Head gasket Repair. Need shop suggestions?

Welcome to Prius Chat .

You can always try @Avi's Advanced Automotive in So Cal as he has done this job a time or two.

Might be worth a private conversation or calling him up to chat about your specific situation .

 

There is a member in here that went to Hybrid911 and they seemed pleased with the result, so there are options in SoCal.

Another shop in SoCal is HybridPit, which @sfv41901 and @RightOnTime run. They might be able to help as well.

Good luck and keep us posted .

 

Danieley4,
How many miles do you have on your car? Has the Toyota recommended maintenance been kept on schedule? and do you have records?
I feel these "bad headgasket symptoms" are all on Toyota. No engine built in the last twenty years should need a head gasket job with under 250K miles on it

 

i wonder if that is why they updated the pistons in the 2015, after updating the rings in the 2014

 

This guy is semi local to you and does the job for $680:

($425 starting labor HEAD GASKET REPLACEMENT 4 cylinder (most cars) - automotive services)

I would personally prefer to do the job with a bit more “care” but this is an option if you just want it running.

 

No, no negligence on you nor the previous owners part. Only on Toyotas part . The clogged EGR cooler is causing spot overheating in the head. Toyota should man up and cover all these situations, at least till 150k~200k.
Mine was diagnosed at 116k by the dealer. The service manager says its because Toyota uses them 'stretch to torque' headbolts.
If that were the reason shouldn't we have them retorqued or replaced at 100K?, Just askin'

 

This is an interesting thought. Though, how would you know how much they have "loosened" since the torque spec isn't ft-lbs but 36 ft-lbs + 90º + 45º. So, i'd say if they have loosened, new bolts would need to be used. I think at this stage, keeping the EGR cleaned might prove to be more useful in delaying HG issues at 50k mile interval. But only time will tell as there aren't a lot of engines doing regular cleaning and surpassing an additional 200k miles (not saying there arent people doing it, just that its very few to get results that confirm the egr theory).

 

I'm working on it.

 

The smart people would just get rid of their turd gen cars before 150k miles. After that, it's a roll of the dice. I just think it's a poor engine design.

I talked to the shop foreman at Longo Toyota, he said the earlier turd gen cars all will have burning oil issues or head gasket failures. It's just a matter of time. And on top of that, the HV battery will fail

 

not gonna disagree with that! Though 150k miles and I wouldn't have even had the car paid off yet. The rest of the car looks barely used for 7 years old. Yeah, i agree it's a matter of time and some would say, "Its a high mileage car, what do you expect!" But if keeping up with the EGR extends the life of an engine, then at least the owners have that to help mitigate older engine failures. I never thought about coming to this forum when we first purchased the car. Maybe it would have changed our minds, maybe I could have kept up with the EGR. Who knows. What is bothersome is talking to the dealers and them either acting surprised about it or blowing it off like we're a bunch of nut cases.

Strangely, I don't get too worked up about the HV battery. It's a battery, they have a definite lifespan regardless of how well you take care of it or even use it. When hybrids first came out, my fear wasn't if the battery goes, but when, how much was it gonna cost. I wanna say I remember something in the $8k-10k, thank goodness they were lasting 8ish+ years and the prices have definitely dropped significantly. $10k might as well buy a new car. $1-3k, that gives more life to the vehicle.

 

Agreed, and this is more/less the message I have been trying to relay.

 

Every car fails at some point.
At this point, I have 140,000 miles on my Prius and I haven’t had a single failure. I do maintain the car with great care, but everybody should. Seven years old, daily driver, and it’s solid as a rock.

 

I've stopped by Hybrid911 once to buy a part for my car. I saw a guy taking apart a HV battery in a attempt to fix it. What I saw was a module swap taking place. He was struggling a bit because he didn't seem to know the correct way to remove the battery case from the battery before doing work on it.

Although I don't have first hand experience with Hybrid911 repairs, just what I saw there would persuade me to continue DIY repairs.

 

I and few others on here have successfully swapped engine from 2016-2018 prius to 2010-2015 prius. It will require few modifications, which is not really big and any mechanic or diy-er can do it. This engines can be found at 1k range but if you go pick it up at lkq. They might get you lower price like in 850-900 plus core and tax. You get core back once u give them old engine.

Look at “fix that prius” on youtube. @Ragingfit @cnc97

Currently have 3k on new motor and averaging 55-58mpg depending on morning traffic. I once had 63mpg when i had my cruise on 60 mph for 40mile commute no traffic. I run amsoil in there. I used engine flush from amsoil before i added the new oil

 

They're also linked here:

Swapping in a Gen 4 Prius' 2ZR Engine into the Prius v | PriusChat

 

But if you buy an engine from LKQ or wherever, how do you know that it's not because the engine is shot that the thing ended up at LKQ?

 

They come with a warranty.