2007 Engine sounding louder

how many miles on her? could be a leak in the exhaust, or working harder to recharge a weak hybrid battery. or even the 12 volt.

 

My wife's '05 Camry got louder over time, the exhaust pipe in front of the catalytic converter had rusted enough to have a little hole. I had it patched at a garage by a welder for ... $70 ish. It failed later on, but I'd learned about parts shopping and doing that work myself.

However, I was in the Army at the time and had a safe DIY garage to get a lift, and expert advice for getting this part off, and the new part on.

Can you see the underside of you car, and look at the exhaust? That's my guess, emphasis on guess.

Good luck.

 

Mine started doing this too. It may be becasue the Hybrid battery is getting old...not holding a charge very well and the engine has to work 100% harder when there's not a nicely charged battery to participate. You can confirm this by watching the battery volume on the mfd and see how many times it goes into purple bars and how fast or how long it takes to put some blue bars back in the tank or if the noise coincides with low battery charge.

And since you live in new England you may have substantial rust under there too. get a flashlight and look.

If your not throwing any codes you should get a Hybrid Battery charger and see if you can charge and balance the pack. May extend the life of your battery for quite a while. I'm in the process of charging my battery today.

9 years is a long time for a battery.

 

you need to determine if the noise is coming from the engine itself, or from the exhaust system. hopefully, its the exhaust. I assume you did check to make sure your oil is full and clean?

 

Check your battery bars more often. I can almost guarantee your battery is heading south. To what degree I'm not sure but my car started making a very loud noise upon acceleration. Like its was missing the air cleaner or the car had a cold air intake.

The Prius is designed to have a major participation in power from the battery. Its a very anemic little car when the battery goes soft and that tiny little motor does its best to satisfy the pedal demand. In order to do that its got to work really hard.

The battery going has a few definitive symptoms. One is the mileage tanks. The other is its spends alot of time in purple. Goes to purple pretty easily like just sitting in a drive through.

 

I would watch your battery charge. When you have 3 or less bars, it's normal for the engine to work much harder to drive the car, and the additional noise is just the engine revving to a higher rpm. This can happen more when using AC, as when the AC is on, it draws significant power from the hybrid battery. If this same noise is occurring at a high state of charge and was not previously or if the character of the noise has significantly changed, then I agree with what others have said - it's likely an exhaust leak. Also keep in mind the sound of the engine changes after the first minute of use; the Prius runs the engine rich with a different timing for the first minute to warm the catalytic converter. If you listen closely, the sound of the engine changes after this warm-up cycle is complete.

 

You would be surprised... The muffler can and does rust rust from the top where you would not see the damage. Been through 2 mufflers since my '05 was new and both failed from the top (underneath the heat shield). Car currently has over 283,000. Don't give up just yet.

 

Now that you mention it, I did have a set of tires at one time that sounded like the wheel bearings were shot...The tires were LOUD!!! As soon as they were replaced, the roaring noises disappeared and my ride became more enjoyable!

 

What tires are you using? I feel like my prius has always been loud, and awhile ago had wheel bearings replaced and it quieted it down signifigantly. But whenever ive had someone else drive my car they always comment that it shouldnt be this loud. Im using new Michelin Defenders i got earlier this year, and i dont know but maybe its those that keep it consistently loud at higher speeds. Ill also mention that, that the car is louder the faster im moving. Any insight? You using the same tires?

SM-J727VPP ?

 

Yes its always been loud. Its a loud little car compared to a bigger sedan. Its all tire so if your running LRR tires and hyper inflating its going to be really loud.
My wife loves the car but to me its a very loud & uncomfortable world class engineered little car. Its her car.