Gen 2 versus lightning bolt

If you have time you and a friend can both joinAAA plus. After 30 days you get a free100 mile tow. Then your friend calls in and he gets another 100 miles. Then you call again and get another 100 miles. I had 2 friend have a Range Rover towed this way 450 miles to LA to a custom body shop. You get 4 100 mile tows a year. So with 2 of you that’s an 800 mile value for the cost of 2 AAA plus memberships. The drawback is you have to be a member for 30 days before your tow benefits. Kick in.

 

I don't think you can tow a prius. It would be put on a trailer and surely they would notice the same car having it done more than once.

 

Correct just like a Range Rover. Flatbed tow truck. I didn’t even think this would be possible had my friend not done it.

 

And having an older Range Rover
AAA plus membership is pretty much required…lol. Saved me twice so far.

 

Oh. I thought he was talking about the distance. Usually when I call for a long tow AAA plus sends a flatbed. I guess it gets better fuel economy??? Not sure. Maybe that is a perk of AAA plus. You get a flatbed…??

 

It'd be a head scratcher for the AAA tow truck driver if he got the call for the tow for another 100 miles right after he dropped the car off after towing it for 100 miles. I know if I was that driver I'd be annoyed.

 

It sounds like the kind of thing that, even if there isn't an explicit "don't do that" written into AAA's terms, one could get written in if it happened enough.

 

Yep... and one step closer to that now that we all know about it...

 

Another update from the dealer!

They got a hold of a used ECM, so I went ahead and had them install it for further diagnosing. Now they know of 3 more ECUs that need to be replaced next. Buuttttt, further diagnosing still needs to be done after that. So my sister and I are fortunately are going on a road trip in her truck in a few weeks through Des Moines, so we're gonna tow the car on the way back and I'll see if I can get those ECUs replaced myself. I imagine I would just need to rent a vehicle trailer to hook up to her Tacoma?

Thanks so much! I may hit you up too once I get the car back here. Probably by the end of the month.

 

U-Haul tow dolly $186 Des Moines to CO Springs, U-Haul auto transport $426, that's for a Tacoma 4x4, w/6500 tow package.

 

Copy that. I’m in and out of town but let me know.

 

A storm chasing bust lewered me into Iowa, so my sister and I now towing the Prius back to Colorado right now. Here's the part numbers for the ECUs that need to be replaced next:

Skid Control ECU: 89540-47130
Hybrid Battery ECU: 89890-47092
Hybrid Control ECU: 89981-47212

They want $2400 to replace them with used ones in 8 hours in addition to the $900 I've already paid. I can get them used as well for under $200, but they said a dealer will have to program them to the car once installed. Though is that just pairing them to the immobilizer? If not, could I have a dealer do the programing for me once they’re installed? Or is it something a regular hybrid specialist could do?

Also went back to the spot and found 2 scorch marks on either side of my back left tire. Also found the bit of antenna that flew off.

 

Do you have Techstream, or a buddy with access to Techstream?

I suspect the hybrid control ECU wants to have the correct VIN stored in it, and it will want to make the acquaintance of the immobilizer ECU.

I don't remember any of that being really complicated. Pairing with the immobilizer was mostly something like "turn the power on and leave them alone for half an hour." Just something that would slow down a thief who wanted to be clever and swap an ECU to drive off with the car.

 

I've got a USB adapter for techstream, though last time I tried to use it I couldn't it work on my old laptop. I'll see if I can get access to another one.

 

Alright, got the ECUs connected. (Well, mostly, 2 are hanging by the wiring harnesses under the dash, lol.) The car still doesn't start, but that also could be because 2 of my ECUs have slightly different part numbers than what I ordered:

The Skid Control ECU I got is 89540-47100 when I ordered 89540-47130
The HV Battery ECU I got is 89890-47090 when I ordered 89890-47092

Looks like from this thread Skid Control ECU Replacement | PriusChat the Skid Control ECU I ordered should work, so we'll see. But I'm not sure about the Hybrid battery ECU, so I went ahead and ordered another, hopefully this time the seller sends me the right one.

I got Techstream 12 working on a VirtualBox on my work Macbook, and before ripping apart the car, none of the ECU were responding:

Now with the new ones connected, 4 ECUs are now responding: Engine & ECT, Hybrid Control, HV Battery, and Cruise Control.

So 2 of the ECUs I installed are responding, including the HV Battery with the wrong party number. Is the Skid Control ECU the "ABC/VSC/TRAC" one? If so, should I try to order that one with the correct part number too? I suppose I could wait for the correct HV Battery ECU to arrive and plop that one in and see what happens. Though if anyone can think of any other ECUs to order in the meantime based on this troubleshooting I can go ahead and order while I wait for the new HV Battery ECU.

I'm pretty sure all the pairing and programming is done. I did get error messages when writing the VIN number into the Hybrid Control ECU, but now it's reporting the correct VIN number so it must've workered at some point. I've also done the immobizer 30 minute pairing twice by jumping pins 4 & 13 in the OBD II port after hitting the power button twice (not Ready), but then again the Immobliser ECU has an asterick next it too so no pairing may have happened.

 

When you say this, do you mean you've pressed the "Health Check" button (in the left bar) and only these four responded?

Have you tried double-clicking any of the boxes that have an asterisk?

 

I would stop and assess things a bit before continuing. There is the possibilty that the lightning strike took out every ecu on this car.

The ecu's you replaced are the 3 that talk to a scanner directly on the CAN bus (so the CAN bus works- which is good - no other ecu's on the bus are pulling it down). If the HV battery ecu can talk and provides data to the scanner, I wouldn't worry so much about it right now. There were a few revisions for that ecu on the Gen2 and it's not your problem. Likely the same with ABS, but that needs a little more checkout.

Everything else on the car talks to a scanner directly or indirectly through the SIL bus. There's a bunch of stuff on the BEAN bus - power mode, immobilizer/ certification, HVAC, TPMS, key transponder, transmission (park control). All that talks to the gateway which talks to the scanner on SIL.

At this point, what all actually works or turns on when you power up the car? Have you checked for 12V at every fuse at both fuse boxes?

The next level of diagnosis would be to unplug ecu's on the SIL bus - one at a time - and see if anything else responds to a Techstream health check. These would be: EPS (power steering), SRS (airbag), gateway, and ABS. With all of those unplugged, plug in SRS, then see if it can talk. If not, unplug it again then try another ecu, and so on. If each of those has powers, grounds, and comm lines but won't communicate then it's dead.

I'd expect that if (the recently replaced) ABS was the only ecu on the SIL bus, that it might talk.


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Thanks! I got the other 3 ECUs unplugged along the SIL bus and the only one that's causing problems now is the SRS Airbag Assembly ECU. With it disconnected, now every other ECU is communicating after a healthcheck:

My car doesn't have Remote Engine Start so I presume I don't need to worry about that.

I cleared the codes, and now have nice long list to work through:


Here's some more info on the more relavent ones:
Hybrid Control:


ABC/VSC/TRAC:


Gateway:


Should I wait until I get the SRS Airbag Assembly working before working through these codes? I've been looking through this huge wiring diagram to find the power, ground, and comm lines:
https://attachments.priuschat.com/attachment-files/2016/07/110280_Wiring_Diagrams.pdf
but couldn't find a spesific pin-out of this plug to the SRS:


I also checked all the little fuses in the 2 boxes, and couldn't find any that weren't reporting at least 12v. Are there more? I'm looking at my engine fuse box diagram and there's some bigger ones in slots 27-42 with an annoying cover over that I could stick my tester into if that's okay to try:
Fuse Box Diagram Toyota Prius (XW20; 2004-2009)
Otherwise, everything from the headlights to the keyless entry are still working, so I haven't found anything else that's broken so far.