Lithium Battery swap

Yes it's easy and there's lots of youtube videos about battery removal and repair to study. The hardest part is having good safety practices when you're doing this the first time and new to the risks. Also double checking all your work is essential as one bolt that doesn't get tightened can generate a lot of heat that can damage the cells in the battery pack. But it's definitely easier with a PriusC than a regular Prius.

And if you're ready to do this today, there's a very limited release of packs that were supposed to be sold out, but available today and likely sold out again by tomorrow. If you use my affiliate link I can offer you unlimited tech support too: http://www.projectlithium.com/?ref=9qLPw

 

Have you worked around electricity very much before? I don't mean building a PC, I mean voltages that can hurt you.

 

Let me know if they've sold out? On a couple of occasions in the past couple years I've been able to get them to be back in stock long enough for someone I'm friends with to make a purchase. If need be, I'll see if I can do the same for you... They're a very generous company that knows how valuable it is to help people as much as possible!

 

Sounds like you will be fine. It's pretty easy to send yourself to the hospital with 200+ volts DC is all. DC is more dangerous than AC, but more than that, it's a battery and there's basically unlimited short circuit current, which can melt things, start fires, and burn you instantly even if it doesn't electrocute you. A friend of mine who converted an old vehicle to electric nearly killed himself this year because he was careless turning a wrench and shorted out the batteries just momentarily. You can do it safely, of course, just want to make sure you have a general awareness of what you are working with.

How often do they get new shipments? I have been looking recently but noticed they just came back in stock. Do they sell out and get new shipments frequently?

 

It's fairly unpredictabe... It's based on their R&D of a very small number of packs that have problems because they are constantly trying to find ways to improve the packs they sell and sometimes when they find a really good upgrade, they stop production to switch over to the new design.

The V2.5 upgrade for example has vent holes in the bottom of the module because a battery pack that lives close to the equator in a super hot climate has shown heat-related deterioration that might prevent it from a 10+ year lifespan. As the owner says:

"We name ourselves “Project Lithium” because we will never stop to improve our product. We might run into bump sometime but we will get back up and continue to evolve."

 

Where do you find a NIMH battery replacement with install for $2,000 and a lifetime warranty? That must be a used battery for that price, and they are going to lifetime warranty it?

 

The prototype pack in my Prius is about to hit 40 months of use and has the same cells as new packs. Also there's a guy who already put 200K miles on his pack and Jack gave him a free new pack just so he could study his pack and project forward on the capacity of the cells holding up past the one decade goal. He made a youtube video about those calculations: Hybrid App - YouTube

Also, as each new version of the pack comes the owner understands existing customers will want it so he's planning a huge discount for existing customers so whenever your mechanic doing your install has someone to buy your old pack at a discounted price you'll likely be able to get a new pack in your car at next to no additional cost.

Let me know if you have any more questions?

 

GreenBean has something similar to that on their rebuilt batteries. I think it's less than 2000 dollars. People I know who have that warranty think its a good way to go.

 

I always say that other than rebuilding and reconditioning a long road trip is the best thing you can do for an older OEM battery pack because all the use always seemed to improve its performance for a few days after the trip. Not sure if that applies to Lithium-based packs? But if you want to feel like your car is running better than before on your road trip...

Of course the problem is the owner of Project Lithium is a perfectionist and worries too much. So every time he finds a way to improve his design he shuts down production and no longer builds the outdated version. I'm pretty sure he'll have more packs for sale in early January and might be able to provide one to your mechanic sooner than that. Perhaps you can facilitate a business relationship with the Project Lithium owner and the mechanic? I think he has price breaks for mechanics who install them.