OK, So I got he triangle of death. tore the battery apart and found one module down. I replaced it cold. Ran fine for 2 months. Bang Triangle of death again. (this is where it gets bad) Ordered another module and drove the car for a week. Got the module but drove another week. I just didnt have time to replace it. Car went into limp mode. I brought the prolong kit and cycled it thru the drain/charge cycles. Drove for about 20 minutes and the triangle came back and it went intot limp mode. Could I have killed the inverter by driving it for 2 weeks? What can I look for? How can I test the inverter? Help!
If worried about the Inverter make sure you have movement of Inverter coolant in the coolant reservoir. That makes sure the invert coolant pump has not died and the Invert is overheating. But your problem is you have a 13 year old battery pack. If you continue to drive the car in limp mode that really hammers the battery. Don't know what you mean by replacing it cold. Only way to make pretty sure the battery is working ok is to load test every individual battery module and make sure they all have pretty close charge/discharge behavior. They charge up correctly and will hold a charge properly. You really cant just buy a module off ebay and slap it in. that will not last long. That is known as whack a mole battery repair. If the battery ecu see's one module tanking it will fail the battery. It has too as all the battery's are in series. The battery as a whole is only as good as the weakest module. Every module has to be pretty close to proper capacity. In a 13 year old pack i would suspect many modules are not performing well.
Thanks Ed. I think I toasted the inverter as well.. By Cold I meant I jut jammed it in there. I drove the car for 2 weeks with the bad cell(s).
It's simply not worth swapping used battery modules mixed with old ones. It's an endless cycle that you will forever keep doing as long as you keep driving the car. It's only considered a temporary fix like putting a bandaid on rather than permantely fixing the problem. Brand new batteries is the only permanet solution if you plan on driving these cars for another 10+ years. With tbe age of the battery, it's already too late to try to save a dying battery chemistry. Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
