Finally received the Prius Prime!

congrats on your purchase. first thing you should do is replace all the interior bulbs with LEDS. makes a big difference and the car looks better at night.

 

Spare tire.
If car will sit idle 5+ days at a time get a 12volt battery maintainer.

 

+1
And lithium jump pack to keep in your glove box just in case you let the car sit too long.

 

If you plug-in the prius prime to charge the high voltage battery, the charger also charges and tops off the 12v battery as well. Thus no need for jump packs or battery maintainers.

 

If you drain the battery completely a few times best budget for a new 12volt battery as well.

 

Definitely not true. Charging the traction battery just keeps the 12volt from discharging but does nothing the”top it off”. Several members have confirmed this at length. And that minuscule charging of the 12volt only happens while the traction battery is actually being charged. Only plugging in isn’t enough.

 

No, the charging the traction battery does not charge the 12v battery sufficiently to maintain the 12v SoC. I have monitored the charge level of 12v and during 3+ hours of the traction battery charge, the 12v battery was minimally maintained, but never charged.
See the data here: 12v Battery Is Discharging, Re-Charge Now ! | Page 10 | PriusChat

Plus this minimal float charge only occurs during active charging of the traction battery, but not after the traction charge is finished. Keeping the charge cord pluged in will only drain the 12v battery quicker.

 

I'll comment too.

This is just simply wrong information.



Rob43

 

Might want to verify that claim. A multimeter will prove it wrong. In fact, there's some extra load on the 12V while the EVSE is connected and not charging.

I suppose the confusion comes first from the fact the the PiP really did charge the 12V while charging the traction battery. (But only while charging.) The Prime only sends enough voltage to the 12V to keep it from draining as has been said many times on this thread and others. I had made the assumption that it charged both batteries as well having come from a PiP to a Prime.

 

Do you have a suggestion for a lithium jump pack for my 2020 PP. Living in Canada I use Amazon.ca and they give me the following message
We cannot find any "lithium jump pack" for your 2020 Toyota Prius Prime.

 

I don't think there is any Prime specific jump starter. Since none of Prius models uses the 12v battery to start the engine, you really do not need a heavy-duty jump starter with a lot of cranking power. I've read people have successfully used eight D batteries (8x1.5v=12v) connected in series to start Prius with a dead 12v battery. I now have two lithium jump packs and keep them in each of our cars, but I have not used either of them yet, so I don't know which one works better. It is like a spare tire. It is good to have when you need it, but chances are you may never need to use it.

Two I have are:
www.amazon.com/Starter-12800mAh-Portable-Engines-Battery/dp/B07NPL6MJP/
www.amazon.com/DBPOWER-19200mAh-Portable-Starter-Flashlight/dp/B07DWSYYZR/

Note: The DBPower model is substantially cheaper after applying a coupon ($65) than Anker model ($100) for almost twice as much juice, but I have read a comment from a member who bought this model and the pack was dead in very short order. Mine is still charged and ready to be used after almost 8 months in storage in a car, but again I have not used it to jump-start a car. I bought this model because of the price but also due to having Type-C connection. Although after receiving it I found out that the output on the USB-C is not high power, so I can not use this port for charging my laptop. It works fine for a smartphone. Anker model on the other hand is a simpler and smaller pack built by a very reputable company, so I would hope it is better quality.

 

They probably can't find any jack stands or metric socket sets for the Prime either. The jump pack is a tool. If it's 12V, it'll work. Most are way bigger than the Prius needs, but that great because you can use it to help friends start their cars, too. Just get one that has good reviews. Don't overthink it. I simply got one at the local auto parts store after checking it out online. When I showed them Amazon's price, they matched it.

 

I took a look through the thread you linked documenting with data to prove the 12v parasitic battery drain of the Prius Prime. Excellent research! Thank you for correcting me. I was not aware of that thread, I just went by what Professor John D. Kelly said in his 2017 Prius Prime - 8.79 kWh Battery Removal video where he describes at the 21:30 mark of the video that the AC to DC HV battery charger also has a 12v rail used to power the cooling fans and keep the 12v battery charged.

 

Hmmm I wonder if you could hardwire a trickle charger to the evse port so you have a attractive and unavoidable improvement?

All the local places here say all deals, coupons and price matches are cancelled due to covid

 

A CTEK 4.3 has been working well for me. That said, I'm not sure what the heck's going on with the price. I picked one up for about $80 CDN, maybe 6 years back (locally, at KMS Tools). Now I see them on Amazon.ca for around $175.

It might even be COVID related: so many cars sitting idle, batteries going off, supply and demand??

Maybe just search CTEK charger, some of their other, possibly newer models might be cheaper, more available. You want to keep it around 4~5 amp rating.

 

@thymara was asking about a lithium jump starter pack, not a charger. I don't think CTEK makes a jump starter, do they?

BTW, I was contemplating purchasing a CTEK charger which can be sourced in the US for $90 USD. www.amazon.com/CTEK-56-958-Automatic-Extreme-Climate/dp/B00GODCLYU/

But I had a need to charge a 6v battery and ended up buying a cheap Chinese 4 amp automatic charger by Suaoki to replace my ancient manual 10 amp Schumacher charger. I think I paid ~$30 for it last year, but the company is defunct now and you can no longer find the charger sold anywhere. www.amazon.com/SUAOKI-Battery-Automatic-Maintainer-Motorcycle/dp/B07374QD33 It has worked fine for me, but not sure of the quality and longevity. One thing I found out about this charger was that since it is a fully automatic 6v/12v charger if the 12v battery has been depleted deeply to around 7v, it thinks the battery in a fully charged 6v battery and does not charge it. I had a small 12v motorcycle battery used on my portable generator stater which was deeply discharged down to ~7v. I could not charge this battery using Suaoki. So, I recently purchased this charger from Victron. www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07TLCT7X7/

It has builtin Bluetooth to monitor the charging process. It is solidly built and it is IP65 rated. Very impressed with the built quality and also with the app that goes with it.

BTW, I also decided to install an on-board charger on my PRIME and purchased this charger/maintainer as well. It is also solidly built and IP65 but is much smaller than other chargers I have. www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07W3QSMF9/

 

Ah woops.