Intermittent A/C problems & red triangle of death

Help! I'm new to this, know next to nothing and am desperate. I have a 2008 Prius which I bought new. Previously I had an '04 I purchased in '06. I have loved my Priuses and sworn I never wanted anything else, but the last few months have me contemplating selling this one & never getting another. I'll put everything I know hoping it helps somebody tell me which direction to go.

Last fall I hit a deer and had extensive front end damage ($6k). I don't know what all was done in the repair process but am sure I needed a new radiator. After online research I'm wondering if maybe there was a wiring harness or something damaged that wasn't noticed or replaced.

This spring I started noticing that sometimes the A/C wasn't blowing very cold air. It would also seem humid and musty. This seemed to get worse over the months becoming more frequent. On June 20 it stopped cooling almost entirely and I got the red triangle with the exclamation flashing with the word "problem" and beeping.

I took it to the dealer who checked it and said that I was out of freon ($250). They said there were no codes and they didn't know why I had the red triangle. It cooled again, but was still intermittent. I returned to the dealer several times, but they said they couldn't find anything wrong and gave me all kinds of wonderful explanations. "Well, it's really hot outside, so it can only do so much." "It did stop cooling as much when we stopped, but that's because it needs air moving through it." I know it's hot, but it's been hot other years, too. In those years, I also stopped sometimes while driving but the A/C didn't stop working. Give me a break!

I replaced the cabin and engine air filters hoping that would help. No such luck.

This month I took a 1200 mile road trip. The A/C was still acting up some, but it wasn't a huge issue as it wasn’t that hot where we were. Then, the red triangle of death appeared toward the end of the trip. I thought it might be overheating and popped the hood. The red liquid in the container on the right was bubbling. Sorry I know that's vague, but that's about the extent of my knowledge on it. I waited, restarted it and continued without further incident (aside from the intermittent loss of cooling.) The mileage rolled over to $100k at about this point.

I took it to the dealer there and they said there were lots of codes, most of which were old. They didn't find anything wrong with the A/C, reset all the codes and had a master mechanic look at and drive it several times. They said there was nothing wrong, ($100), but I did get a list of the codes they said were there to start with: P0A0F, P3000, C0200, C2123, B1200, B1207, and B1271. They told me that sometimes just having the old codes in it will create problems.

On the way home, the A/C worked intermittently and toward the end of the trip I got the red triangle again!

I chill easily. Even keeping the A/C in my house set at 75 I still get chilled and sleep with a blanket. If cranking my A/C all the way doesn’t chill me, then it’s not working right! I have loved my Prius, but I still have a car payment and want A/C that works when I need it! If I can get it fixed, I would prefer to keep it, but am seriously thinking of getting rid of it!

Suggestions? I can take it someplace else, but at this point am thinking that maybe I need to tell them what to fix! Yes, I realize it’s ridiculous to think somebody in cyberspace is going to tell me what’s wrong if the dealer couldn’t by looking at it, but it seems like somebody out there might know more about it.

 

Thank you!

Many people on Prius chat know more than most dealers...
That's what I figured!
I'm no expert, but first step is your 12v battery... Have you replace it yet?
No, I haven't replaced it. It is the original.

To check it: Turn the car on in acc mode (not ready mode) then hold down your info button on your display screen while turning your headlights on and off three times. Doing this will get some diagnostic screens on your MFD. If you have any error codes write them down and clear them...
This is what I saw:
Under System Check - all ok except Audio CHEK When I touched that it said "63-44 8/11/16 2:57:22"
Under LAN Monitor -
EMV CHEK showed the following codes and subcodes:
01-DB 110-E5-F
01-DC 190-18-3
01-D8 190-15-1
01-D5 190-31-A
01-DB 190-BD-F
01-DB 178-61-F
NAVI CHEK - 01-E3 -00-F
DSP-AMP showed the following codes and subcodes:
01-D6 -FF-1
01-DD 110-24-5
01-E1 110-FF-1
01-E1 190-FF-1
01-E3 -FF-1
In Vehicle Signal Check Mode next to battery it said 12.3. Does that mean that my battery is ok?
When I touched Nav. Check, everything was white except "RDS-TMC Information" which was yellow.

I tried to clear the codes but don’t think I was successful. Every time I saw something that looked like it would do it, I pushed it, but when I went through the process again, they were still there. The one thing I did NOT do was push “Clear memory.” That just sounded so permanent that I didn’t want to do it unless specifically told to do so.

And then check your 12v battery charge. If it's below 12.3 volts without headlights on it can create all kinds of confusion in your computers and sensors....
I don't know how to check that. If the 12.3 v battery display in Vehicle Signal Check Mode was it, then I guess I'm ok. If not, I need to find out how to check the battery.

So, does that help?

Many people on Prius chat know more than most dealers...
That's what I figured! I don't mind to take it to somebody for work or put some money into it. I just don't want to keep taking it to people that don't seem to know what they're doing and pay them to tell me they don't know. Likewise claiming to know what's wrong, doing a lot of expensive work and still not having it work isn't acceptable either!
Thanks again!

 

Besides the master warning red triangle light on the dashboard, what other warning lights or MFD icons appeared?
The only other thing it said was "PROBLEM." (Gotta love it in the left lane of the freeway in rush hour when it's 105 and your A/C isn't working! Haha!)

While it may be possible that your car needs a new 12V battery,
Is there a way I can/should check it? Did the 12.3 I saw indicated in the Vehicle Signal Check Mode simply inicate that it has a 12V battery? I know that may be a stupid question, but don't want to stay stupid!

I suggest that you take your car to another Toyota dealer so that the car can be checked out.
Thanks!

 

Many of them have accumulated over the life of the vehicle and are no big deal and will take a long time to figure out each one of them on google or on here. Main point is to clear those codes and see if anything new come up.
I'll try it again. The code thing really confuses me since the dealer that sold it to me said there were no codes. The next dealer said there were a lot, but they cleared them and there were no new ones. That was just last Tuesday though! It sure seems like that's a lot to accumulate in under a week if they really did clear them.

I think in my one experience with clearing those codes was that you had to hold down the clear code button for a little while for it to work.
I'll try that.

And that clear memory button, I think I had the same concern as you but I think I tried it and it didn't do anything.
We'll see.

Thanks again!

 

The codes are cleared now. I heald down the clear codes button for 2 minutes and they were still there so I pushed clear memory and they're gone. We'll see what happens next.

 

At the risk of being redundant, "THANK YOU!" I can't tell you relieved I am just to be getting information!

 

Yep, just trying to make sense of it all.

PS: If your dealer isn't finding a problem that's a good thing! Doesn't mean you shouldn't keep trying to figure it out, but its a good sign, right?
I'm cool with that as far as the triangle. If it only happens every 1200 miles or so, and that's the extent of it, I can certainly live with it. It sounds like the A/C is a separate issue and that's much more frustrating. I drive a lot and generally spend about 5 hours a day in my car (mostly in traffic) during the work week so A/C is a dealbreaker!

Or as it is with a Prius you reboot by disconnecting the 12v battery for a little while. You can do a search on here for details of how to do that...
I'm so glad I found this!

 

About your A/c not working some times and it appears mostly when stopped or vary slowly moving ?
No, actually, it doesn't it sometimes when moving at 40-50 mph, also.

Did this just start after you got your car back from the body shop or at least when it first started getting hot out side for the first time after you received your car?
Yes.

#1: Was a after market condenser installed on the car as part of the repair?. ( After market condensers many times have fewer cooling tube, fewer cooling fins per inch, larger cooling tube are not as good as the smaller ones, After many years of testing condensers side by side and re-installing the OE condenser the high side PSI will drop back to normal. you can have 100 PSI + difference in high side PSI with a NON-OE condenser.)
I don't know. Is there a way I can look at it and tell?

#2: If so were all the foam filler air dams re-installed onto the new condenser? plastic paniels on top of the radiator support installed?.
I don't know. Is there a way I can look at it and tell?

#3: Was the air dam under the car from the bumper to under the engine re-installed. (At idle this helps keep the vary hot radiator and engine heat from rolling forward being pulled back up front into the condenser and reheating it with 120 to 140+ air).
I don't know. Is there a way I can look at it and tell?

#4: If the refrigerant is just 2OZ or 3 OZ over or under charged this will be a big problem on hot days.
This was one of the things I learned in this process. The dealer told me perhaps they had overfilled it. Of course, afterwards it dawned on me that they didn't say they checked it so the next time I had it back to them I asked them to do so. They said it was ok, but I don't have much faith in them at this point. In other words, I'm not sure this can be clearly ruled in or out. That certainly doesn't help the logical process.

#5: If it was poorly recycled refrigerant with air mixed in it this is a problem. ( I find this a lot in my area )
#6: If it was poorly recycled refrigerant and the owner of the machine did not replace the refrigerant dryer in the recycling machines because it cost money. There can be excessive moisture in the refrigerant and this will be a problem.
#7: When the car was recharged some shop only leave the vacuum pump on the car untill they see 29in of vacuum and then recharge in less then 5 min. This is vary bad if the body shop left the A/C lines open to the air for the few days when the car was being repaired. There WILL!!! be excessive moisture absorb into the ester oil. AKA ND-11.
Unfortunately, I imagine I'll never know about these.

#8: intermittent electrical problem, with sensors, relays, wire connectors or plugs, control modulus,
At some point, I suppose I can just start replacing things to find something that works. Using a matrix of probability that it is a certain relay, plug, etc. along with how expensive parts are, I could find a starting point and trouble shoot from there. If it gets to this point, I'll seek more guidance on it since it could be that with labor costs it would make more sense to replace x, y and z at one time as opposed to doing them one by one.

I did not list every thing, only a few common things I find all the time after a body shop or repair shop works on a Prius. A lot of them listed are like a time bomb, they will not cause any problem at first the cars A/C may work ok at first and the customer and the shop are happy. Then 9 mounths to a year and a half later is when problems start. The customer is left paying the bill later for what a shop did long ago, not knowing how the problem was caused.
It sounds like that may be what I'm seeing here.