About how long do 2006 prius usually last before they give out?

My 2006 has about 289k now. Three years ago, I purchased it at 200k. Still running strong and getting about 50mog. My plan is to try and get to 500k. I replaced HV battery with rebuilt HV battery when I purchased it.

 

The main concerns are

1. Rings seizing and cylinder damage.
2. HV battery dying.
3. Catalytic converter dying or getting stolen.
4. Brake actuator breaking.
5. Wheel bearings going out.

Each one of these, except the wheel bearings, can easily be $2,000 in parts, depending on where you live and what options you'd consider.

Catalytic converters normally die if you start burning oil, which if your rings seize, then you'll start burning oil. This can be prevented by changing the oil regularly, at least every 5,000 miles or every 6 months, whichever comes first.

Toyota forgot to also put brake fluid changes in the maintenance schedule. But a brake fluid change every couple or three years could help keep your brake internals going for longer.

The battery will go some day. You can try different maintenance tricks, but in the end it may die anyway. OEM batteries are getting hard to find these days, but I'd be very careful with aftermarket stuff. If you live in a moderate climate then maybe the Project Lithium battery, aka Nextcel battery, could be a good choice, as long as you're taking care of your engine and brakes.

If you take care of your engine and brakes, everything except the battery and wheel bearings could potentially last well beyond 400,000 miles. If you do yearly oil changes and never change your other fluids, such as coolant, transmission fluid, and especially brake fluid, then you may have some major repair bills headed your way soon.

 

or the cat gets stolen in the crime capitol of america.

it all depends on the condition of your car now, and how much you are willing to spend on repairs. there's no average, and if there is, you're probably beyond it

 

Ya, and the thing is IF you live where you need an OEM catalytic converter, then theft or cat damage can become costly. If you don't then a cheap aftermarket catalytic converter may work just fine.

 

You are likely beyond whatever the average is. And you can keep going as long as you are willing to spend money on maintenance and repairs.

Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.

 

A rule of thumb, if it looks like you're going to start pouring the same or more money into it in a year than a year's worth of payments, get a car that has payments. Otherwise, just keep driving it. Who knows how long it'll last. You could start saving what a car payment would be and when the Prius finally bites the dust you could have a hefty downpayment, or even flat out buy your next car with just cash.

 

@Isaac Zachary thanks for the post. I was just thinking of this question for my Gen 2 Prius. I almost created a new thread until the 'relevant' thread search popped up; great feature!

Are there any warnings for the rings seizing and cylinder damage ahead of time?

What about the break actuator as well?

I have a 2007 Prius with 187k on it. The HV battery went out 2 years ago and luckily I replaced it with an OEM from Toyota. This forum was a huge help in DIY'ing that! I couldn't have done it without here.

I get oil changes every 3k-5k, have a CAT shield installed and take care of the car for the most part.

I'm just curious how much longer it can go without major problems.

 

Seized rings cause the engine to use oil. If your engine isn't using oil they are probably fine. Frequent oil changes can help prevent this. I scoped my cylinders and could see where the rings pulled chunks out of the cylinder wall. Not good!

 

@Isaac Zachary what do you mean by the engines using oil? I don't get that.

 

@PriusFruit With 187,000 miles and 15 years on it, your car is definitely “over the hill”. Studies by iSeeCars have shown that less than 4% of Prii last to 200,000 miles or beyond. But with that said, if there isn’t anything significantly wrong with it now and you keep up with regular maintenance, it could last another 4 years or more before one of those $3000+ repairs is needed.

My 2009 Prius with nearly 170,000 miles has hit 2 of those really expensive repairs, but thankfully one (catalytic converter theft) was covered by insurance and the the other (multifunction display failure) was able to get repaired by AutoBeYours for less than a tenth of the cost of a new replacement.

 

@Moving Right Along nice color Prius!

My multifunction display stopped working a few months ago too, but I'm okay with not using it. The touch screen stopped working consistently.

The multifunction unit doesn't really matter for the function of the car driving though, right?

 

A good engine doesn't burn/leak (aka "use") more than a quart of oil between oil changes. In other words, you never need to add oil other than at oil changes.

But if you start needing to add a quart of oil between oil changes, you're engine is starting to go south.

A quart every 1,000 miles, and you can be sure you have stuck oil rings or some other very bad leak somewhere (internally or externally).

Then it gets to the point you have to add a quart every few hundred miles.

When your engine burns more oil than gasoline, then it's time to do something drastic.

 

@Isaac Zachary thanks for sharing that. I'll look out for that and thankfully right now that's not a problem.

I have another question for you.

Do you think it make a big difference to do an oil change every 3k instead of 5k for high mileage Prius's?

I used to go in for an oil change every 5k miles, but after 175k I started doing them every 3k.

 

The car will run and drive without it, but it’s really helpful for temperature settings. Without the display, you can adjust your pre-selected automatic temperature via the steering wheel controls, but you can’t see what temperature you’re selecting and you can’t change the fan speed or which air vents to use. In my opinion, the $300 I paid to AutoBeYours to fix it and the hassle of taking it out, mailing it to them, and then putting it back in was worth it.

 

Good, question, one I don't have a straight answer for. In theory it should give it a longer life. But by how much?, is the question.

 

Thanks everyone. I know what to look for now and I'll probably take care of my multifunction display soon.

 

That's true for a Prius but apparently not for many recent cars. I happened to be in a Toyota Dealer parts department last week and noticed stacks of OW16 oil in boxes. I asked the parts guy which cars used such thin oil, and he listed a very large number of 2022 models. I stopped him before he got to Prius, but if Corolla's are using that, the gen 4 Prius must be too, or maybe even thinner. Toyota and other brands have gone over to very low viscosity oils in order to eke out a few more MPG. Unfortunately that thin oil gets past the rings to some extent even in a brand new car. People don't expect their brand new cars to burn oil, so they don't check the dipstick often, and can be surprised when the oil pressure light comes on.

 

True. Both thin oil is more likely to get burned and car companies let you change oil yearly and people don't allways change their oil on time even when it's yearly. But going by what the actual manual says, unless you do flat, summer, highway driving only, you really should be changing your oil every 6 months or 5,000 miles, whichever comes first. And it is very unlikely you'll need to add oil in that amount of time even with 0W16 and similar oils.

 

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OK ... I just did the first sorta major repair on my ’05 G2 w/ 177,000 clicks. Nothing was any type of failure just regular wear-out stuff. Front wheel bearing hubs, front brakes and a new 12V battery. I got all the parts from RockAuto and it was in-out in 1-day. +/- $720 otd. It runs just fine and I think maybe the mpg has improved a bit.