Is it worth replacing high voltage battery?

congrats, all the best!

 

No. Sell your car cheap to me Ha ha.
Seriously these are some of the best cars ever made. Never seen such a low maintenace vehicle. Get the battery straight and drive another 170000 miles.

I just went through this— i bought my 2005 with 255000 miles on it and a bad battery. It drove fine but i just had to keep my computer in car and clear codes. No big deal. Once a day at most usually and sometimes every few days. I could do it while driving. So you could get a code reader amd just leave it hooked up and reset your codes. I deove a couple months like that and got 44 mpg avg about.

I bought a grid charger and tried that. But no discharger. It didnt help much and if a pack has a bad leaking module , it wont help. And then also other modules can go bad shortly after.

Geid chargers dont really do much unless you check replace modules. Then it is good for recharging and discharging the pack to balance it.
I quickly realized i didnt want to take my oack apart and replace modules and charge and discharge for days.

Thankfully there are guys like TMR-JWAP, He is awesome at this and i just got a pack with newer modules from him and traded him mine and i should be good a few years or longer. He has a thread about troubleshooting and taking a part a bad pack.

The thing is , unless you are going to take apart the pack and replace modules , a grid charger wont help an old pack with 170,000 miles cause chamces are one is leaking or several are close to going bad. So you really need to test each individually and visually inspect them.

I have a grid charger for sale cheap if you do want to replace your own modules or try it. Or talk to TMR-JWAP

This gives me an idea. Loan a grid charger. Ive seen that on some forums. Ill post that up

 

For our Aussie member Down Under, IMO (In My Opinion) you made an excellent choice.

Why/How:
1) 170,000 km ~ 105,633 miles; that Prius has many more km/miles to go!
There are many reports of original or second owners easily breaking 200,000 miles ~ 321,868km, and no major problems, other than usual maintenance (oil change, tire rotation, new tires, engine air filters, cabin air filters, engine & inverter coolant drain/fill, brakes, etc).
2) $2700 AUD for a new HV Battery sure beats the price of a new car or new used car + a possible loan.
3) If auto insurance is anything like the US, consider getting rid of comprehensive insurance. Why? You can easily save a few hundred per year on this component of auto insurance per year. The car has low value b/c of its age. If you have $4-$6k in savings, you can immediately buy another old Prius, similar to yours.
4) If an accident were to cause the Prius to be totaled, and the HV Pack is salvageable, you can buy a Gen2 that has a bad HV Battery for a discount, and put your good HV Battery in it. Or you can upgrade to a Gen3 w/ a bad HV Battery, and swap the modules from your good Gen2 case, into the Gen3 case.

Read this post for 12V battery testing and benefits of an OBD2 reader like Techstream
Is my inverter coolant pump slowly failing? | PriusChat

Post #5 - how to test the12V
Post #8 - SOC (State of Charge) chart and good AGM compatible smart battery charger
Post #13 & 15 - Techstream​

If you have never had the transaxle (think transmission) fluid changed, read post #473. It also contains a study link of used ATF-WS fluid analysis, that shows the fluid does need to be changed.
ATF fluid changes ARE Required. | Page 24 | PriusChat
USA dealer pricing seems to be in $100 range, for parts (4 quarts of Toytoa ATF-WS) and labor (simple drain and fill, NO FLUSHING required or possible, it is not a conventional automatic transmission).

We can only hope you don't experience any of the costly repair items that could occur, as highlighted by Bisco in post #7. Fingers Corssed. Consider learning to DIY, to help bring your vehicle ownership costs down even further.

 

These Toyota hybrid vehicles are bullletproof if you do your maintenance well (synth oil changes, diff, tranny, brake fluid, coolant, etc.......stick to OEM fluids) and plan on rebuilding the battery around every 150-200k kms. Mine has over 350k kms now and it's only on it's second traction battery. Knock on wood but I think it will rust out before it will die mechanically.

 

so Christina,
is the car still running right?
im making same decision, woulf like your input. thx.

 

how many miles on her?

 

184000 miles.
2004 pkg 9... no major probs... did chg 1 module last year.
dont believe the original hv pak is on her because she was numbered... unless dealer refurbed her, but mod #s were not consecutive.

just changed rear brakes diy...

 

sounds like she's just broken in, i'd go for a new oem, or 'newpriusbatteries.com'

 

I guess every Prius owner goes through this stage if they keep the car long enough or buy a used one.

Mine is a 2005 with 121,000 miles on her when I bought her. I worked for the owner's wife...both were university employees and did meticulous maintenance for the 15 years they owned her. We had the battery conversation when I discussed buying the car and priced the car accordingly. (I paid $2400 12-19)

The car had historically been garaged both day and night. When I originally bought her I parked outside. The first 90 degree day in June...you know what happened!

I learned a lot about battery technology in the next couple of weeks. Took the battery out, found the bad cell, found other weaker cells, thought about reconditioning and other options. I spoke with practically everyone near Atlanta who rebuilt battery packs. I could see where someone would be confused trying to make a choice about moving forward.

I finally decided to buy a new OEM pack from Toyota. I'm getting old and am in no mood for disobedient automobiles at 2 in the morning. Playing "whack a mole" might be fun the first time or two but....

I'm one year in and the battery has been flawless.(I monitor with Torque Pro) If you plan on keeping the car replacing battery with new cells is only way to go.

Battery life is mainly determined by:

1. Age
2. Exposure to temperature extremes.

Mileage seems to make no difference.

I see a lot of Prii sitting in the sun all day with no shade protection. MY car's interior temperature goes above 130 degrees on a 90 degree day after being parked for 2 hours. Battery temps are in the 120s at that point. Before you even start driving! I'm convinced this is the major reason for early failures. The cooling scheme is lame on my Gen2. Look at all the losses just from it's design! The cooling is ineffective in high traffic, stop and go type environments. Regen heats up a battery like crazy. Toyota should have used liquid cooling in their packs like the Lithium packs use and made it continuously running. They should have heated the battery too for those folks up north who see sub zero temps on a regular basis.
Having said that...my battery lasted 15 years!! The warranty is 8 years! Somebody somewhere did something very well!

 

A really mixed message there! LOL.

Probably more a question of cost-benefit.

Having said that my battery does not seem to get hot at all.

I suspect that hotter batteries are more a product of modules going bad and not much you can do about that than replace 'em.

 

cool..
was the old one or replacement 15 years?