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2006 Prius with 106k miles Newly rebuilt hybrid batt. Shifts only to Neutral

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Care, Maintenance and Troubleshooting' started by chuck2002, Mar 25, 2015.

  1. chuck2002

    chuck2002 Junior Member

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    I bought a 2006 Prius with a diagnosed bad battery and tons of warning lights lit on the dash.
    Toyota had diagnosed a bad hybrid batt and ECU. (I have not replaced the ECU)
    The car was driving and running fine otherwise.

    Took the hybrid battery out and located the bad cell and replaced it. No drama there, but now after reinstalling the hybrid battery the car will not shift to Drive nor Reverse and only goes from Park to Neutral.
    All dash lights come on and everything appears to work minus the shifting, and the ICE engine never comes on.

    I tested the 12 volt batt and it was reading 11.7 volts, so I bought and installed a new 12 volt battery.
    Any ideas? Thanks.
     
    #1 chuck2002, Mar 25, 2015
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2015
  2. m.wynn

    m.wynn Senior Member

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    Are you completing the service plug installation fully by sliding the clip down?..

    At 1:00 in the vid:

     
  3. dpeverhart

    dpeverhart Member

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    Are you sure it's going into 'Ready' mode? If not try holding the start button down for about 5 seconds.
     
  4. chuck2002

    chuck2002 Junior Member

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    Two
    Thanks for the replies. I just got off of the horn with Todd at TampaHybrids.com and he immediately suggested the same as you guys. I did not have the orange plug in correctly. Rookie mistake.
    I gotta give him props as well, because he told me where else I was going to be screwing up in that I needed to do a grid charge/discharge to my newly installed battery so that it balances out with the new cell.
    Big props to him for the 15 minutes he spent with me explaining what steps I needed to take. Now I need to decide whether I want to spend the 500 bucks to get a hybridautomotive charger setup for this "cheap flip" Prius. (Since it appears that this is the easy route instead of doing each cell individually.)
    I got the car cheap enough though that I think I will still be way ahead even if I decide to make this investment.
     
  5. JC91006

    JC91006 Senior Member

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    Or if you're close enough to Todd, he may charge it for you with a grid charger......for less than $500
     
  6. chuck2002

    chuck2002 Junior Member

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    Two
    He was extremely helpful and probably would, but I am 8 hours away or thereabouts. I went ahead and ordered the hybridautomotive charger and discharge bulbs setup. Screw it. I might be able to help out others here locally in Ft. Walton, FL with it if nothing else....

    He mentioned he is doing his rebuilt battery swapps for 800 bucks including the labor to perform the swap. Also a nice deal that I would take him up on if I was closer to Tampa.
     
  7. kiwi

    kiwi Member

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    If the module which you have installed differs in capacity with the rest of the modules in the pack - whatever charger you use (Professional One which cost $2500 - $4500 or amateure one for $500) will not change it's remaining capacity or capacity of other modules.
    Car will charge the pack with about 50Amps in few minutes. $500 grid charger charging at extremely low currents is waste of time and money....
    The whole "change module or two" approach is unreliable practice, waste of time and have unpredictable results - meaning that you would have no idea whether you will drive another mile or another thousand miles.

    I can tell after running 45 minutes test on the car of what is the remaining useful capacity is left in the pack.

    For example from recent tests:
    2009 Prius with the brand new pack from Toyota - benchmarked as 100%,
    5 year old pack with 80000km (67%),
    5 year old pack pack with 1200000km (60%);
    5 year old pack with 180000km (33%) (due to the fact that two modules are becoming to fail, the rest of the pack is ~40%);
    5 year old pack with 256000km (4 dead modules and the rest are below 2.7AH highly unbalanced - in that particular case super-duper electrician’s diagnosis who came before me and was using Genuine Techstream was - "One dead module - just change it").

    Now, ask yourself, whereabouts on that list is your car after you have changed just ONE module?
    Please also on my behalph ask Todd: how does he test rebuild packs for individual module behaviour under load? How does he know and provide you reassurance of what is the leftover capacity of the pack BEFORE Delta V on the modules are becoming bigger than allowed threshold and trigger error codes?
    As per their web page (Hybrid FAQ - Tampa Hybrids Inc.) - they are using RC chargers (for charge/discharge cycling) and $500 charger which they are recommending ...- these toys are not good enough for working on Prius.
     
    #7 kiwi, Mar 25, 2015
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2015
  8. chuck2002

    chuck2002 Junior Member

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    Kiwi, I have seen your posts, and while I appreciate that you are trying to help in your own special way, I am not asking Todd or anyone else anything on your behalf.

    If you want to know something, you should ask him. He is on this site too. Funny, he appears to be making a good living off of fixing and selling Prii with batteries he has refurbished. I don't know his methods nor do I care. If a hobby level charger is working for him, who am I to argue? He certainly knows more about this stuff than I do, but I appreciate someone using something cheap to do a task that could also be done by something expensive.
    I know he was very helpful with me on the phone and I really appreciate that he took the time to help with my problem and then educate me as to how he operates with his fleet and other things I should consider like cleaning bus bars, etc.
    Based on his experience and my own research, I have made the decision to use the hybridautomotive charge/discharge method for my car.

    I have learned lots in the last 3 weeks of owning a gen 2 car, that's for sure. It has been lots of fun. I might just keep this one and not flip it after all..... Who knows. I kinda want one of the soon to be coming out 2nd gen Chevy Volts though.
     
  9. kiwi

    kiwi Member

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    Good luck with that ....The guy, who is selling those have being advised more than few times to make improvements on the safety of the connection diagram to disallow High Voltage to be presented in the trunk of the car. If you are electricallly literate - you will see it yourself, otherwise - consider having second opinion ON SAFETY from people NOT affiliated with that "greed charger" scam...
     
  10. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    or, you could buy one of kiwi's products.
     
  11. kiwi

    kiwi Member

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    There are a lot of people in the world who made and continue making good living on ignorance of other people .....

    The facts of the matter are:

    There is no need for maintaining HV Pack in Prius with any other extra charger.....
    Pure engineering arguments are too complex to digest by many, hence hystorical evidence is:

    On-board charger was installed by Toyota in their first Prius (NHW-10 year 1997-2000) which you did not have in USA.
    After improvements made by Denso with the battery management system that solution became obsolete.
    If that was still required - you would have charger in each and every hybrid sold by Toyota by now. You don't. People who try to earn a buck on sale and installations of those devices would try to convince you otherwise...

    Safety aspects:

    There are several virtual cars in my LAB including fully assembled packs with that on-board charger (5 of them), have scrutinised the schematics and design - solution is so safe that there is absolutely no way one can hurt themselves. The Toyota's charger itself can not be operated stand-alone and there is absolutely no way high-voltage can be present openly in the trunk or passenger compartment whenever that charger is on or off. Charger is manually operated when the car is stationry and is itself computer-controlled.

    FYI: High Voltage is present in the case with that "greed charger" you wish to buy and there were no response made by supplier on this forum about any practical solution mitigating the safety issue their device presents.
    There were no documented evidence of any improvements their grid charger makes apart from referring to Honda users.
    FYI: Honda hybrid system itself is fundamentally different from the one in Toyota design. So references to whatever benefits honda users may have had are not relevant. Honda users also were unable to produce any documented evidence of any battery health improvements.

    Hope this reply will instigate analytical thinking in some ...
     
    #11 kiwi, Mar 25, 2015
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2015
  12. kiwi

    kiwi Member

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    I am not selling to general public. That guy have no chance...

    Dealing with HV batteries posess a lot of risks and the least thing I wish to do is to give my tools to non-pro...

    This business requires a lot of knowledge (electrical safety is a must), training, skills, state of mind (attention to details) and honesty above all.
    I am getting a lot of enquiries from people who wish to start this business and unforunately I have to say no to many...
    The latest two examples:
    - "hybrid" garage owner from one of southern states in USA had no idea that the voltage in the batteries connected in series is summarised - they were under impression it was no more than 7.2v straight after you remove the safety plug :) :) :)
    - another one from western state was sending us enquiries openly lying and pretending to be someone else - if they are openly lie to me (so easy to check for us) - they would do the same to their clients. And I've cheked they are - I observe their anouncements in the media ...

    I also have plenty of evidence of hard work some other garages are doing, going extra mile in providing superb service to their customers...
    Some of them have created their own tools, some still on the edge of buying from me (not cheap).
    Those will eventually come to a conclusion that public becomes knowledgeable enough to demand more what they can currently provide... .

    Well, public always have a choice.
    My advice:
    - if unsure of your "hybrid specialist" reputation - go to Toyota
    - never make your own decision on ONE and only advice
    - seek second opinion
    - use 3 sources "of truth" which are not affiliated with each other
    - scrutinise "minority report" if two agree and one does not
    - trust your "Gut feel"


    Recent event - cost one guy $4000 for the new pack from Toyota. After advice from super-duper auto-electrician they were so convinced that the HV Pack was the culprit - they did not seek second opinion After I tested that pack for capacity and unbalance (was perfect by the way) they sold it retrieving some of that $4000 unnecessary cost...
     
    #12 kiwi, Mar 25, 2015
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2015
  13. chuck2002

    chuck2002 Junior Member

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    Two
    Kiwi, you can stop now. Thank you but as I stated, my mind has been made up. I saw all of your points and the counterpoints in the 8 page hybridautomotive charger announcement post. I read all posts and all 8 pages and I gotta tell you that your points, while valid to you are simply not interesting to me.
    Thank you and like the hybridautomotive owner, I am simply going to be ignoring you from now on.