Life after death (for my Prius)

My beloathed beater Prius C finally gave up the ghost yesterday. Driving out of the grocery store parking lot, it informed me that my hybrid battery needs service.

From some minimal research, it looks like the Prius doesn't use the hybrid battery to help start the car, and most folks report being able to drive around solely on the ICE. I continued to do so yesterday and saw a roughly 5mpg hit.

Here's the deal: This is an extremely bad time to try and buy another vehicle, and the Prius just passed registration last month. Theoretically, I could get another year out of the ole gal before she goes off to car Valhalla. I read a few reports of people saying the car eventually stopped turning on after the battery pack error message. This seemed to be mostly on the 2nd gen Prius', mine is a third gen. Any GRM folk have experience driving one for an extended period w/a bad hybrid battery? 

I have four Gen2 Prius.  My lowest mileage version was bought at 78k miles which now has 160k.  All the others are currently somewhere between 150k and 205k.  I am blessed to say I have never had hybrid battery trouble. However, I have seen the cars get "confused" and report of hybrid trouble.  In these cases, I use my Torque Pro App w/ Android and special free Prius software (called PIDs.)  

Even without the check engine light off I have found that "clearing codes" a couple fo time seems to have a positive affect.  

First you need to download Torque Pro ($4.99 one time) from the Google store to your handset (phone or tablet.)  
If you are not an Anroid user, the cheapest method is to go to Walmart and buy the absolute cheapest Android handset for any pepaid company.  There should be one for $19.99, certainly $29.99.  You will never make calls with this phone, the intention is just to use it like a tablet via wifi.  Even cheaper, get someone to give you some old, retired Android handset.  

This link should lead you to Prius C pids

There is also a product that works with Apple (as well as Android) and it is called Dr Prius.  I have no expereince with Dr Prius.

Either way, you'll need a a bluetooth OBD2 reader.  I have had great luck with the Panlong version recommended in this Dr Prius page.  If you use the shown discount code, these cost just $8.79

I have not dug into it but there is also a cloned Toyota Diagnostic software called Techstream.  Need a laptop and a cable in addition to the software.  

A quick look on https://www.car-part.com shows a $700 Prius C battery in Austin.  The site doesn't mention how many miles on the car.  Another in Houston for $600 from a Prius C w/ 79k miles

On the site, enter your year, make, model (only choosing Prius.)  Then choose battery.  Then choose battery for Prius C.

Not looking to dump any more money into the Prius. It's absolutely pummeled with hail. With 163k, I feel like I've had $3000 worth of value out of it over the past few years. Great call on techstream, I already have it on one of my old laptops! 

I'll bet even a hail damaged Prius C is worth $1k not running and $3k running.  Maybe even higher.   

For your sake I hope it's just a glitch and you get another 100k from it, but don't fret.  Prius is a pretty good candidate for parting out.  There is plenty of used-parts demand for them.

I myself would consider the batteries because of a recent thread I posted about needing some batteries for boondock camping.

Buying another car right now is rough.  You really need to get lucky.  I had to work really hard for two months and do a 500-mile drive-n-drive to find my current van for a decent price in January.  I would say that if you need to shop for a replacement, set your budget and find a list of cars that fit the bill and set up alerts on CL, FB, and some other sites and just keep looking.  My van ended up being the perfect configuration for me, with a specific flaw (a rust spot) that A) I didn't really care about, and B) the southern seller thought it was instant death to all possibility of sale and was sheepishly willing to negotiate.

I'm trying to view car buying right now as a function of distance.  Whereas the prices have shot up, I'm trying to view it as I'll just have to go farther to find a deal.  A year and a half ago you could set your budget on a Prius and find three in your own city to choose from.  Now you'll still find three in your budget, they just might be a fly-n-drive instead.  My secret is to find what you want by shopping areas that the features you're looking for aren't desirable.  My last 4x4 truck I got out of Florida for cheap because people don't want 4x4s in Florida.  I mean, they don't have snow or elevation changes, so unless you're a swamp mudder, the market is limited.  I.E.... buying a Prius from Portland where everyone eats Quinoa and hugs trees maybe isn't smart.  Buying one from Nebraska or Oklahoma where a higher percentage of folks are driving coal-rolling Cummins with pictures of Calvin peeing on a bowtie might net better deals on Prii

Buying another car will happen eventually, but we have 3 other running cars and we only leave the house once or twice a week. Our friends offered us their Model 3 eye-poppingly cheap...we might take them up on it but it would still be the most expensive car we've ever owned and will never pay itself back via gasoline savings. 

Anyone have direct experience with the question at hand? If I drive it for another year with a bad hybrid battery, what are the chances of getting stranded?

One can DIY replace hybrid batteries, OR you can diagnose the bad cells and just replace those.  Usually, there are very few bad ones.  PriusChat and You Tube will help out  (My '12 Camry Hybrid has been fine so far, so I haven't had to memorize all of this yet)

LS swap it and all your troubles will disappear.

calteg said:

 Anyone have direct experience with the question at hand? If I drive it for another year with a bad hybrid battery, what are the chances of getting stranded?

Mine hasn't left me stranded yet but the motor generators need to work in order to convert torque from the ICE to propulsion.  I'd expect an actually bad pack to leave you stranded soon.

Techstream can reveal a lot about what you need to fix, it's usually less than replacing the whole thing.

In reply to calteg :

If you can get a battery for $600, why not just do that and sell it in another year? I'd think it'd be easier to sell and you'd probably get much more value out of it with a working hybrid battery vs trying to sell it with one that is bad. Running Prius with bad battery pack is probably $1,500 but running Prius with working battery pack is probably $3,000, so the $600 cost could actually net you an extra $900 a year from now. (Actual numbers may vary, but the concept is the same).

90BuickCentury said:

In reply to calteg :

If you can get a battery for $600, why not just do that and sell it in another year? I'd think it'd be easier to sell and you'd probably get much more value out of it with a working hybrid battery vs trying to sell it with one that is bad. Running Prius with bad battery pack is probably $1,500 but running Prius with working battery pack is probably $3,000, so the $600 cost could actually net you an extra $900 a year from now. (Actual numbers may vary, but the concept is the same).

This seems like the move. Also, as we all know it's really rough to buy a car right now - that $600 invested in another pack is going to pay itself back on the purchase side if that means you can wait until the market comes back to its senses.

90BuickCentury said:

In reply to calteg :

If you can get a battery for $600, why not just do that and sell it in another year? I'd think it'd be easier to sell and you'd probably get much more value out of it with a working hybrid battery vs trying to sell it with one that is bad. Running Prius with bad battery pack is probably $1,500 but running Prius with working battery pack is probably $3,000, so the $600 cost could actually net you an extra $900 a year from now. (Actual numbers may vary, but the concept is the same).

Let's say that scenario plays out. In a year I'm trying to sell a 180,000 mile, badly hail damaged Prius. That's a slim market, with or without a working battery. 

I got in there with Techstream over the weekend, verified that I need to replace the hybrid battery. I cleared the code just for giggles and so far I've added 100 miles to it without incident, though I'm sure it'll come back soon.

Great on clearing the code and getting 100 miles so far.  As I eluded to before, I have seen these cars get "confused" some times and clearing the code can be enough.  

Similar: a car can throw a code for a misfire in a cylinder.  That misfire happened ONCE yet with the code tripped, the light will stay on forever unless you clear the code.  I have high hopes that you will go a lot farther and just need a little help from Lightstream.  

I have not played with Lightstream (I really need to get a copy.)  Will it give you a live reading of the voltage in each cell?  Will it give you Ohms for each cell?  Is one cell or a few cells reporting different than the majority? 

200k+ Prius sell every day.  I promise you that yours, even dented will sell quickly. Would be a great choice for someone delivering, like door dash.  Especially easier to sell if you can hype up the battery replacement.  

Not sure how deep the reporting goes. This is full on Techstream, so it might have the ability to drill into the battery pack reporting, I just haven't played around with it on a hybrid car before. I'll dig into it a bit this weekend.

This is your cars way of telling you to let it die, and reincarnate it as a Challenge entry.

calteg said:

Not sure how deep the reporting goes. This is full on Techstream, so it might have the ability to drill into the battery pack reporting, I just haven't played around with it on a hybrid car before. I'll dig into it a bit this weekend.

Techstream can report voltages and internal resistances on each of the individual battery cells, so it's pretty easy to identify a bad cell.

In reply to Driven5 :

The thought crossed my mind. The Prius C weighs 2500 with the hybrid battery...if I stripped the batteries out and gutted the interior I bet we could get it close to 2000lbs

calteg said:

In reply to Driven5 :

The thought crossed my mind. The Prius C weighs 2500 with the hybrid battery...if I stripped the batteries out and gutted the interior I bet we could get it close to 2000lbs

I was thinking the same thing then K swap it. Add turbos. Stir in a little bit of Koni and add a dash of Eibach and I bet you end up with a really fun car. 

dean1484 said:

calteg said:

In reply to Driven5 :

The thought crossed my mind. The Prius C weighs 2500 with the hybrid battery...if I stripped the batteries out and gutted the interior I bet we could get it close to 2000lbs

I was thinking the same thing then K swap it. Add turbos. Stir in a little bit of Koni and add a dash of Eibach and I bet you end up with a really fun car. 

Pfft.   This is the new world order.  Higher HP drive motors, lose the ICE and you have some racing classes all to yourself for a few years.

As a coda to this thread, I've gone just over 500 miles since resetting the hybrid warning. MPGs are bang on my historic average (46mpg). I'm optimistic that Mr. Welsh was correct and the car just got "confused"

John, you are a Welsh of information for the car buying process. 
Thank you!

Buying cars is rough right now but selling them is super easy.

Seriously......all cars are roughly double what they are worth at the minimum up here. If you have another car option, sell the Prius and sit on the proceeds for awhile and drive option 2