Looking at some used Priuses. Some of them indicate they have new batteries. Some of you helpful folks have asked, "Well are they NEW or are they refurbished?" I can pay a Toyota dealer 120 bucks for a used car inspection. But that's a lot of dough and will add up if I do that on multiple cars. It's totally worth it for a car that we're highly interested in. But I would rule out an older Prius with high mileage if it doesn't truly have a NEW battery. So my questions: Is there any way for ME to pop the hood and tell if it's a refurbished battery versus a brand new one? Or can this only be verified by Toyota? Or can it not even be verified at all?
What years are you interested, or what price bracket, if don't mind? Also, which battery are you concerned about: the regular 12 volt, or the larger hybrid battery?
The larger hybrid. Years would be 2005, 2008, 2007. Specifically, there might be a 2005 w/ 85K miles but that has a "new hybrid battery" as of 75K miles and 2 years ago.
"New" might be referring to a third party refurb'd battery, or a brand new Toyota battery. The latter is preferable, but refurbs can do well too. Neither is an absolute guarantee of trouble-free future. A well maintained, lower mileage car of those years, original battery or replaced, would be my objective. I would test drive a few, note any differences in drive feel. Watch the state of charge display, steady around 1/2 to 3/4 full is a good sign. The website's really flakey right now btw, pretty hopeless trying to have a dialogue.
A "new" battery could mean lots of things to lots of people. If it is a new Toyota battery, from Toyota, the VIN# would have been registered with Toyota at the time of replacement, so Toyota would have a record of it. Start by calling the service department. At the very least you could relatively quickly tell the age of the case that the battery modules are housed in. (Could not tell exact module age without removing the pack and cracking open the case.) You would need to spend some time taking apart the back hatch area. Removing some 10mm bolts on top of the battery. Be ready to realign/reinstall the white plastic clips. If this is through a private party, they should have some sort of receipt for the work done. This might also clue you in to if it was a hack job from some craigslist specialist where only a single module was replaced. You could reach out to a local independent hybrid repair shop to inspect it as well: MileHybrid Automotive in Denver, or Boulder Hybrids for example.
