.
15:27It really is hard to complain and it is just very easy to drive.
15:31It just feels like a normal car, which is what's important for these hydrogen cars.
15:35So the Toyota Mirai, from the point of view of just a car,
15:38this is perfectly normal.
15:40It rides really well.
15:41It drives just like any other car.
15:42You'd never know that it has an alternative fuel stack and all this other
15:47gizmo gadgety stuff under the bonnet and also in the back here.
15:50What about from future sustainability?
15:52Hydrogen is really resource intensive to produce, so that's going to be the biggest
15:56hurdle for this over something like an electric car or just an internal combustion car.
16:00But once they start rolling out hydrogen and figure out ways of doing it greenly,
16:04I think these could really take off, especially in just consumer cars, buses, trains,
16:09all of those big applications where you're returning to a base and you're easily able to
16:13fill it.
16:13The charging time is much quicker than an electric car as well.
16:16So I'm excited to drive the new version of the Mirai and I'm looking forward to seeing
16:19more hydrogen cars on the road in Australia and around the world.
16:23Let me know in the comments below, what do you think about this?
16:25Are you completely against all of this alternative fuel technology,
16:29or do you reckon stuff like hydrogen has legs once it comes down in price?
16:33Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.
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16:44something new and something fun.
16:45But until next time, take it easy.