The car was designed with a service life of 180k miles. This car is half through it's 2nd life. Any major failure can cost you $4000. So if a major failure comes up in 10,000 miles, your car suddenly became a $9000 car with almost 300,000 miles
If I were a dealer looking out for my best interest, I wouldn't stop you from buying the car. It's like having a potential $4000+ customer in the very near future. If you're in the Los Angeles area and like project cars, I know of a 2005 with 400k miles on it for $2000......less the hv battery that I bought and a failed transaxle.
thanks guys...it is temping but sounds like a risk (like any car) .... they will let me take it to dealer....+ said it is not orig battery other chepo I could get right now is a 2001 Toyota Prius 217,000 mi. . guy will also let me take it to dealer and says it is not orig battery . he wants 3000
Not original battery doesn't mean anything. Anybody can replace a module. If you have a tight budget, I would suggest you don't buy a Prius with high mileage. They can be very problematic and very expensive to fix. It's a roll of the dice and you don't want to crap out when you get a 7
[QUOTE=" If you have a tight budget, I would suggest you don't buy a Prius with high mileage. They can be very problematic and very expensive to fix. It's a roll of the dice and you don't want to crap out when you get a 7[/QUOTE] here is where i am at. want to take month long road trip ATL to seattle and back option 1: drive dodge 3500 with gas bill of 2500.00 option 2: rent hybrid for estimated 1600.00 + 700 in gas option 3: buy cheap hybird and not loose the money on rental . other logic behind this would be I want to but a new plug in hybrid prius but not quite ready so this car would be transitional
Are these cars all you can afford or qualify for on credit? because if you bought an 08 medium mileage Prius, and simply used it for the trip, reliability would be much more secure and you could likely make most of your money back after you get your plug in hybrid. Of course I say this without knowing your situation. As for the 01, not comfortable for a long trip. Not recommended. I would look for a Gen II with less than 130k miles with a good maintenance record.
I agree with bisco and recommend always having a couple extra modules on hand for any long road trip involving a hybrid. If your battery fails it'd be easier to do a Band-Aid swap on the modules (assuming that module failure is the problem) than be forced to tow the car or take it to a dealership. It would also be wise to purchase an OBD II to self diagnose or to use as a preventative tool. Jessica
OMG, what a downer that would be..... "Kids you go off to Disneyland, I'll stay behind to do open heart surgery on this battery to get us home"
I guess i got overzealous reading about the long running taxi fleets. but another way to look at it would be this. what is the difference in reliability on a long trip buying a 3k hyrid VS a 3k regular car? don't prius keep going even if the traction battery dies? (only wondering like if i was in middle of trip...not that i would continue to drive it that way ongoing)
A car with nearly 300,000 miles, the most reliable thing on there will probably be the HV battery. Everything else is a wear part that can break. Just a few things that can break AC is most likely leaking, so you might have no AC in the middle of your trip Inverter pump Inverter Engine/transaxle/hv battery
and a dealer shop cant reliably predict that stuff being or soon to be problematic? (e.g. too internal)?
If only everything was that easy to detect. We would all sell our cars before those components break SM-N900P ?
I've done a few "emergency" jobs for people who are visiting Houston from the northern states and had their battery kick the bucket while here. And no, the Prius will not be safely drivable after the HV battery dies. Just. Don't. Do. It. In your case, I'd would probably buy the car (if a better deal didn't present itself), buy the OBD II some spare modules and tools, get it professionally checked out and maybe get AAA, lol. Then, I'd fix it up and flip it when I got home! That's just me though... Jessica
You can always buy the car and put an ad on craigslist for travel companions. They'll chip in for gas and help push the car when it breaks
