**UPDATED** Car died after leaving it with the valet...

Well I don't know if this is suppose to be the valet's fault when you leave them a car with a dying 6 year old battery. It would be the same as a rental car company giving you a car with a dead battery, it wouldn't be your fault for renting it right?

 

If the car started on the first connection, it seems unlikely to have been reversed.

Could the portable charger, set to crank a traditional non-hybrid's starter motor, have put too high a voltage on the Prius 12V bus? I would set a charger to a 2A or 4A setting, not a fast charge or 'start' setting.

Based on the history of Prius jumpstart problems here, if I ever need a jumpstart for mine, I won't even allow the donor car to start its engine while the Prius is connected. Connect with both cars turned off, boot up the Prius with the donor car's engine still off, then promptly disconnect. The Prius' should then be left 'Ready' so its internal inverter can do the remaining charging. Or until it gets home and I can connect a slow batter charger.

The Owner's Manual does call for the donor car to be started, and run for 5 minutes before booting the Prius. But I'm wondering if some bad voltage regulators out there are damaging Prii during jumpstarts.

 

My take-away from this incident would reaffirm my belief that you should park your own car.

 

You got everything fixed and you got a new battery. I don't think you should overthink this issue. Things can fail, for unknown reasons. I don't think there's any relation to the headlights and the blower motor. Maybe there's rats and rodents in that parking garage?

 

It's seems a long stretch for all this to happen, and all these jokers standing around with jumper cables. A lot of things fritzing at the same time. Granted he comes out of it with a new battery, but $975 plus all the innocent denial and run around?

 

The Prius does have its oddities. Every time I learn of a new one I try to educate my wife. Besides the, "don't go into car washes, don't leave the power on and go shopping", there's the: "don't start the car then shut it down during its warm up cycle". I hear that the ICE may run very rough, as if it's only on 3 cylinders, or a lifter is stuck. Something about a service bulletin to replace the intake manifold to fix the problem.

It's almost like a Prius should require a special license, the same way jet aircraft require a separate type rating for each model.

Note to wife: do not let anyone else drive car (i.e., no valet parking).

 

$975 is cheap from dead battery stories we read from here.....and those stories are caused by the owners themselves.

 

I'd most suspect a two step process. Battery died mostly due to age, possibly with a little help from a minor valet error such as leaving a light on.

Then some other error happened when they discovered the dead battery. Was there a prior jumpstart effort before you arrived at the car? Can you inspect the jump start machine, see what various setting it has and is currently on? I'd be suspicious of a setting meant for direct cranking of common starter motors.

Does the HV-to-12V inverter still work? That is a more common failure point.

 

So the end result was to have a new blower motor installed? New headlight bulbs? Did you get the old parts back? I don't think I can accept a "master tech" diagnostic if he can't really tell you what happened to your car that caused the failures. He should know the related systems and see how things could have been affected from a dead 12v battery.

 

I think you should ignore anyone you want
Tall rob said, and I quote"So, I went to a hotel tonight and gave my car (2010 Prius II) to the valet. When I came out about 4 hours later, a different valet guy said they had a problem with my car and that it had no power. But, somehow, they were able to drive in reverse and park it near the entrance. This must have happened shortly after I left the car with them."

I said, and I quote"The valet was able to back the car to you because reverse in a prii is electric, while forward can be electric or ice" seems to me the car ran(ready) at the time but the ice didn't work, what's the problem?

But then and I quote" so even thou the 12v wouldn't start the ice, the 220v was able to move the car backwards" which is a mistake, the car obviously was started to move backward, mybad, thanks for being so eloquent....bud

 

And I'm sure you'll get a straight answer...

 

of course he will.

 

So thinking about this a little more, I'm thinking when they jump started the car, they didn't cross the wires and reverse the polarity because your fuses haven't been blown.

I'm not an electrical expert but if the grounding wire was somehow put around the headlight wires by mistake, would this blow the headlights?

 

unfortunately, in many large cities, there are no other choices.

 

Amazingly, he did. Nice to know there's at least one ethical manager at that hotel.

 

Learned alot in your story. Thank you for the detailed follow up.