May have drained battery - now what?

good point. there was a young man about a year ago who recommend everyone open the hood, find the jump point in the fuse box, notice and understand that one side is metal, and one side is plastic, and also to find a good bolt for ground so that if you ever needed to jump it, you wouldn't have to try to figure all that out in the dark and/or freezing cold. he posted pictures showing everything, but for some reason, got totally criticized, run out of town on a rail and hasn't been heard from since.

 

Unless the 12 volt is totally dead, it will still pop the lock on the hatch.

So, I still prefer the direct connect, whenever possible.

Too many individuals have cause expensive damage with improperly using the under hood jump connections.

 

I think from reading posts here that just as many have caused damage by trying to connect directly to the somewhat inconveniently located battery.

 

Don't think so. The positive terminal always is covered with a plastic cover. The negative terminal is bare and connected to the chassis.

 

OK, so here's another related one: In the manual the illustration on how to jump start underhood shows the ground point as a bolt on the extreme left side, too far from the post for the short battery pack jumper leads. Why wouldn't a bolt just above the positive post work?

 

I use a protruding bolt on the driver's side of the engine. Not sure what it is exactly, might be coolant bleed bolt?? For bigger clips this might not work, though.



When we purchased the car needed a jumpstart and I watched the service department guy hook up there. Any bare metal on the engine is a really safe bet, most bare metal on the body also.

If you've got a multimeter with continuity function (or just use ohms): hook onto a real solid bare metal on the engine, then check continuity to other prospective points you're thinking to use, make sure it makes a circuit.

 

Yeah, it's crazy right?

Kilowatts of power on-board, but you're dead-in-the-water because the puny aux battery is to weak to turn on the computer, which would have rescued the situation by activating the 12V charging circuit.

I think this design was a deliberate decision by the business analysts to lead you into a service-call at the dealership.

 

How is it possible to cause expensive damage? There's only two ways to hook up booster cables, and if you own a pair, it probably says right on the package the right way to connect them.

Oh, I forgot, some people would rather just chance it instead of reading simple instructions.

 

When the battery's in the car there's a pretty obvious red cap with embossed + symbol. But take the battery out and it's a bit more subtle. I took mine out about a week back, cleaned the posts and clamps, then charged it at room temp. On the top of the case are just these embossed symbols, a little hard to see. I touched them up with a silver sharpie.

 

It's dark, it's cold, it's raining or snowing, you're wearing gloves, you get the cable right at one end and wrong at the other...and on the Prius the damage can be much more expensive than on a standard car.

Enough people have done it who don't otherwise appear stupid that it's prudent to give the cautionary message.

 

The terminal that's connected to the chassis is probably the (-).