I want to share my experience with a car that was gifted to me. The car was always garaged. My mother drove the car until 2016. After that the car was driven even 4 to 6 months. February 10th I transferred title to my name changed the tires and oil (witch they over filled) and drove the car from San Diego to Cabo San Lucas. 1023mi. Car ran flawlessly. Very impressed
Welcome to PriusChat!! How is Cabo these days, as of a few years ago there were reports of "hanging overpass scenery" when traveling to the airport.
The car seems to be working properly. Do you mean I need to charge the battery? no more thing hanging from bridges lately
you have a 12 year old hybrid battery that is still withing parameters. but nimh batteries like to be used. prolong chargers exercise the cells to reinvigorate them. it is the perfect time for preventitive measures. once a module goes out of parameters, it will be time for a new battery.
Ok. This is what I have been trying to research. The car was driven regularly till 2017. Short trips 2 to 4 miles per trip if that. I personally used the car 2 times per year. I disconnected the 12v battery when leaving the car for 4 to 6 months at a time. So when the car became mine I started to wonder what the effect was of not driving it the last two years. The battery was exercised. The battery seems to be performing properly. I averaged 47mpg today. All around town driving with 5 minutes on highway. Hilly roads. Don’t know if we havdd Ed the equipment for force charging or balancing of the hv battery. I would really like the correct info before I mess with something that is working well. No offense but there seems to be conflicting options on this subject.
21k miles and 12 yrs in, it may be prudent to do a top end HV battery balance at a minimum. You could cycle it a few times, but with 47mpg and no rapid indicator swinging on the MFD, might just leave it for the time being. WW @ericbecky @strawbrad @TMR-JWAP do?
I would get an OBDII bluetooth enabled adapter (that plugs into the under dash diagnostic port) and run the Dr. Prius app tests that give you a report on the hybrid battery health and remaining hybrid battery capacity. If the tests show that all is well, then just enjoy the vehicle. The developer of the Dr. Prius app is an active member of this community. By the way, my 2010 sat for a year while we lived abroad 6 years ago and continues to be healthy.(but it has been driven actively during the other years).
I agree with @royrose in regard to evaluating the battery first. Whether it be Dr. Prius (which I have no direct experience with) or Hybrid Assistant/Hybrid Reporter which will provide a graph of all 14 blocks, the important thing would be to get an accurate evaluation of the battery condition. "Don't fix what isn't broke" is a good thing to follow. What I like about HA/HR is the battery test function and graph function. Just crank up the AC and let it record. Then it graphs all the block voltages by time, making it very easy to see strong/weak blocks. Do it every few months or so and you can easily monitor any changes or degradation and make future plans for repairs if needed.
Actually, after reading your post again, I now suspect your new Prius is most likely just going to be an unreliable, money pit, troublemaker kind of car. You were extremely lucky it didn't leave you stranded during your 1k+ mile trip. My recommendation is to immediately drive it to South Carolina before your lucky streak ends, park it at my house and sign it over to me. In trade, I can provide you with a 2006 model that has 341k miles of proven reliability. Now, in all seriousness, congrats on the great car. It should last many years. Just get some good apps to monitor it.
Just drive it. The Hybrid Assistant / Hybrid Reporter app is an easy and cheap way to monitor the battery. If you like to tinker with stuff it's the best option for looking at the battery. Overall battery life is greatly influenced by climate. Hot weather kills batteries. To someone from the tundra San Diego sounds like a really hot place. A quick Google search showed that your temperate climate has been the perfect place for a battery. Someday your battery will fail. It could be years from now. Most Gen 2 Prius are getting pretty beat up and not worth the expense of a brand new battery. Your car would be the exception to the rule. And now you have the opinion of someone who has rebuilt hundreds of batteries.
