Help with constant failing battery - P3000-123, P0A80

remanufactured batteries fail quite often, so it is a strong possibility

 

best way to find out is a two day subscription to the service manual and code trouble shooting

 

I think you got more than your money's worth if they've come out and put a different pack in 3 different times... The problem is the rebuilder you went with is the cheapest price there is...

Whereas if you went with someone who charges in the $1200 range, like Professor Joe who has spent $50K in testing equipment over the past decade you'd have a rebuilt pack that would be good for up to 3 years: https://2ndlifebattery.com/contact-us/

Of course your best bet if you want to boost MPG and overall vehicle performance you need to upgrade to the most advanced Lithium technology perfected in that past ten years rather than Toyota's NIMH technology that was perfected in the early 1990's.

It may cost more at first, but the boost in MPG over the next ten years would make it the least expensive option. And if you use my affiliate link I'll give you unlimited tech support: https://projectlithium.com/?ref=9qLPw

 

All your screenshots point to the battery pack being bad... There's no signs of other problem with the hybrid system... But you do have a non-related error code for your catalytic converter, as well as a coolant control valve that needs to be replaced.

 

yes, that battery is a piece of junk. Block 13 has failed as shown in the third photo. They may be installing replacement batteries, but the ones they're installing have been rebuilt the same way as the one taken out, Very poorly. That battery was under only a 30A discharge when it coded out. It should be able to handle 120ish+ if the gas pedal is hammered from a stop.

Batteries can be rebuilt successfully as long as proper testing is performed on the individual modules. When that testing is not perfomed, the rebuild is effectively just a guessing game. Sometimes good luck strikes, but not usually. Show your rebuilder the third photo with Block 13 voltage being 12.68 while all the others are mid 14s. The P0A80 + Block 13 is all they should need to see to verify the battery is a POS.

 

Have you checked for corrosion on the pins of the battery ecu? If theres a coating of greenish corrosion on the pins and jack plugs into the battery ecu, it may not get a good voltage reading. It's strange that you went through so many rebuilt packs without solving the problem. So just wondering if anyone checked the battery ecu?

Not clear if you swap out the whole battery including the battery ECU each time the battery has been replaced? Are you putting in new built battery including the ecu which mounts on the side of the battery case each time? IF so ignore this advice.

 

As long as you like your Prius, this new pack can be moved into your next Prius as long as it was built between 2004-2015. And sometimes you can get a crazy good price on a low mileage Prius that's only problem is a bad battery pack. Your pack will be back in stock mid-June, maybe you can get one more swap under warranty while you wait?

 

if you're not going to buy an oem, you don't need the core for anything

 

All you ever got was a slightly better set of used battery cells. There is no way to remanufacture batteries.

There is a myth around here that deep cycled and recharged modules can bring some of them back to life. Batteries use a chemical process which gets depleted over time. They have a maximum number of cycles and they are done. Getting 6 to 12 months out of a reorganized set of used modules is all you can expect especially when one wesk module takes you out.

Buy new cells and get 8 -10 years of reliability.

 

Yes....that myth has been proven true......a failed battery will pretty much always be a failed battery. A weak battery can be restored to a more reasonable level of performance. I can provide a ream of data recorded from module testing. Is it impossible that my 2007 has modules it it originally from a 2004, with serial numbers showing they were manufactured in 2003? That battery has only one? or two? modules replaced and the remaining were "refurbed". (been so long, I don't rememebr if it was 1 or 2, lol) It's been in the car for years now and is still a beast. That battery is effectively 20 years old and rolling strong. Hasn't been touched again since I rebuilt and installed it.

 

Lol, it's absolutely not a myth! If you really think it is a myth then please provide a valid reference to prove it because vague mentionings that number of cycles is the only thing that defines battery lifespan is dishonest and dismissive of the facts.

Meanwhile here's a valid reference for basic Nickel-based battery science that proves that deep cycling these battery types is not a myth but a fact: BU-807: How to Restore Nickel-based Batteries - Battery University

The entire reason folks like https://2ndlifebattery.com/ can consistently rebuild/recondition packs that outlast their 3 year warranty is because they have high quality equipment to accurately measure module health and match them up with similar modules.

I've seen 2nd Life Battery's facilitates several times over the past 1/2 dozen years and am extremely impressed with the quality of their work, as well as how many times they've spent more than $20K on the latest in lab grade testing gear to ensure their warranty holds up for 3 years.

If you don't want to upgrade to Lithium for better performance and higher MPG I can assure you that 2nd life won't let you down.

 

My 2 cents:
Have had NexCell lithium in one of our Gen 2's for a year (20k+ miles). Driver is steadily 50 mpg+ w/o any real effort during her daily rural hwy. commute. Local dealer's jobber price on an OEM IS $1,800 after a $350 core charge, so for about 25% more the NexCell is a no brainer next new battery we need. When replacing the original modules w/ the new lithium units I found 22 of the old modules had acceptable IR and held their charge uniformly well for several weeks, so they were all earmarked as possible replacement modules in future OEM rebuilds, which in turn should also be taken into consideration when analyzing the total NexCell cost of ownership.

Something I've been paying more attention to anytime I crack open a hybrid pack is cleaning up ALL traces of previous battery corrosion. Original copper buss bars get cleaned & mirror polished, harness, module terminals & mains all cleaned & protected. I rebalance w/ a Prolong consumer setup and so far (little over a year) every rebuild/reconditioning has fared well.

That 1st NexCell was installed in a well cared for 200k mile vehicle, but should that ever go down for good, the NexCell is just gonna move to a new old Prius home. Whatever age car you put one in, it's still going to have a significant residual value even if the car it's in dies, so all told they make good sense, supposing of course that the initial cost fits your cash flow.

SM-N960U ?

 

What's your bus bar cleaning technique? I use a rock tumbler, which is near effortless, but not very shiny...

 

Ha ha, yeah, well that's been something of a journey.

Began with wire brushes & wheels, but then somebody mentioned the effect of creating a record album profile, so I went in search of something better.

Then moved on to a rotary rock tumbler and a variety of different media. Walnut shells leave an oil deposit that then has to be cleaned, and most were fairly useless on the deeper staining.

Next batter; vibratory tumbler. Provided an interesting material flow, and again, tried numerous media, but ultimately it was a near catastrophe with the terminal nuts and not much of an improvement over the drum tumbler. Dust and crud from the media got pretty persistently lodged in the nuts, so onto the next great idea.

Tried acids, from white vinegar to 30% sulfuric, and thought briefly about heating it, but the idea of working with an aqueous solution of the latter, in my shop (not a lab) seemed a bit too genius, so I resorted to just soaking the copper in the dilute sulfuric. Again, and somewhat surprisingly, only an incrementally better outcome and not the silver bullet I was looking for. Tried simmering in white vinegar, and that also offered only a modest improvement.

The terminal nuts, on the other hand, responded quite well to being placed in a Freezer-type Zip-Loc baggie with straight Malco Red Thunder (my default degreasing cleaner) and two 30 minute hot cycles in the ultrasonic cleaner. Using the baggies keeps the amount of cleaner to a minimum & saves me having to clean the tank. This had no effect on the copper plates, but it did do a nice job of removing the walnut oil residue. My tank is decent sized so I used it to clean up the plastic bits (wire harness troughs & covers) as well, and for that it worked great with just a bit of Simple Green (the Malco is a little pricey to use a lot straight).

Unfortunately there was no silver bullet, Easy Button solution to what I was after, although I do still seek that unicorn. In the meantime, the ultrasonic is going to be the primary for cleaning the plastic bits and terminal nuts. It's OCD, I know, and the trouble of cleaning the copper bars is considerable compared to just buying a new set of nickel plated new ones, but that miniscule loss of conductivity will keep me up at night, so I continue cleaning the original copper.

At present that entails an overnight soak in the sulfuric acid, a rinse, and then mechanically wearing the surface down on progressively finer wet sand paper. I double-face tape 600 - 3,500 grit paper to a thick piece of glass and try to recall why I went to college while mindlessly rubbing the little bastards back and forth till they begin to shine, then onto a buffing wheel with some jewelers' rouge before a final bath and rinse. I'm certain it's not even remotely worth half the time spent, but it looks real pretty when I return a battery to someone, and I get to sleep some.

I also use brush-on, needle applicator & spray Craig products (D5 & D6) on the harness and terminals, and for the last year that I've been doing all of this it has proved to hold up extremely well. As I rotate through doing Prolong maintenance regenrations on our small fleet of Gen 2's, and others that I service, I've not encountered any new corrosion buildup on any of the copper, or the harness terminal ends, so that's been somewhat reaffirming.

Having now done this on several dozen batteries I can say that the one with the NexCell lithium pack is definitely my favorite, and the way to go however, and with the new v. 2 upgrade I'll have even fewer copper plates to fool with as I replace more and more NiMh with them. Of course the plates on the lithium modules are always nice and clean, since they aren't subjected to the corrosives from the NiMh modules, and the De-oxit keeps the dissimilar metals playing nice.

I'll let ya know if and when I find that Easy Button.