We drove the new Prius v 300 miles roundtrip this past weekend, our first jaunt of any length, and got the poor thing covered in squished bugs. So I got my bucket and hose (also for the first time) and backed the car out of the garage. Turned on the hose sprayer to loosen up the bug carcasses and … BEEEEEEEEP. I stopped and looked around the neighborhood to see where the sound came from and saw nothing. Oh well, I continued spraying … BEEEEEEEEEP. Cripes it's coming from the Prius! So what … is the water too cold for you or something? Then my feeble brain remembered reading something back on page 5,603 of the owner's manual that water could make the Smart Key system sound a malfunction warning. So I took the fob out of the car. I'm assuming this doesn't happen when you're actually driving in the rain. On the other hand, I've unintentionally tried twice to lock the "keys" in the car and it won't let me. Bravo!
i think it's when you get near the door handles. the 2012 o/m is only 2,000+ pages, they must add 1,000 per year.
It IS possible for the electronics to be fooled by a HEAVY rain.......or heavy stream of water from a hose. I've had my C beep at me in a really heavy downpour for unknown reasons and had the adaptive cruise stop working in the Fusion for a time during rain of FLOOD proportions. No lasting problems with either though.
While washing the car, it shouldn't be in your pants pocket either. Keep it beyond normal SKS range to avoid repeated relockings. Just beware that this isn't 100% foolproof. While it is very good, a very few unlucky folks have found radio dead spots in the liftback cabin where the car doesn't detect the fob. I wouldn't rule out low fob batteries and other interference as contributors. I don't recall anyone yet reporting such dead spots in non-liftbacks, but beware that they are possible.
I love this Prius forum, and I also love figuring out acronyms (as a newbie) without going to Google. Working on "SKS range", although I know what you mean. Silly Key Signal? No, probably not.
