Prius Battery Pack Apparent Death

In reply to porschenut :

I had the coolant circulating pump go bad a little while back and ended up replacing it, a coolant switch, thermostat and I think some hoses just as preventative maintenance. 
 

Burping the coolant was difficult but I managed to do it I ended up putting the front of the car up on ramps and making a funnel that was sealed to the radiator neck but elevated to keep air from getting in.  
Turned the ice motor on full time to burp it all  

i posted about it....  let me try to find it  

edit: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/prius-overheating-any-guesses/181468/page1/

porschenut said:

Off now to put a new inverter coolant pump in.

To piggyback on JFry's sealed funnel for coolant burping...I have since learned of a sealed funnel for this effort.  A Harbor Freight version or similar sold at O'vanceZone or Amazon

Interesting but didn't have a problem when doing daughter's car.  I clamped off the hoses, only lost a few ounces of fluid.  The reservoir still had fluid in it when I finished so I just topped it up.  Saw no need to drain/refil as the coolant looked fine and hoses were OK.

porschenut said:

Interesting but didn't have a problem when doing daughter's car.  I clamped off the hoses, only lost a few ounces of fluid.  The reservoir still had fluid in it when I finished so I just topped it up.  Saw no need to drain/refil as the coolant looked fine and hoses were OK.

Same here. Barely lost any. Bleeding the system isn't bad with the bleeder screw. 

Well still having issues....

it was driving fine although I noticed that the battery icon didn't seem to go into green anymore when I know it usually would. 
 

regardless it seemed fine.  
 

then my wife called saying that the triangle was back so I told her to park it. 
 

That was a few days ago.  I just got home and looked at it.  12v battery was at 12.26. Not bad.  
 

it started up just fine but had the triangle and the same code. So I cleared it like I have before and it seemed fine.  But when I put it into reverse, it gave me a warning and beeps and put a battery light that said something about main battery. 
 

but the weird part was that even though the ice motor was running and it was in reverse, it barely moved.  I gave it gas and it revved up but didn't move much faster. So I stopped, put it in drive and it pulled forward fine.  Stopped, reverse and same thing.  Drive again worked fine.  
 

put it a third time into reverse and just stayed on the gas a little with it barely moving and after a few seconds, it was like the belts/clutch started to grab and over the course of about 2 seconds fully engaged reverse and all was fine. 
 

also weird was, once I pulled it onto the street, I saw that the battery icon had one bar.  So I put it in park, and the ice kept running, showing that it was charging the main battery.  I figured I'd let it run for however long it needed.   I was checking some stuff for a few minutes, looked up and it was at 3 bars.  Which seemed awfully fast. 
 

I think at that point it stopped running the motor so I put it in gear and then into B (I recalled that that gear kept the ice running) and saw that the battery was now showing 3/4 full (2 bars short of full). 
 

now I'm not sure what demon I need to exorcise. 

Reverse is electric motor only, so a low battery could be the culprit.  The motor won't charge it fast enough to make a difference but once it is charged all should be good.  Sounds like the HV battery is getting tired, have you done the DR Prius battery test?  I prefer torque pro for running data but the Dr Prius battery test is a good tool for baseline and monitoring battery condition.  A pain to do but useful.

Funny how a forum devoted to motorsports has so much talk about prius hybrids.

I have not experienced the same problem but I have been really lucky on batteries...

Good point about reverse being electric.  I think that is true but have never noticed it.  Just because the engine is often running while going in reverse, that could be engine running to charge batteries but the actual propulsion comes from just electric.  

I find that if I want to keep the engine running, like when you want it to run to charge battery, putting on the defrost setting (in either hot or cold) seems to really force the engine to run.  

So, if it really is the battery going bad, I think you have three options:

1. learn hybrid battery reconditioning by watching a lot of youtube videos.  Buy some good cells ($50-$200) and spend the hours doing the work.
2. get on FB and find someone who does this more often.  Here is a quickly found sample.  Seems that for $350 he arrives with a fresher battery and takes away your battery.  If that $350 includes the couple hours of trunk plastic removal and trunk plastic replacement then it is a great deal.  
3. Another option is just buy a used battery pack.  On car-part in your area they run $900 to $500.  This place in Van Nuys has one listed for $550 but no further statement of how many miles were on the car it came from.  That might require a call

I'd probably investigate option #2 further and speak to a few of these jobbers. Link to FB search withing 20 miles of LAX for Prius Battery

Yes, funny isn't it???   I think it's because this group is diverse and not super narrow-minded.  I have my c6z that I love doing time trials with but the Prius gets such amazing gas mileage....

I had wondered about reverse only being powered by electric...   later I experimented and it seemed like reverse was electric only.  But if I went fast enough the ice kicked in but I couldn't tell if it was helping or just charging.  
 

In reply to John Welsh :

Awesome.  Super helpful - you've done all the hard work for me

I hate to think that it needs a hybrid battery but in post #1 you say it has more than 180k miles.  It wouldn't be outside the realm of normality for it to need a battery.  Seems that the battery issue can be solved for $500-ish.  That's unfortunate but not crazy money.  A set of 4 good tires will run you that.  A set of 4 struts similar.  Those are normal car ownership expenses.  

Being in CA, a $500 repair bill that lets you continue to run solo in HOV lanes is likely worth the $500 itself not to mention the cheap access to 44 mpg.  

In reply to John Welsh :

You could barely buy four garbage tires for $500 anymore.

I'm not sure that buying a used battery is worth it - any gen ii is likely going to have a lot of miles. 
 

im also not sure about "reconditioning" them.  I've not read anything that definitively says it's very beneficial and a lot to the contrary.  Plus, how do I know that a Facebook seller has done any kind of reconditioning that's worthwhile?

so I'm kind of left with going with an established company....

i found one that has a lifetime warranty, he will come to me, and it's $1300.  Can't tell if they are new cells or if he just mixes and matches good ones from used packs.....

I suppose if we knew were keeping the car  for a long time it would be an easier decision. 
 

another company offers 1-year warranty and free install (but it's a 45-min drive) for $500 limited time.     I reached out to him but haven't heard back. 

Late model Jaguars have the very same sensitivity to low battery voltage. The #1 recommendation for all sorts of car issues is to add a battery tender and/or replace the battery. Apparently that does fix most "issues."

In reply to jfryjfry :

I've seen chatter about putting newer (and larger) Gen3 battery packs into Gen2s.  Might be worth some investigating. 

one option is that discharger being sold by the vendor whose name escapes me now (on prius chat) , its basically just a light bulb resistor that tries to drain everything and give the cells all a deep cycle. This usually recovers NIMH type cells somewhat. I think the key to replacing single cells in the pack is to do it properly and cycle the pack, matching the voltages carefully. 

At $1300 I would probably go for a Toyota battery if your local dealer does not have a big mark up on it.  They tend to be $1600 to $3000 from the dealer.  There is a lot more you have to swap over on the battery than I would have thought but it is not a hard job to do.  If mine was not my wife's daily I may have looked into rebuilding it my self, the cells can be bought individually online & multiple apps claim to be able to perform cell balancing.  When I installed mine a number of the high voltage cables inside the battery were corroded as well, the cables come with a new batter so I would consider them a must if you rebuild as well.

Before you replace the high voltage battery, I'd get a load tester on your 12V (regular battery).  My wife's Pilot lit up like a Christmas tree one afternoon when we tried to start it. Voltage across the terminals was good, but it failed the load test in spectacular fashion. Replaced the battery and all was right with the world again.

I don't think the 12V battery is the issue, but would want to eliminate it 100% in case you're dealing with a faulty 12V battery.

In reply to dj06482 (Forum Supporter) :

Agreed.  Or, as I said in either this thread or another thread, take the huge 12v battery out of your F250 and with jumper cables, connect that battery to the Prius.  Since the 12v battery is in the trunk you can just drive around with this battery connected.  In case that the little 12v battery has a dead/problem cell, you could just completely eliminate the small battery and connect the big 12v directly to the car (via jumper cables.)  

Once hooked up, clear the codes, even if no codes are showing.  Does driving improve?  

It's definitely the big battery.  After I cleared the code the first time, it was normal for a few weeks until this episode.  
 

I figured that people have driven for months if not years with the main battery acting up.  So yesterday I took my two boys about 30 miles away with the battery icon fluxuaring from completely full to completely empty within 15 seconds. About two miles from our destination, it lost all power on the freeway and had more warning lights including a banner that said "problem."    Yeah, no kidding!

i limped it to our destination - when the main battery is out it accelerates about as fast as my grandma on a mountain bike in high gear.  It seemed that it could eventually get up to around 40 but if it was anything of an incline, I was nervous that we might not make it.  
 

i was nervous that it wouldn't even start to get us home since the ice starts off of the main battery but it fired up about an hour later when we were ready to leave. 
 

it ran fine for about 1/4 mile and then for the rest of the trip I was trying to time lights, avoid major intersections and stay behind the big slow city buses which accelerated like teslas compared to us. 
 

so I know it's our main battery but I'm leary of giving a  company (hybrid2go) $1300 for what is quite possibly nothing more than a used pull-out.  And while they talk a good game before they have my money, will they really come out and replace it if it starts to fail?   Will they even be around in 2 years?  
 

I'm digging around and not liking what I'm seeing about any company (including h2go) short of factory and another one that is about $2200 who sends a kit to rebuild the factory pack with new cells. 
 

well, that and a $1400 (+core) 2-year warranty one from Autozone.   
 

the factory ones all seem to be $2500-3500 around here but I'll keep looking. 

Dorman sells a refurb'ed battery.  Notable from its orange case.  I know Rock Auto used to carry them.  I think it is what most auto parts stores carry.  Dorman has a few videos of their operation

Here's how my cheap a$$ approaches it...  

I went to car-part in your area and searched used hybrid batteries.  I found this place, Dan's in Fontana, about 50 miles from you.  I honed in on this one because it had pictures of the car and those pictures included the VIn plate.  Also, real front end damage took the car off the road.  Likely running fine right up to the scene of the accident.

I then put that VIN into the Toyota owners site and low and behold...  

In 2015 at 107k miles this car got a warranty replacement battery.  Since warranty, it then got a real Toyota battery.  What we do not know, without calling is how many miles the car had when it arrived to the JY.  I searched for a Prius Transmission on this JY's site and they have the one from this car but miles not stated either.  This battery replacement was the last dealer service the car ever got.  

I think this warrants a call to the JY to find out miles.  Also note that the JY does not list a price.  This might mean negotiation is possible.  You now know more about this battery than they do.  The key, is can you really get the exact battery from this exact car????  

The service order says:  REPLACED HYBRID BATTERY OLD BATTERY # 2345P247110076070121 NEW# H313SAJ00S3A.  Are those serial numbers that could be verified???? 

The keys are: 
How many miles was the car driven on the fresh battery? 
Can it be verified that you receive this exact battery?  
Can you keep the JY from knowing this is a desirable battery to keep the price down.  

I once bought a JY bumper cover from a far away JY.  The guy I spoke with offered to take my number and have a yard worker send me pics of the panel.  You might ask if they could send you pics of the actual serial number on the actual battery.  

Sure, replaced in 2015 makes this battery 7 years old and miles unknown.  But, the battery you have is from 2005 or 17 years old and has 180+k.  This one is 10 years newer and could be half the miles.  

I hope the yard comes back with an answer that the car has 177k miles. They will then perceive that the battery has high miles too at 177k when in reality it just has 70k. I'd offer $400. 

Holy smokes John!  You're amazing.  That is exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for.   I reached out and hopefully i can get that battery tomorrow.  
 

Here's some more learning...  

Old style battery code: 

New style genuine Toyota Battery Code:  
Taken from the service work order, this newer one is H313S...  That would mean 31st of March 2015 for manufacture date which jives with install date of July 2015

The sticker you want a picture of looks like this: 

I heart GRM so much right now, and I don't even have a Prius. 

I should have thought of this earlier.  Why not just google up the VIN of that JY car?  

Its vin is: JTDKB20U977673291

Gogling it only retuns:  https://badvin.org/v/JTDKB20U977673291-2007-toyota-prius-c70

Without paying what seems to be $4.99 or $2.99 much of the info is hidden/blurred such as odometer reading.  What we do see is that the car was auctioned in Fontana 3 years ago.  Therefore, the battery has been either on a shelf or in the car for 3 years.  That's good in that at 7 years since manufactured it only saw 4 years of driving.  I do not know how well Prius batteries age on a shelf.  

I'm thinking more about how to get the serial number verified but not tip off the JY to this ones value....

This yard only show one prius battery in stock but they could use the old listing for newer stock.  I might say that you really just need a "parts battery" and your okay with a high mile unit (like 177k miles) because there is likely still a few good cells you could harvest.  But for "compatibility" with the unit you plan to refurb, you need to verify that this unit's serial number starts with H313S.  If you have that match, you'll have the full match since that references the exact day the unit was made.  But, this JY doesn't strike me as filled with Prius specialists.  

See if you can buy this JYs unit w/o having to turn yours in as a core!