Rear Ended and Rodent Damage

I kept reading for the rear ended part but it never came.

For that price, I would just keep whatever hood liner you have left on there. Doesn't seem worth it to replace it.

 

Did the mice return and rear end you?

 

lol, that just doesn't sound right....

 

Is the pad actually needed? What's its functional purpose? I assumed that it was there as insulation or something.

Edit:
Previous thread about rodent problems: Rodents UNDER MY HOOD! | PriusChat

While googling the hood insulation, an ad for ebay showed up with lots of results: UNIVERSAL HOOD INSULATION PAD CUT TO FIT 1 2 THICK | eBay

 

They rear "ended" him indirectly by the means of dealer raping him by the engine cover replacement price.
I'm glad I could help.

 

I'd be a little worried about engine heat negatively affecting the paint on the top of the hood.

As for rodents, I bought a Raticator electric rat trap! If they end up in my engine bay I'll simply move the trap there and fry the bastards.

Raticator - Electronic Rat Trap Humanely Kills Both Mice & Rats!

 

It also acts as a fire suppressant. If the engine catches on fire the pad drops on top of the engine/fire giving you a little extra time to get out of the vehicle.

 

The hood blanket serves to reduce the heating of the hood from the engine ( thermal insulation). There is no engine cover on the Prius C and without the blanket, the paint on the hood may be damaged (finish is dulled) over time. Apparently, you don't check your engine oil, etc and lift the hood from time to time so as to notice mice chewing away on stuff. For some strange reason, mice like to chew on hood insulation and make nest material from it. I wonder if these little critters built a nest under the hood or in the air intake into your HVAC.

 

I wonder if bags of mothballs under there would help.

 

The car would have a serious design flaw if he has to check his oil in the first year. I would almost guarantee that the majority of people on this website haven't opened their new cars to check the oil in the first year. Will there be a few? Absolutely, but not the majority.

 

I open mine every few days just to admire the Sokie Tech gas hood dampers I installed recently.

 

Aren't you meant to check it weekly?

I'm not saying I do... but normally about once a month or at worst, every second month, I will check. I expect not to have to top up oil between my half-yearly servicing, but if there's an issue I do want to know about it.

 

You shouldn't have to... some people do and that's their prerogative... but with a new vehicle, you shouldn't ever have to. Maybe when the car is 5 or 6 years old, but even then, the newer cars are very well sealed.

But I don't have to worry about it. I drive 5k miles in 3 months, so the dealer gets plenty of under hood time with my car.

 

Yeah, uh, I never open my hood. Once when I first got it and a self described "car guy" wanted to look at it. I'm a lazy car owner. I follow the maintenance schedule, but do none of it myself. Sorry car people. Shake your heads and/or fists at me if you'd like. Part of the reason, though, that I bought a Toyota was the reliability and lack of constant maintenance.

 

I don't have to do any maintenance for another 1.5 years. I've opened my hood several times, mostly to see what's going on under there and ooh and ahh at the shiny stuff before it gets dirty. It's also good to know where fuses, jump points, fluid check locations and such are, as well as to be sure there aren't any rodents under there.

 

Also good to remove any leaves that collect in the tray-like area at the rear of the engine bay, below the windscreen. Easiest car to remove leaves from given they made it a tray rather than a deep canal like most cars.

 

Argh... it's happened to me now... rodent damage! It/they attacked my washer system in multiple places. I can't be sure of the exact timing but it appears I discovered the washers weren't working around the same time they did it. At first it was simply that the windscreen jets were not operational.

I had been away for a month in June/July and it wasn't until a few weeks later that I had an instance where I went to use the washers. I had forgotten that I normally avoid using them at night because with the headlights on, the headlight washers are used as well. The headlight washers serve no purpose at all other than to leave spots all over the front of the car... but on that night the illuminated water fountains told me that part of the system was working. I also tested the rear washer successfully.


Looking in the engine bay I immediately saw the problem. Clearly there's a break around the hose joiner, but also there's clearly bite damage with holes on the underside of the upper hose. I don't know if the diagram on the right is accurate for my model (it comes courtesy of Google searching) but if the part marked 85389B is meant to be there, there's no sign of it now.

I also noticed the level of the washer reservoir was far lower than normal. I normally just keep my windows clean and rarely use the washers. I refilled it, but soon discovered the car was leaking washer fluid, taking about 5-6 days for the 4.7L to leak out completely. I was about due for a service so I waited until last night to refill the reservoir before taking the car in today, but by the time I got home from the service station where I filled it, it was already empty again. The official verdict was that as well as the above, they have to order two hoses marked below (from the headlight washer system) from Japan. They're not expensive, but I'll have to wait about three weeks.


I guess I can be thankful that they chose to gnaw on a non-critical system... I just hope they/it is actually gone now!