Bought 2008 prius, key is missing!

I bought my Prius from a guy that fixes up salvage vehicles. He told me that when they buy the vehicles, they always come with only one key fob and no manual. Now you know where all those fobs and manuals on eBay come from....

I think you're screwed. You need a functional fob to program the new one, AFAIK. See this thread.

 

I'm afraid to a large extent pjc is correct.

You can have the dealer or some locksmiths with the correct equipment reprogram the car to accept a new fob. Internet access is required while doing this. The car is programed to the fob not, the fob to the car.

I am not certain but I believe more than one ecu is required to be changed if you are going to try exchanging parts from a breaker.

John (Britprius)

 

Hi B4C,

From experience if you want to use parts from a scrapped Prius then you will need the following, all from the same vehicle:

1. Key FoB
2. Engine ECU
3. Immobiliser ECU
4. Hybrid ECU

I have played around with what is needed in the past and using these parts the cars ran fine. Other than this option then yes you will need to visit a dealer although the U.S. has more relaxed vehicle information than repairers like me here in Perth, Western Australia.

Good luck,

Gavin
Current Tech Auto Electrical

 

check out thread by member 'ovni'. he is selling discountedprogrammed keys, iirc.

 

UPDATE to Low Price Alternative to Prius Keys 2004 - 2009 years only | PriusChat[/url
This is the link

^^^^^^^

 

Ovni's keys only work with a car that is already working with one fob.

Gavin is correct, those ECU's are registered to each other. But the Engine ECU, for sure? I am looking at the immobilizer service info (non-SKS) and it mentions the Hybrid Control ECU as part of the group, but not the Engine ECU.

 

Nh70,

You are right, the engine ecu is not coded for immobilization purposes but I have had problems with engine ecu's that are not from the same vehicle possibly running slightly different software versions (I assume) and therefore throwing up codes and in general not behaving as they should. Any other insight would be great.

Cheers,

Gavin.

 

OK, that makes sense. And welcome to Prius Chat. It is always good to have more knowledgeable voices in the mix.

 

You can replace all the necessary ECUs & bits but it is a PITA, you have to take the dash all apart including the dash top. Steve at autobeyours.com sells matched sets of ECU's.

You can make the car drive again without taking anything apart, but you need a fob (used is OK), Techstream, and then you need to do a seed reset for the immobilizer then the smartkey system. To get the passcode you have to have locksmith credentials or find someone who can get you the passcode based on the onetime seed the car generates via Techstream. Most dealers can do this, but they will probably charge you a lot. Do you know anyone with Techstream? For seed resets an old version of techstream like v4.2 is best since it uses 6 digit seed instead of 96 digit hex seed.

 

Or you can hire a local immobilizer locksmith. I made the mistake of losing both fobs. I had to buy two NEW fobs at the dealership and instead of paying them an additional 160 to program (not to mention the cost of towing my car there 100$) so $260 total, I just paid a guy to come out and program it with his computer thing. I was watching him. He had a device that had a security calculator on it so it didn't need to be connected to the internet. It generated the code for the device to accept. Pretty awesome. Anyways he charged me $100 to do it. It took him about 1 hour. He also cut the internal keys for me too. The only thing that didn't work was the lock and unlock but after doing the "chicken dance" they ended up working fine.

NOTE THIS THOUGH: If you lose BOTH keys, you need TWO keys to re program the car. Even the dealer does this but won't tell you. Thats the only reason why you don't need to buy two keys when they do it. Still more expensive though and it leaves the opportunity for it to happen again. Next time not so lucky considering the immobilizer only remembers 4 fobs!

Also note this about EBAY FOBS: You CAN program the immobilizer to start the car. You CANNOT program a used fob to lock and unlock the doors. You MUST have new keys for this feature to work.

You can however save money by entering the car with the emergency key and starting with the fob....if your a cheap nice person...

 

For the record his name is Roger and he owns arizona key guys. He can give you more details if you need help with someone who has the same tech in your area. Just google "immobilizer locksmith" plus your city. And if your REALLY a cheap nice person you can buy new fobs on the internet and wait for them to get here. Save yourself an additional $200.

Make sure they are new though otherwise you'll be opening the door manually.

Hope that helps!

 

This is not 100% correct.

You can have used (Ebay) fobs and have full smartkey functionality....just not with chicken dance.
You require special equipment and knowledge to make it work.

We do it all the time for customers with used Ebay fobs and they have same functionality as "programmed" virgin fobs when we're done.

 

My apologies. Is that the same with the non sks fobs? Mine is not sks.

 

Yes, it is possible to mate used/ebay SKS or Non-SKS fobs to the appropriate Prius and have 100% functionality. It requires a "seed code reset", which usually requires locksmith credentials to get the one time passcode. We use Techstream but some locksmiths may have alternate tools to accomplish the same thing.

Actually with used non-SKS fobs you may be able to make remotes work via chicken dance, but I've never tried it. Anyone out there tried?