Battery Vent Odor

Has anyone seen a video or directions to actually remove the battery cover? I have seen how to remove the battery and haven't taken it out yet but no where have I seen how to remove the aluminum cover

 

For those doubters, trust those of us who have "the smell", it is legit. It's not musty ac smell. The closest I could compare it to is urine/ammonia

 

Does the smell fill the car all the time, or is it only when driving it for a while?

 

You could try putting an ac vent air freshener clip on the air intake

 

all the time, worst in summer


iPad ?

 

All the time. Air fresheners, Lysol, febreze all do nothing. I've shampood the upholstery, carpets etc. At best it masks the smells very temporarily

 

Has anyone tried an ozone machine?

 

guys, the smell emanates from therubber tubes in the HV battery. I have a piece of smelly tube in a zip bag on my desk. the rubber is sticky, looks wet and smells of horse piss. same for your fingers if you touch the pipe. it is very likely caused by a educt used in the manufacturing of a rubber stabilizer, more specific, a anti-oxidant. google for p-cresol and horse stable or p-cresol and antioxidant. together with ammonia, p-kresol IS the biggest part of the smell of urine.


iPad ?

 

I agree with you. It smells like pig or horse piss. Same problem in my 2006 Prius vent.

 

any update on researching the piece of tube

 

just an fyi: I did find a mouse nest next to my hybrid battery when I cleaned the hv fan. it is a good idea to pull the trunk and rh side panels, just to verify no water or rodents in your car and to clean that hv fan while your in there.

 

How come my 07 doesn't have that smell? Is your car stored outside in the sun no tint or never cover the windshield?

 

Yes that's a good question.

I think that enough people have confirmed that it's the rubber vent tube to be pretty sure that it's indeed the problem. But why do only some people get the problem while the majority don't? That is the mystery.

I guess it's something like the rubber on the rear hatch lift handle. Although quite a lot of people have reported that theirs has softened and melted, for the majority of people it's fine. One possibility is that they had different suppliers or some bad batches or something, and the other possibility is that it's just different environmental factors and the "melty" ones had been exposed to something.

 

purely a guess but maybe Toyota used different suppliers of the tube which has some of us getting the smell and others not. This is not caused by parking in the sun.

read on another forum that this is the reason. different suppliers.

 

this information is very helpful at the moment. just bought a pruis about a week and half ago, I personally thought it was my pregnancy causing me . Appreciate this post, THANKS !!!

 

a fellow german priusfreunde forum chap just ripped his HV battery apart to remove the rubber hoses. They smell so bad even though a plastic bag he stores them outside in his lawn. The smell is not smelt nor were any of hiscel leaking or show a malfunction. It is just the roubber hoses smelling like horse urin. it is very organic, in nature and sticks to your clothes and hair etc.
After replacing them for Silicone rubber hoses, he now reported the smell is almost gone and his wife now accepts to enter the car again.
Again an other case where Toyota Germany has refused to accept is as covered under the 8yrs warranty. Toyota Germany told be the rubber hoses inside the HV-battery are not part of the battery and hence are not covered by the warranty that includes the HV-battery. In my case the car had a uninterupted Toyota main dealer service record. I am pissed and my car smells from piss. NExt month I have some time and rip them out. I jsut hate that I have to rip half the interior apart to get there.
I have not done any analysis yet as I have not got free access to a GC-MS yet. I will. Promised.


iPad ?

 

That sounds very plausible. I got some heavy rubber wheel chocks, they had a nasty smell for some time. It's dissipated now. And our kids got us a humming bird feeder, had a rubber cork with a nice toxic smell. It's hit-or-miss.

 

how much did the silicon hoses cost him?

 

I have just ordered and received 2 meters 10x14mm hose for €10 on eBay. Will hopefully get to swapping the pipes in August.
Just insert a 1/4" square wooden rod into the pipe and use a 5mm or an approximate diameter inch hole punch to prepare the holes.
The end plugs are pulled from the smelly hoses.
The battery stubs the pipe sticks onto have a diameter of 6mm or approx. 1/4"
These pictures are from user "zweisam" of the german Priusfreunde forum.
You can lift the battery lid without having to remove the battery from its location.
He used a drill to put the holes into the silicone tubing. The hole to hole distance is 41mm.
After fitting those, the fellow reported that smell rapidly declined and is pretty much gone. I am guessing in a few weeks it will be complexity absent.

Best regards from Germany, home of the Prius horse stable smell special edition that Toyota does not care about.
Always striving for the highest quality and safety, they prefer to leave customers alone or offer a $500 repair fitting the same smelly pipes again.

 

To replace them with anything but the same odiferous tubes would be an admission. Funny world we live in.