Hello, I had my new to me prius up in the air and noticed this broken part under the car. It looks like a lightbulb, but all of my lights and signals are working. This is front passenger side next to the radiator. Anyone know what this is? PS - Car was in an accident before I purchased it.
I'm not 100% certain, but it looks like it might be the external temperature sensor. Does the external temperature display correctly on your MFD?
The white rectangular plastic piece looks like an electrical connector. Whatever was connected to the other side looks like it was broken off and the two wires are just hanging down. Is this on the engine side of the radiator or the grill side? If on the grill side then uart could be right about the external temperature sensor.
External temp sensor works on the car reading 90 degrees now, but it looks like this sensor couldn't possibly be working with the grime and exposed wires. Any other ideas? No CEL's showing on the dash.
I think its the Engine coolant temp sensor. If so that may mean there's no engine coolant because I think the sensor is in the coolant stream and it fell out of its sealed hole. Take the topside black plastic engine cover off and open the rad cap on the right and check coolant level in the rad. Check the inverter coolant level while your at it.
Yes, it's the temperature sensor for the gas motor (ICE) to turn on the rad fans when it gets hot enough.It's not unplugged, it's broken into two pieces. The arrow points to the part that unscrews from the rad (antifreeze will pour out) and screw in the new one. Plug in the electrical connector after you remove the broken piece from it. A common problem is for the hose clamp on the hose just above it in your picture, to rust to "cornflakes" and let leak on the sensor. This causes the pins in the electrical connector (brass) to rust into a green paste and stop the fans. Problem cannot be seen until connector is unplugged. Trouble code B1476 will be set which (I seem to remember) stopped the air conditioning from working. Replace sensor and splice in a new plug-in connector to repair. Clear codes. Hope this helps someone!
Even so, it is good information (for new readers coming to this thread) and actually resolves this thread quite nicely. It sounds like this "new guy" knows what he is talking about.
