Hello- I brought my prius in for a recall to the dealership. While I was there I was told that my car should also have the battery serviced ($299), engine and inverter flushed ($189) and coolent flushed ($189). It's at a little over 60,000 miles, 2011 Prius. I do not trust this dealership at all, but I'm also worried that maybe these are things I do need to get done. I don't know enough about car maintenance myself- can anyone who knows more about these things tell me if these are legitimate things that I need to have done to my car? Thank you!
OMG I'd stay away from them. Battery service is a joke and the coolant is good for the first 150,000 mi. Also you don't FLUSH a Prius a simple drain and refill. Bet the price is different too when they actually do it. Go to a dealer that is interested in talking GOOD care of your car NOT making your wallet lighter.
Your owner's manual mentions none of these services at 60k miles. You should ask the dealer about that
The best thing for your battery is to use a smart charger when not driving. The coolants are easy to change, and the coolant is inexpensive. I would stay away from that dealer.
welcome! the only thing they are gonna flush is your wallet. the battery service is probably cleaning the cooling fan. do you carry any shedding animals regularly?
Cleaning the fan is only part of the job. Fur can get past the fan, as can other dirt and stuff. So to do it properly, you would have to clean the whole air path. Which would mean at least pulling the cover off the HV battery to check for blockage. And then also checking the exit housing.
Ok, the Toyota USA required maintenance is outlined, interval-by-interval, in the: Warranty and Maintenance Guide All new Prius come with this Guide, and The aforementioned Owner's Manual. As mentioned above, the engine and Inverter coolant are not due for drain-and-fill, for quite some time. The interval (per the Guide) is: 12 years or 120,000 miles, whichever comes first. If you're missing this Guide, you can download it from Toyota Tech Info: https://techinfo.toyota.com/techInfoPortal/appmanager/t3/ti?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=ti_home_page&contextType=external&username=string&challenge_url=https://techinfo.toyota.com/techInfoPortal/login/techinfo&password=secure_string&request_id=5686910685274229208&authn_try_count=0&locale=en_US&resource_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftechinfo.toyota.com%2F (click on the "manuals" tab) The 12 volt battery is an expendable; it it's the original battery it very likely does need replacement by now. $299 is steep though. Pep Boys (for example) will replace with a compatible Bosch battery for around $150~175 (installed), depending if they're running a sale or not.
NOT talking about the 12v battery. There is NOT a fan for the 12v battery. Talking about the HV battery. There IS a fan for the HV battery.
Is it really a 2 hour job to actually check/clean the entire airflow path of a Gen 3 HV battery? Maybe what I'm asking is if anyone has really seen this job performed by a dealer. Is it really anything more than a fan check/clean? Even pulling the cover off the battery isn't going to tell you much, since any crud would be on the bottom of the battery.
12v bat. Doesn’t need service. HV bat. Fan cleaning service is easy to do. Coolant drain and refill are due at 120k miles, and is easy doable. All maintenance videos on our YouTube. Doing this yourself will cost you less than 100$ lol...
Thank you so much. I definitely don't trust this dealer but they made me nervous that I was missing something. I really appreciate your feedback!
How easy or hard something is depends on you and your skill level and how much you want to do something. I hate putting gas in the car anymore. It's too much work! I am a semi-retire technician. And I won't pay someone $100 plus an hour to do something I can do. Even if it takes longer. And most importantly, I KNOW it's done CORRECTLY the FIRST time!!! If you take pride in yourself and your work, you'll do it right. I've worked at different dealerships and there are some really bad and nasty mechanics there. But there are also good ones. It's just finding them! I've realized pretty much everything I've done on my Prius (2010) has been fairly easy. Doing the egr cooler was trickier, but not hard. But then I have a lot of specialty tools that helped me a lot. It is nice to have a 2nd vehicle incase you don't finish something or need to go get a part though! As nutzaboutbolt said, the HV fan is easy to do. And worth the time to do it!
One thing with the fan cleaning @NutzAboutBolts video: you don't need to pull up the rear seat. There's one bolt requiring removal, behind/under the rear seat, just below the fan intake, and you can just push apart the seat bottom and back, make a gap, reach through with a ratchet on an extension (12 mm socket size IIRC). Don't drop the bolt though... Excellent videos btw; they empower reluctant DIY'rs, who maybe just need a nudge.
