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What to do with ageing 2009 Prius?

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Care, Maintenance and Troubleshooting' started by Mr Mik, May 19, 2023.

  1. Mr Mik

    Mr Mik Junior Member

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    I am not sure what to do with my trusty 2009 Prius.

    It has done 505,000km and had a new HV battery put in at about 350,000km. Still on first set of brake pad but disks had to be machined and replaced a couple of times.

    Still using 5.0L petrol /100km with aggressive driving style and roof racks on. Has been the same throughout the life of this car except when the first battery was on the way out.

    Oil consumption is increasing, now about 1L oil topup required every 2000km, no oil dripping anywhere, not blowing smoke, but P0420 error and engine light are on most of the time.

    I got a P0a78 error a few weeks ago, pulled over, read out the code, checked under the hood for anything obvious, wiped the code and kept on driving. It has not returned and the car runs fine as always.

    My mechanic says the engine cannot be reconditioned, no-one supposedly does this any longer (I thought about over-sized piston rings and pistons or something like it).

    Air-con re-gassed for the first time a couple of weeks ago, they did it for free because 'there is something wrong and we could not fix it', but the aircon seems to be working just fine again since the regassing.

    So, is there something I can do about the oil consumption?
    What does the oil consumption mean? Where is it going, and will the problem accelerate?
    How many more kilometers can I expect to get out of this Prius? I'd like to get to 1 million for some reason!

    Any suggestions will be much appreciated!
     
    #1 Mr Mik, May 19, 2023
  2. Leadfoot J. McCoalroller

    Leadfoot J. McCoalroller Senior Member

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    consumption means more oil than usual is left in the combustion chamber during fuel ignition, so that excess oil becomes a secondary fuel and is exhausted out as CO2, soot, ash and other waste products.

    These tend to be much dirtier than those of simple gasoline (petrol) and have a tendency to foul the catalytic converter once consumption has progressed to a certain rate.

    It helps to know how the excess oil is getting into the combustion chamber. Sometimes it seeps in past the valve guides, sometimes the rings fail to sweep enough of it away from the cylinder walls during the intake stroke. You can have both problems in the same engine. There are other possibilities too, but those two cover a lot of ground.

    A full overhaul does work, but those are breathtakingly expensive from a labor standpoint, which has made them less available. The better cure is to transplant an engine from a crashed car with fewer kms.

    As far as I'm concerned, Toyota built these cars to last roughly between 15 and 20 years. Drive all the kms you want in that window but don't be late. So if you want a million, I suggest you start driving a lot more.
     
    #2 Leadfoot J. McCoalroller, May 19, 2023
  3. Tombukt2

    Tombukt2 Senior Member

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    1 NZ can still be had today new in the C . So should be plenty avail from JDM importers. The gen3 will run out of stock first I bet
     
    #3 Tombukt2, May 20, 2023
  4. MCCOHENS

    MCCOHENS Member

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    II
    Keep driving it. The oil rings could be gummed up, but I doubt it. However that is a cheap easy thing to address. You could look for a lower mileage motor, but honestly you got your money's worth out of this one. Now the choice to keep or dump is also emotional.
     
    #4 MCCOHENS, May 20, 2023
  5. SFO

    SFO Senior Member

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    Try doing a piston soak with a quality solvent that includes a % of MEK or make a home brew. According to Kano labs, you can run Kreen (contains % MEK per the SDS) in the oil for the full schedule, so after soaking the pistons you shouldn't need to do an oil change, unlike Berrymans B12 chemtool or BG Products EPR, which say to drain the oil after a time limited oil treatment (add to the oil in the crank case).

    You could also try a oil based cleaner, either the one quart "add in", or the full oil change : https://www.advlubrication.com/collections/automotive-lubricants.

    Valvoline/Cummins also makes a similar "oil product" for diesels that can be used in petrol vehicles, called "valvoline premium blue restore".
     
    #5 SFO, May 22, 2023
    Last edited: May 22, 2023
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