I have a 2006 Prius with 230,000 miles on it. Yesterday the car had the bank of dash lights come on including the red triangle of doom right after my husband started driving out of a parking lot. Prior to that no symptoms, no loss of gas mileage, car has been running great. He did the right thing and pulled into another parking lot, and called for a tow. Since it was Saturday we had to take it to the dealership. The dealership says that it has P3000 and P0A80 as the ONLY codes. Of course the dealership is saying that the HV battery is dying. BUT I have had a similar problem twice before, where the HV looks like it is failing to charge and thanks to smart people here at Priuschat I just had the 12v replaced and all was well. Today they tell me that when it came in to the dealership they said they charged the 12v (so obviously that was low) and then reran the diagnostic which came back with the same two codes. Now what I want to know is if the 12v is not holding a charge can that cause those codes to throw even after it was recharged, quickly as they came back with the codes within an hour of getting the car? Second question is whether it is typical for an HV battery to not have any loss of gas mileage or other symptoms prior to throwing those codes? And finally whether it is typical for a bad HV battery to throw ONLY those codes and no others? Thanks! Dealership is pushing really hard to get me to buy a new HV battery for $3000 plus install. Note: the value of the car is below or equal to cost of HV replacement.
Just remember that the genuine Toyota battery can be found at several dealers for $1600. Dealer install takes them an honest 2 hours, but they charge for 5 = $600ish. Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
Same Prius or a different one? The thing about the PriusChat replace-yer-twelve-volt-and-all-is-well cure is that it makes the warning lights go away (because the power was removed), and they'll stay away for as long as it takes the car's ECUs to re-detect the condition they were warning you about the first time. In the early stages of traction battery deterioration that can take a while before similar readings are caught again and the codes come back. In later stages they'll come back faster. Which means, if this story is all about the same Prius, the shouldn't-there-have-been-earlier-indications question is like a secular version of the boats-and-a-helicopter joke.
A couple thoughts: They are probably right given the codes and the miles and age of the battery. With a full charge on the 12V it won't throw bogus codes and even if it's low, it has to be very low for that to happen. My 2005 got down to under 9 volts with giving a trouble code. They are not giving you full information on the codes. First of all, it's a P0A80, not a P0A80. The first character tells which system has the error and the rest is a hexadecimal number. Possible decimal digits, as everyone knows, are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, & 9. Possible hex digits are the same plus A, B, C, D, E, & F. But the main thing they're not telling you is the sun code that goes with the P0A80 which would tell which module is failing. $3,000 plus install for a new battery is highway robbery. $3,000 including install still seems steep. Lots of people are buying new Toyota batteries at other dealers for under $2,000 and putting them in themselves. It takes about two to three hours to do the job. Then you have to take back the old one for the core charge since the new battery has to re-use some of the parts from the old one. Given the age and miles on the car, I don't think it's likely to be worth a new battery even if you do it yourself unless you already taken care of the other expensive possibilities like brake accumulator and/or air conditioning.
If you are DIY @2k1Toaster here sells a kit of new cells for $1600 delivered that basically gives you a new battery pack. the link is in my signature. New Prius Battery Kit (GEN2, 2004-2009) - New Prius Batteries LLC
Same Prius, in 2011, and 2016. The 12v seems to last about 4-5 years here in the desert. I have read that the usual list of symptoms of the battery going includes lower gas mileage, ours is GREAT! That is why I am suspicious of sudden death of the HV. It has been treated well, lives in a garage, does longer drives rather than short trips. Yes we are near or above 100 for 5 hellacious months of the year. Also the timefor a new 12v is here and when it came into the shop the 12v was low.
Ok, the code was a typo on their side, I just copied and pasted. YES! They have not told me which cell(s) are bad, they just want to sell me a new battery pack. I did ask about additional codes, the service guy claimed those were the only codes — huh? Of course they wanted to sell me some additional services that I don’t need as well. If you know of a shop with better prices in southern AZ please let me know. No the Prius has not needed anything else besides the recalls (done) and a water pump ... and a master wiring harness (packrat damage).
Ok, another question (number 5): IF it does need an HV battery replaced, and assuming by some miracle the money to do that fell from the sky, what kind of value would it have? It has been remarkably trouble free. Question 6: I have done a few things before DIY, fixed a broken antenna using info from this site, for example but I think doing the battery pack might be beyond me. However I may be able to find someone who likes to play with Prii. If I can would you recommend replacing just the bad cells and reconditioning? Or replace the whole thing? Does replacing the whole thing with new increase value at all? Thanks!
Replacing the pack with new or a newer pack is generally much more reliable than replacing modules or using a repaired pack that can due at any time. Replacing the bad modules and then reconditioning it an option though.
Wouldn't be "sudden" if it already tried to notify you twice before, but you cleared the codes by replacing the 12 volt and carried on.
I've been there because my sister lives south of Wilcox, but never needed repairs. However, a quick look on Google gave me three Tucson hybrid shops. I checked the yelp reviews on the first one. Not bad except for one that looks like a mistake -- 5 years ago from someone in San Antonio TX. Hybrid Repair in Tucson, AZ | Import Service Center - Import Service Center My Blog | My WordPress Blog Expert Hybrid Vehicle Repair and Services | Auto Repair Tucson Edit to add about the other codes they would have gotten. A P0A80 code will have subcodes telling which block has at least one bad cell in it. For example P0A80 and P3014 codes say to replace the HV battery and that block #14 has one or more bad cells in it. Techstream would say something like, "Block 14 becomes weak" or words to that effect. The dealer likely didn't mention that in order to avoid you saying something like, "Well why not just fix that block?" Dealers don't do that stuff. Other shops do it, but many have quit doing it because the results are usually short lived since the other cells are just as old and probably won't work much longer. But some people don't mind what many on PC have come to know as the "whack-a-mole" game.
Ok, I basically have three choices. 1) Put a new 12v in and see if it pops codes again, which it should if the HV battery is really bad. But if it doesn’t then maybe it’s a bad 12v. Cost $250. 2) Put a new battety pack in at the dealer, because it’s there. Cost $3000 assuming they don’t insist on doing other things. 3) Get my chiropractor, who has done this with his Prius and has volunteered to do it with mine, to use his equipment to figure out which modules are toast, replace those, and float the pack. Cost probably $500 because I would pay him for his time. Which would you do given the age of the car, miles, and no other major repairs ... yet. Please include your reasoning. Thanks!
