2010 Prius 100,000 Mile Preventative maintenance Items

Good advice. I always like a "dont overthink it" approach.

 

Last night I did the inverter coolant change (easy!), and then the transaxle fluid change. That was a bit harder than on my Gen2 prius (harder to thread a hose down through the engine bay to reach the fill hole from above). Anyways got that all done.

I dont think I had the car perfectly level though because at about 3.4 liters it started dripping out the fill hole. I've heard for others this happens at 3.7 or 3.8 liters. Anyways I got it all plugged up, took the car down and was draining out my old fluid from the pan into bottles for recycling and at the bottom I found a washer. Turns out the washer fell off the fill plug (thank god it wasn't the drain plug washer!).

So today I have to jack the entire car up again and remove the fill plug just to put the crush washer back on.

Any thoughts about only getting 3.4-3.5 liters of ATF into the car? I've heard that Toyota specifies 3.5 liters - can anyone confirm or do I really need to make sure it holds the full 3.7 or 3.8? If it needs more I will need to find a jack that can raise the rear of the car about 1 more inch and I think I should be able to get a tiny bit more ATF in.

I have the car on solid wooden ramps (look like the image below) I built in the front, and then used a floor jack to bring up the rear. I have parking brake on, and wheel chocks in place. Somehow the rear floor jack cant quite extend far enough to lift up the rear to be perfectly level but it is close. I think this is the source of my problems with it not taking as much fluid as others have. Maybe I will just put the jack on a 2x8 to add a bit of height.

 

3 changes is a lot in that little kms. What do you reckon is a "reasonable interval"? I know its specified for "lifetime". To me that means about every 100,000-150,000 kms. I did the first ATF change on my gen 2 at 300,000 kms which I think was a bit late.

Thanks for the reassurance on the amount of fluid required! I will get that crush washer back on and call it good. Glad I wont have to fuss with the tubing and funnel again.

I am finally soo close to being done with all the items I set out to do (except the water pump, which I am saving for a bit later). I hope to have the engine under-cover back on the car tonight!

 

Mendel is correct - on my 2010 Prius it is on a hose junction just above the EGR cooler. Odd that they took it off after a few years of that generation.

 

Great - got the washer on and got the undercover on last night. Finally done! Well, there are about 4 plastic clips I couldnt get back in as I was in a rush to drive the car somewhere. I might fiddle around with those later if I have time.

Wood ramps like that were easy to make and relatively cheap (maybe not any more as lumber prices are sky high). They also seem fairly safe. I drive the car up on the ramps, undo all my bolts and things that need torqing, then I jack up the rear of the car to get it level with a floor jack to fill with ATF. I think its "fairly" safe to do it that way. I do get under the front of car without setting the rear on jack stands, but of course the part I am under is held up by the wood ramps. I then drop down the rear jack and crawl back under to torque everything.

 

Hi Everyone,

I just thought I'd post an update after doing all this work and 5-6 months have gone by.

First thing I should say is that the car does not appear to burn any oil at all, and 5000 kms later (about 8,000 since last oil change was done) the oil doesn't look incredibly dirty. It looks much cleaner than the oil did in my 2005 Prius with twice the miles on it.

The oil catch can is catching incredibly small amounts of oil/water. I'd say it catches about a teaspoon or less every time I fill up a gas tank. I've only empied it twice since I installed it in April and each time it only had about a tablespoon of gunk in the bottom. I expect more water to be in there over the winter. I should note that this might be because my OCC is installed fairly high up (in the small space at the very top front drivers side of the engine compartment. I should also mention that I used fuel line to plumb the OCC in so its fairly sturdy just hanging on the hoses - i never mounted it in any way (not even a zip tie). I dont really see the need to. The one complaint I have about the OCC is that now when you are around the car it stinks like the stuff inside the OCC. I might have a small leak in one of my hose connections, but there is no noticible performace issues (so I presume no major vaccum leak). I had to wrestle the hose connections on all of the fittings so I didnt even use clamps, but it is just as likely that some of the gases are escaping out of where the dipstick screws in as there is no rubber gasget there.

I guess in summary I want to relay to people they shouldnt be absolutely terrified of buying a used 2010-2014 Prius. There is a lot of talk about oil consumption, failing head gasgets, failing pison rings. I guess only time will tell if I prematurely experience any of those issues, but so far the car seems to be in perfect shape.

Oh, also based on the trip computer I have averaged 4.9l/100 kms since I bought it without trying to optimize economy. This is a mix of almost daily short city trips (2-5 km) and highway driving. I am quite happy with that result. When I am on the highway I tend to average closer to 4.6 or 4.7 l/100 km which is great. We will see how she does in the winter.