Does the Prius overheat in hot traffic?

My Scangauge reports on my 07 in Florida never exceeding 196 degree engine temp in brutal stop & go. Battery gets down to red bars as Patrick points out but temp was never a problem.

 

it has a red coolant light to indicate when coolant is too hot

 

I sat in 80* heat in the sun with no wind, windows rolled-up AC on, for 3 hours. ICE cycled on/off 2 bars to 3 bars. At end of tank I averaged 49.6. Tank prior and tank following were 54.2 So sitting in the heat with ice on hardly uses any gas. I must admit it was scary letting the ice go down to 2 bars.

 

80*F in snohomish? must have been a while ago!

i got a bit nervous the first time the SOC got that low, but it gets charged back up so quick once you get going the mileage hit isn't that bad.

 

Anyone know at what temps the coolant fans turn on? I'm not sure if verifiable facts were ever posted.

 

Hey, this isn't an air-cooled 911 you're talking about here. The ICE turns off if you get stalled in traffic. Nothing to overheat. Your AC does run on the battery, however.

 

Hi Bob,

Assuming that the air conditioning is not turned on, the radiator fans should turn on at 100 degrees C (212 F) and turn off at 98 degrees C (208 F), per p. 16-8, 2005 repair manual.

 

Yes!!! Mine just shut down on me because it overheated. I have had this problem for the life of my vehicle and cannot get Toyota to do anything. I am really dissatisfied and would like to find others with this problem. It is a great fuel efficient vehicle for commuting, but I cannot use my air conditioner if it is warmer than 80 outside.

Anyone have this problem????

 

Like I said above, I've driven it with at 115F with the A/C on and it has not overheated. There's something wrong with your cooling system -- lack of coolant, air in the system, pump failure, or a fan failure.

 

Cooling system repair isn't that difficult or has to be that expensive. First, you can make sure your electric fans are on with the A/C on. If they are, just have the dealer flush out your radiator and replace the thermostat. You'll probably find that this service alone will probably solve the problem. yeah, perhaps they won't do it under warranty... but paying a bit to have this done is a lot better than overheating on the side of the road.

 

What do you mean, exactly, by "shut down": The engine stops? One or more warning lights appear on the dash? The car will not move? More than one of the above? Something else?

 

It has been over 105°F (40°C) for the last couple of days. The highest temp I have ever seen on the scanguage is 90°C.Edit: I have seen 92°C once or twice in the last couple of months since I first posted this. The thermostat is supposed to be fully open at 82°C.

 

the traction battery will overheat in our weather if you dont run the A/C.

 

Like the above poster stated, it's been pretty damn hot up here and I have not had any issues nor since I purchased the car. Summer here can reach 119deg (although rare) and regularly hits 100-110deg. Overheating is not something I worry about in this car. I will say that once temps get into the tripple digits, the A/C tends to lose some of it's ability to keep the cabin cool but it's not unpleasant. That's just the name of the game with evaporative systems.

 

I agree. Although we're finally having some rain (actually, an amazing amount of rain), a few days ago the news reported that we've hit 30 days straight of at least 105 degree weather. Many of those days we were in the 113 degree range. The Prius does great. The dashboard seems to radiate heat very bad at those temperatures as well as the huge sloping windshield. To combat this a sunshade when parked helps considerably. Also, driving with the windows down the first few minutes after sitting makes a huge difference. I'm surprised how much of a difference it makes. I guess allowing the 150 degree air to be replaced with 113 degree air helps after all.

 

My HV battery overheated just sitting on hot asphalt.

I had my oil changed local shop and when to pick up my Prius. The temperature was 104 in the shade. Immediatetly the car was sluggish. The HV battery was at 9 bars, but the gas engine was doing all of the work. I also noticed HV battery fan running but did not know what is was at the time.

I went back to shop and they did not know what the problem was. They look for loose electrical connections and put the car on the lift to make sure nothing was damaged. Everything came up negative. But this was the second Prius that this happened to at their shop.

I took the car home and planned to take it to the dealer to be checked out. The HV battery fan went off just as I arrived home. I called the dealer and prepared to take the car in. The Prius was running more normal and the traction motor was doing some work. Within about 10 minutes the Prius was running completely normal.

I did some research on the internet and learned about the HV battery fan.

I am guessing the computers were cutting access to battery until it cooled down.

My Prius is red and gets extremely hot when parked in the sun (chapstick melts in the center console).

Anybody experience anything similar or have an insight on this matter?

 

Hi Red...,

You should probably get some window sun shades to cut down on the heat-soak condition. When its hot, you need to use the AC, so some of the cool air bleeds throught he battery to keep it cool, too. Possibly at the oil change, they had the windows up, and had it parked in the Sun.

Yes, when the battery gets too hot, the car will protect the battery and avoid using it for traction. I hade it happen on occasion in 90 + weather, when I was not using the AC, and had a free flowing fast trip home on the highway. Towards the end of the trip home, the car would not go into glide, or EV mode. Now I just use the AC, or hypermile.

BTW, this is a completely different topic than the original post. If the Prius is running along, AC on, windows up, then gets into traffic, the Engine shuts off, and the car runs on battery. So the engine does not overheat. Many other cars maynot overheat, but the engine temp will skyrocket. In the end even the battery was cooled down on your car, once the car was used on the road.

The traction motor (MG2 - motor generator 2) is almost always used for acceleration. But, the electricity may be coming from MG1, not the battery. This is not shown on the MFD display, as there is no MG1 there. The reason for this, is MG1 is kinda like an electric torque coverter, which takes the overspeed of the engine, generates electricty from that, and sends the electricity to either the battery or MG2 depending on operating conditions.

 

If it is hotter than about 90°F, I run the AC regardless to help keep the HV battery temp from getting too high. I also use a sunshade and crack the windows open about an inch when I have to park in the direct sun. I also bought a white car.