My 2012 Prius has 84K miles. I recently purchased it used. I run A/C here in AZ all the time with radio on and using a dash cam hard wired. Twice I have been going through a car wash and at the end of my trip through the wash, I get a list battery light that says to charge it in other than when in neutral. I stop outside the carwash after car hesitates and in a few minutes all is fine. What's wrong? Is the 12V battery in need of replacement? I replaced one in my 2007 Prius easily. Is it the main battery dying? Hope not. Maybe water from car wash got in somewhere? Is the Dash Cam I had Best Buy recently hard wire for me recently drawing from main or 12V battery?
Search around on here about other owners experiences with a Prius and a car wash. I only use ones that do NOT require you to be in neutral and the equipment moves around the car (touch less). As for running the AC and listening to music, is this done while the car is not in ready mode? Good luck and keep us posted .
The HV battery does NOT charge when in N. So....when going through a car wash, you either need to get it near to fully charged first OR turn off all of your accessories including the A/C.......or both. You are lucky that it didn't die and refuse to restart.
Hybrid. Never go to car washes with neutral with these vehicles. Even if you go in with full charge, after many years, the SOC will go from 60 to 40 quicker than it was brand new. I always go to car wash bays and bring my own scrubs stuff.
It means that while running your air conditioner while in neutral you almost killed your traction battery because you kept pulling electrons out of it without replacing them. Put it in Park or Drive and the engine will start running and charging it back up -- if you haven't gotten the battery too low to start the engine. It has nothing to do with your 12V battery.
Thanks to all for your comments. Only times this happened was in car wash where I had to put in neutral and had air and radio on as well as dash cam. I was lucky to be able to put in drive and get out of the wash! I really didn't know the battery couldn't survive a quick car wash. I'll find on that moves instead of moving my car for me. Should I be worried about main battery being bad? It's hard to fathom that, but then again it's the only place I ever have to keep in neutral with my foot off the brake.
Nah, you can always buy a hv new battery, or a new car. People do that here so it’s not a bad thing if your loaded.
The Prius is the first car I've encountered that can't be off and in Neutral. The only way it can roll through those pull-along carwashes is in Neutral. So it's gotta be On. And when it's on, and in Neutral, it's incapable of charging. Which makes sense: there's no solid connection between the the engine and the wheels. So the hybrid battery's state of charge is gonna run down, doubly fast if you're running a lot of accessories. And there's a design "feature": if you ignore the pop-up warning, I believe it'll continue to use the hybrid battery, all the way down to unrecoverable territory? I guess comfort trumped battery integrity? Bottom line, avoid the pull-along style carwash wherever possible; use the stationary type, or hey: hand wash.
The sky is not falling. If you turn off the high drain accessories.....like headlights and A/C you should be fine.....since that will leave almost NOTHING drawing power from the HV battery. I would not, however, enter one with the battery really low......new or old.
Your battery should be able to run the A/C and stuff for a while, but it's risky behavior. The older the battery, the less reserve it has plus the possibility of catching it when it's about to ask to be recharged anyway. You might have just caught it at a bad time, but with one 7-8 years old, it's no longer a spring chicken even though it's still just under warranty. Summertime in Tucson puts quite a load on an air conditioner.
Actually, much worse than "doubly fast" when people are stupid enough to go through the wash in "N" with air conditioning on. Radio is a trivial drain, comparatively.
