My Prius is dead and too hi-tech for a newbie ... where to start? Is there a checklist?

Hopefully one of the resident experts can give you some more info about the meaning of those warning symbols. The 12V battery now looks good and the one bar on the HV battery is still enough to get it to kick over if we can work out what else is wrong and get it resolved. Try not to leave the car powered up for too longer interval until then, and make minimal use of light accessories etc. You need to preserve as much charge as possible on the traction battery.

BTW. Did it even try to crank? I mean if you get it to "ready", leave it in park and then just slowly depress the gas pedal (other foot firmly on the brake pedal) it should fire up the engine and then automatically start charging the HV battery.

 

Ok just looking at your photos again I can see that you haven't made "ready" yet.

Dumb question but just checking. Are you sure you had your foot firmly on the brake pedal before hitting the "start" button? It wont go to ready otherwise.

Get someone to check that your brake lights come on when you place you foot on the brakes. It needs this to be able sense that your foot is firmly on the brake (the regular brake, not the park brake) before it will go to "ready" mode (where you can actually drive it as opposed to just look at the display and all).

 

you may need to have the pack charged at toyota.

when you attempt to start, only give it a second... get it to ready mode, press the accelerator, if it doesn't fire (engine feeding battery) turn it OFF immediately. you can do this many times if you keep that start time extremely short. if you don't keep it short and wait 10 seconds you will kill your remaining charge in the hybrid pack. it seems you are not getting fuel or something.

check Here for that code... something about a disk malfunction. i think the screen only reads things that directly use the screen... radio/nav/phone... not vital engine errors.

i had my car in a similar state when i went through too much water an the ignition coils stopped firing (water splashed up into bad areas)... check your coils and plugs? once everything did fire up, the engine ran at it's highest rpm for sitting and it took a while for the battery to gain any charge.

btw... it's vital that you hear something spinning under the hood. it may just be the electric motors.. if you keep the windows down, you'll know if it's just the electric motors wasting electricity or the ICE actually trying to fire up.

 

Yeah that's the mode you need to get to before the engine will start. Not sure what's preventing it, but it must be related to one of the warning lights.

 

you should have it towed to toyota so they can charge it. i'm not sure what that cost. they will also tell you what else is wrong... maybe for a fee.. maybe not...

 

Do you think that's true? I'd agree with you if the car didn't have significant hail damage, but that sort of all-over bodywork (especially the roof) can get pretty expensive and in any case will require a lot of paint work.

 

Try this one more time:

Disconnect the battery negative for at least 5 minutes.
Check the 12V voltage at the terminals with a voltmeter: is it more than 12.5V? If not, put it on a 2A or less charger for a few hours.
Reconnect the 12V battery.
Foot firmly on the brake pedal, push Power. This should bring you to IG-On, where every warning light is lit. This sequence only happens when 12V power has been removed and later restored. Keep foot firmly on the brake pedal and push Power again. If you see Ready, 0 mph, don't touch anything! Just let the car sit for 15 minutes. The engine should start within 5-10 seconds of the Ready light coming on -- I don't know if anyone pointed that out, that the engine will not come on immediately. Let the engine run to charge up the HV battery, and make sure that it cycles off and on every few minutes, once it is warmed up.

The only warning light other than the Triangle is the ((!)) light for Electronically Controlled Braking. Damage to the backup power supply could cause that, but it really requires a Toyota Techstream or higher-end scan tool to read the code for it.

 

it seems like it's trying to feed but not getting anything. maybe you have a shorted motor... there were a few cases where the casing around the electric motor coils would wear down and cause a huge short.

it's also very odd overall because last time you posted pictures you had the same scenario if i'm right... this time you started back with multiple cars on the SOC (state of charge) screen instead of one?

if that happens with another reboot, maybe the inverter is being told to pull power and the screen thinks it is.. but it's just shorting or something... a gap in the computer signals in a sense.

if you get an OBDII reader you can pull those codes (someone stated that already)
or have someone do it for you.

that battery guy is charging you a lot to work on your battery (or so it seems from what iv'e read)... if you're comfortable with sticking your arm into a household breaker box (no cover) and pulling out and clipping in a few breakers or attach a few wires while it's live... then you may be able to take apart the battery without killing yourself. i've read that you have to wear rubber gloves as a (imo very good) precaution.

i didn't take into account the hail damage...... once i turned technical, i didn't go back to cosmetic... that's expensive. time to go aftermarket parts (hopefully something lighter?)

 

Once the car is actually in 'ready' state, the engine can be manually turned on when the car is in 'P' by pressing the gas pedal down firmly. I think this was said earlier but I haven't seen you mention whether you've tried this or not. I'm not sure whether keeping the engine running this way will charge the battery or not, but at least you can see whether the thing actually comes on or not.

Someone mentioned previously that the engine should come on automatically after switching on (in 'ready' state) in 10-15 seconds, however, from my experience and also mentioned in various places in this forum, the engine comes on approximately after 50 seconds to a minute.

 

the big risk is that if the engine doesn't fire you get a really fast drain from the hybrid battery. if you get it too low, nothing will function and it will have to be charged by a dealer. (unless op wants to rig something)...

i think the battery starting out at a high state could potentially be the system recalibrating. (i really don't Know)

 

I am wondering if eBrain has received the correct key fob for the vehicle. If a fresh battery in the fob does not send a unlock code, and the metal key does not turn in the door, could it be a mis-match? If the smartkey does not match the car, then will it ever crank? This might be something to check with the dealership.

As for sounds, eBrain, the starting of the internal combustion engine sounds like a "normal" car starting up, but this does not happen the instant you press the power button.

Good luck with this! You have had a very frustrating start to Prius ownership. Hang in there.

 

Oh no, that sounds like a big bummer! It may indicate that the hybrid battery is too low to start the engine (as others have said above) - you will have to take it and get it charged at the dealers if that is in fact the case. Also, all this switching on and off may actually be having a detrimental effect on the hybrid battery because even more of its 'charge' is being used up - the computers do not allow the battery to be discharged below 30% during normal use of the car (the battery icon on the touchscreen actually only shows the charge relative to 30% being no bars at all and I think 70 or 80% being completely full with green bars). Since yours has been sitting around for some time and/or damaged, it may have fallen to a much lower level. Sorry i'm not of much more help but that's my 2 pence anyway. Do keep us informed.

 

I do not think the hybrid battery itself is at fault (low charge/bad module), based on the warning lights that were posted earlier. I do think it could be an immobilizer problem. Get the codes read by someone with a full Toyota proprietary scanner (not necessarily a dealer and/or Techstream). There's nothing else to do at this point.

 

Update please.