35K miles Service maintenance?

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at 30k, all they did was change the oil, and replaced your engine and cabin air filter. At 35k, I wouldn't be concern too much about anything. If you haven't done so, change your transmission fluid, and then at 40k, change your oil. That's it. Nothing else to worry about. Oh, and rotate your tires if you want to. I don't do it but that's just me. Good luck.

 

Gen 3 Priuses get serviced with minor (oil change) and major (anything else) stuff at 10K intervals. At 5K it's an excuse to fill your windshield wiper tank, rotate your tires, and charge you $40 for the privilege.

As it happens I have a 2010 Gen 3. It started off with 5K oil change intervals; in the spring of 2010 that was changed to 10K. There were a couple of letters sent to the dealerships about it that ended up in Prius Chat. Interestingly, one of the letters addressed the dealership's main concern: The loss of revenue on those 5K oil changes! Toyota said, in effect, "It's not that bad. They'll come in for the tire rotations. Otherwise, keep a stiff upper lip."

Rotating tires is kind of a brainless exercise, assuming you can figure out a way to get two wheels on one side or the other off the ground at the same time. Ramps won't help, much, but a jack and a jackstand can do it. My wife's car has a jack, so I use her's and mine to do it. It takes a half hour, longer if you move slow. The other stuff in the 5K maintenance are equally brainless: Checking to make sure the floor mat hasn't gotten itself loose, knocking the dirt out of the cabin air filter (think that's 10K), and checking the fluids.

There's currently quite a bit of interest on Prius Chat on changing the transmission fluid. The manual says 120K miles, but the cognoscenti who test oil at commercial facilities claim that's too long and have oil reports to back it up. 45K to 50K intervals seems more reasonable and that's a number that other automatic transmissions use, too. We're now getting people running around saying to change it every 30K which, to my mind, is somewhat over the top. A Prius transmission/electric motor system doesn't have a hydraulic analog computer for shifting gears, no torque converter, and a heck of a lot fewer physical gears than Ye Standard Automatic Transmission, so I'd have thought that the tranny oil would be less beat upon. (Mind you, the ATF you buy at Toyota is the same stuff they have people dump into every automatic transmission that Toyota makes. There may be special additives that make it good for a Prius, but it sure looks like every other car is getting the benefit as well.)

Good luck.

KBeck

 

Do you have this booklet in the glove box?



Have a read

 

You don't even need the booklet toyotaowners.com

 

I just had the dealer do my oil and filter change. He said I am due for the 30,000 service where they change my transmission oil. I asked how much and he said $529 and that's because I am not due for a synthetic engine oil change because I just had it done.

What is the price of the 30,000 service? Over $500 seems like robbery. Am I nuts for thinking this price is very high?
BTW, my dealer is in NJ.

 

As they say, "Ha!". One second whilst I get my 2010 service manual from the car.

• Check installation of driver's floor mat. (You can do that - is it hooked onto the little pegs? If so, you're done. If not, fix it.)
• Clean cabin air filter, but only if you have the solar power ventilation system. If you do: Manual says how to get the filter out, which involves emptying out the lower glove box, popping a couple of plastic tabs, lowering the glove box down, pulling out the filter, whapping it against a cinder block and/or using the vacuum cleaner on it, then reverse the process. If you don't have the solar stuff, just replace the filter, a new one's maybe $10 down at Auto Parts Store du Jour
• Inspect and adjust all fluid levels. Lessee, power brakes, two coolant tanks, the oil, and the window washer.
• Replace engine oil and filter. Right. I do that myself when I'm feeling my oats; the local Mobile 1 shop can do it, I warn them to be careful about the plastic door. They are.
• Rotate the tires.

All of that shouldn't cost more than $70 or so, and that's pushing it.
Now, let's talk about the transmission fluid. My 2010 Warranty and Maintenance Guides, both the one that came with the car and the second one that came in the mail after the oil change interval was upped to 10K miles, says nothing about transmission fluid, except to "inspect" it every 30,000 miles. And the "inspect" means, by their words, "See if it's leaking".

Naturally, one can't get to the Toyota official documentation on change intervals except by paying $15 for three days worth. But various places on the web claim that Toyota calls for a change at 120,000 miles. I just checked Toyota's official web site; the most recent version of the Warranty and Maintenance Guide does not say.

Fine. There are people on Prius Chat who use the services of oil examination companies. One takes a sample of the oil, chugs it off to these guys, and they report back on the health or lack of it of the oil, be it transmission or engine. Our people report that at 50K miles the considered opinion of these service people is that the ATF should be changed. There's a lot of cars that call for an ATF change at 45K miles, so people are doing that number on general principles.

The only reason the dealership is calling for an ATF change at 30K miles is because they think they can bamboozle you with garbage.

Fine. I've done that thing. Let's get basic. The procedure is:

1. Get the car up on a lift or over an oil change pit. (If an oil change place is doing this, they've got one or the other anyway.)
2. If you're feeling ambitions, take off a dozen plastic clips or so and a few bolts and remove the plastic cover from under the engine. Takes maybe 10 minutes. If you're not feeling ambitious, don't bother, you can get to the tranny oil change bolts without doing so.
3. Grab about a 2' 3/8" rachet extender shaft (part of socket wrench kit), stick it in the upper of two bolts, and unscrew the thing. Discard the washer under the bolt.
4. Repeat on the lower oil change bolt. Discard the washer. All the oil drains out of the tranny.
5. Put a new washer into the hole where the lower bolt goes. Torque the bolt.
6. Pump roughly 4 quarts of tranny oil into the upper hole until oil starts leaking back out the upper hole.
7. Put a new washer back into the hole and torque the bolt down.
8. If you've taken off the bottom plastic panel, put it back.
9. Done.

That is not a $200 job. It's roughly what any oil change shop does when they change transmission fluid on any car with an automatic transmission. Yeah, I did it myself around 45K miles, and it was a pain, mainly because (a) I don't have ramps, just jack stands, and (b) my hydraulic jack doesn't get the car up high enough so I can slide easily around underneath. But for people who change oil for a living and have got either that oil pit down there or a lift, this stuff is child's play.

The rest of the stuff in the manual is "Inspect" stuff. Ball joints, brake lines and hoses, brake disks, brake pads, drive shaft boots, exhaust pipes and mounts, fuel lines, tank cap, radiator, steering box, steering linkage. All of that is look under at the things listed, make sure they're not leaking/torn/busted/whatever. When some $RANDOM place says, "30 point inspection!" that's what they're talking about. If it is truly a solid, truthful dealership, they'll look. If not, they won't bother.

Is all that worth $500? Answer: Hell, no. If a more-or-less standard oil change is $30, tire rotation $12, and the eyeball check and perhaps a plugging in of the computer into the car to check for junk, well, maybe $150 on a bad day.

Final bit. I'm working on white hair; I've owned cars since the early 70's. Every car I've had responsibility for has had a maintenance schedule that calls for oil changes at some interval. Without exception, every dealership I've walked into has called for oil changes twice or three times as often as recommended by the manufacturer. If you give them the evil eye and say, "Just what the manufacturer calls for, please." they'll do it for quite a bit less. But it irks me no end that these people routinely pull these kinds of stunts. I don't like liars and cheats. One likes to trust professionals at their jobs. But it's a breach of trust about the small stuff - which means that they can't be trusted when the big stuff happens, either. So, maybe a non-30K oil change is $70 and change, and one at 30K is maybe $100 with the extra inspections, assuming that they actually do it. Trying to charge you $400 for a maybe $50 job means you should take your business elsewhere, permanently.

There are auto mechanics, for real, on Prius Chat. I'd love to hear what one of them has to say on all this.

KBeck

 

My mechanic changed the transaxle fluid for $90 total

 

Thank you for your answer to my question.

 

I hope you don't just rely on the hydraulic jack while your under there?

 

you must have a dealer that either 1) follows proper transaxle oil change protocol that almost no other dealer does or 2) rips off ever customer that walks in

 

Nope, the jackstands. But the car can't go any higher than the hydraulic jack will lift it, so it's a tight fit.

KBeck

 

buy a low profile jack and 1 ton jack stands. Also try rhino ramps, that's the easiest way to lift up the vehicle haha...

 

A friend was changing the tires and wheels on his $100,000 Porsche, and it slipped off the jack stand resulting in significant body damage and a trip to the body shop. I'll rely on the dealership lift and pay extra for the peace of mind.

 

true, I wouldn't trust myself with an expensive car that cost 100$k+

 

Didn't think you were dumb!