Has anyone ever bleeded out their brake lines on the 3rd gen Prius. I'm thinking about bleeding my brakes but not sure whether or not I would get electrical errors bleeding. If possible please post pictures of the step by step process as I am a visual learner. Also how often should you bleed your brakes and what brand would you recommend?
Here's the manual. I think the trick is not to let air in durring or Toyota gets to clear the code. Have not done yet. http://priuschat.com/attachments/brake-fluid-chg-bld-pdf.46998/
It is the one routine service I would have the dealer do, you need to send codes to all the brake actuators to move to free flowing, rather than regen. So far as I know only the dealer would have (a legal copy of) that software.
Again I have not performed this yet. If R1CD13 is bleeding (air) out of the system I agree. If the OP is just replacing the brake fluid, it can be done with out Techstream. However if air is introduced into the system during replacement, then a code is captured and must be cleared. The link given is from the Official Toyota 2010 Prius Service Manual. So the question R1CH13...what do you mean by bleeding?
What I mean by bleeding is flushing out the old brake fluid and adding new brake fluid in the master cylinder.
You now have the manual. If you have "bled" brakes before, have an assistant, and can figure how to set and maintain "invalid mode" you are good. Follow the cautions and good luck. Document it with pictures for everyone.
Good luck with that. If you accidentally set off a fault in the ABS ECU (which is quite easy to do), the car will not be drivable. I would highly suggest having a dealer do this...which is not too difficult to find since many of them love to do these "wallet flushes."
How would I accidentally set the ABS ECU off on the car? The only mode that they indicated in the PDF is to set the vehicle in the "Invalid mode" by the following procedures, the CEL would only throw fault codes which you can clear it off with the OBD 2 scanner. Am I missing something here? please let me know, thank you!
If you move the brake rotor at all while it is in ECB invalid mode, you may set a fault (per the instructions). You will not be able to clear the fault unless you have access to Techstream or an equivalent specialty aftermarket scan tool. My experience has been that if any faults are triggered with this system, the brake system will not behave normally. Also, I notice that in the instructions without Techstream, it makes no mention of how the brake fluid level is adjusted after the brake flush is completed. When you do the brake flush with Techstream, after the last wheel, the system cycles for about 60 seconds and the brake fluid level in the reservoir will go up and down - it is unclear whether this will occur when you are doing the brake flush without Techstream. I also had to do the linear valve offset procedure after my brake flush (with Techstream) since the brake pedal did not behave normally for some reason. Basically, IMO, there's a lot at stake here should the procedure go wrong - you will be left with a car that is not drivable.
ah I see... darn, well, when the time does come, I'll ask my buddy and see if its possible to do this without trouble without techstream. But as of right now, I won't be doing it until its needed.
If you look-up the maintenance schedule for the Lexus CT200h, it is a required service every 3 years or 30,000 miles, whichever comes first. I would suggest following that interval. I am due for my second brake flush now, as I am at 61k.
Wow 30k? that's pretty early for brake fluids. I have a Honda Accord and I usually do mine every 60k or when it looks dirty. Interesting... My Prius is at 20k, I guess I'll have to look into it quick then haha... thanks for the info.
Color is not necessarily indicative of the fluid condition - the only way to measure the brake fluid condition is to measure the amount of moisture and copper content in the fluid. Lexus recommends 3 years/30k, which is in-line with most manufacturers (2011+ Nissan, Honda).
