2008 won’t start. 12v battery died from lack of use and car sat outside thru winter. Car hasn’t been started for 7 months Battery was charged up and load tested, and shop says it is good Power button is green when pushed without pushing brake pedal, amber when brake pedal is pushed. ‘Ready’ light flashes green for few seconds and turns off. “P” is pushed and dash shows in park. When power button is pushed with brake pedal depressed hear momentary activity under hood. Tail lights do come on. Parking brake instrument light flashes even when it is not set. Red triangle . 12v battery is charged. Screen and instrument cluster all light up Here’s OBD scan. Any ideas? Know nothing about hybrids, but car started and everything worked fine before the 12v died from lack of driving. Car has 160k miles.
What are you're OBD error codes? It looks like you said you'd post them and then didn't. Perhaps this is because this is your first post and you need to comment a few or more times in threads to get uploading privileges. Once we know the OBD codes we can help.
Bit behind the times on all this stuff and trying to navigate the forum, thanks for patience. This was granddaughter’s car. looking for easy inexpensive solution otherwise dumping it.
Ok, now that I can see the error codes we can talk more... These codes are pointing to a problem with your hybrid battery pack... I'm located an hour south of you and might be able to help... Sometimes these error codes can be an inexpensive fix with just some battery pack components needing to be replaced. Other times the pack needs work or replacement in which case there's 3 options to resolve based on what you can afford. -- For $400 or so you can have your existing pack repaired, which will be good for a year or so if you 're lucky. -- For $1200 you can get a professionally rebuilt pack that will be good for a few years. -- And for $2K you can get either a brand new OEM Toyota pack or Nexcell Lithium upgrade pack, with the Lithium pack boosting your MPG, AC performance and more power climbing mountains... Both brand new options will be good for more than 10 years and you can use them in your next Prius all the way up to model year 2015
Yeah, except for original post everything waiting on moderators approval. Thanks a lot for your assessment. Actually car is in shoreline near the community college. I’ll pass your reply on to my son as he will make final decisions. I know he doesn’t want to dump bunch of money into it. Wonder what it’s worth as is…. I gather that the 12v battery has nothing to do with starting the engine this is all new to me.
How many miles on it and is the body and interior in good shape? Depending on that answer, If you don't want to spend money/deal with the battery hassle I might be able to help you move it to next person... I'll private message you with more details...
Correct, it just boots up a computer and closes a big relay to let the big hybrid battery do the real work. And it looks like it is doing exactly that, except the hybrid battery is dead (P0AFA) so the car cannot start its engine, and frankly it's a big mess to get out of once one has deteriorated that far. Sell as-is. You could get over $1k if nobody has stolen the catalytic converter yet.
Side question- what app and OBD2 device are you using to scan the car? We have a thread covering scantool apps and want to keep it accurate and up to date. Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
Nope. Looks like the big battery is toast. Considering our two options - fix or dump. Needs a cat (stolen), rear bumper cover, full detail, and of course the battery. Granddaughter doesn’t want a car.
A Prius that sat for that long without running could easily have reach a discharge level that makes the HV battery so low it can't start the engine. I wouldn't give up quite so easily. If there is an independent hybrid shop around your daughters house it would be worth a call to them to see what it would cost to manually charge the HV pack to bring it up to a level that the car will start and begin charging itself. Don't bother calling a dealer since the estimate will just show a picture of an arm and a leg. If it's a reasonable charge it would be worth doing so that you can diagnose the HV pack. As far as the rest of the car if the battery is still good enough to get around after bringing the voltage up, and if the car is registered in Washington state (I see you are in Seattle) then you could put a cheap non-OEM cat on it. There are posts here on PC with low cost known to have worked for others catalyst that will do for the stolen cat problem. Interesting enough, Washington stopped emission testing in 2020 after 38 years of testing. Here's an excerpt from the WA.gov site: What cars need emissions testing in Washington state? After 38 years, Washington's emission testing program ended Jan. 1, 2020. An emissions test is no longer required before renewing your registration. If the cost of bringing the HV pack to at least minimum levels to start the car is too much then It's probably not worth it, but certainly worth a phone call to check with a shop.
Thanks for you comments and suggestions. Car has about 170K miles so the battery is close to the end of its life anyway. So that, cost plus the cost of replacing the cat, rear bumper cover, detailing, along with potentially of additional things going wrong due to mileage, ie struts, engine/trans, etc., and time/hassle of dealing with all this, on a car that isn’t really needed and is nearing end of its life, it just doesn’t pencil out considering what it is worth,IMO. Have a couple people
170k is barely broken in. If the body and interior are nice, the car has value for any DIYer, or someone who can fix it cheap and resell. I could have that car fixed and on the road reliably with about $200 invested. Throw in another $350 if it needs tires.
