1. Attachments are working again! Check out this thread for more details and to report any other bugs.

How do I test battery when it's cold out and I'm on a dealer lot?

Discussion in 'Gen 3 Prius Care, Maintenance & Troubleshooting' started by akb427, Feb 19, 2024.

  1. akb427

    akb427 New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2024
    8
    2
    0
    Location:
    New York
    Vehicle:
    Other Non-Hybrid
    Model:
    N/A
    I'm shopping for a used gen 3 or v. I installed Dr Prius and took it to a test drive.
    It got thru the charging phase in maybe five or ten minutes and then it wanted the battery to be 77 deg F to proceed with the test. I'm in the snow belt. We had the car out for a test drive for probably over 45 minutes, and on a day in the 50s (which is warm for February here), with highway driving, the battery never got past 72 degrees.

    So, is there a way to check battery condition on Priuses when it's cold out and you can't necessarily run it all day?
     
    #1 akb427, Feb 19, 2024
  2. Tombukt2

    Tombukt2 Senior Member

    Joined:
    Nov 29, 2020
    10,369
    1,791
    0
    Location:
    Durham NC
    Vehicle:
    2009 Prius
    Model:
    Base
    Yeah have the dealer or the car sales place pull it into the garage for an hour or two before you come for your test drive see how well that works depends on what part of the country you're in I know you said it but it doesn't tell me where has a lot to do with how car dealers operate it's a regional thing Right now car dealers are well have been enjoying a lot of ridiculous nonsense so they don't really have to do anything cars are double the price for used cars that they were 5 years ago that sort of thing now all of a sudden an old piece of crap car is worth $8,000 but yet half the country's not even hardly going to work Go figure that's probably why the price of the vehicle so high but then nobody's really going anywhere seemingly but everybody wants a $3,000 car right now because they have to have it oh well.
     
    #2 Tombukt2, Feb 20, 2024
  3. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

    Joined:
    May 11, 2005
    110,129
    50,045
    0
    Location:
    boston
    Vehicle:
    2012 Prius Plug-in
    Model:
    Plug-in Base
    Toyota dealer?
    What year and miles?
    Battery might be the least of your worries
     
    #3 bisco, Feb 20, 2024
    JohnPrius3005 and Mendel Leisk like this.
  4. akb427

    akb427 New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2024
    8
    2
    0
    Location:
    New York
    Vehicle:
    Other Non-Hybrid
    Model:
    N/A
    I wrote the Dr Prius app folks, and got a speedy and useful reply... the app shows internal resistance and cumulative delta voltage readings on the battery blades. Even if the full test suite can't run, these can provide some indication of battery condition. After a bit of driving, they both should be very similar across all the battery blades, so if all the bars are showing 25 milliohms except for one showing 35, that's bad news. The resistance goes up as the pack ages, the indicator bars go yellow at 30 milliohms which is a kind of middle-aged range. On the cumulative delta voltage, again all the blades in the pack should be about the same, but I'm not sure what good numbers are, like if .1v is a big difference or not, but the bars do provide some visual indication.
     
    #4 akb427, Feb 24, 2024
  5. akb427

    akb427 New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2024
    8
    2
    0
    Location:
    New York
    Vehicle:
    Other Non-Hybrid
    Model:
    N/A
    Most of what I was looking at was under 120k, some under 80k, so mostly enough time to check the egr/head gasket stuff, and I was trying for 2015 or later and checking recall status.
     
    #5 akb427, Feb 24, 2024
    bisco likes this.
  6. Tombukt2

    Tombukt2 Senior Member

    Joined:
    Nov 29, 2020
    10,369
    1,791
    0
    Location:
    Durham NC
    Vehicle:
    2009 Prius
    Model:
    Base
    Well you might want to look into that little further the two z z engine with 120 plus thousand miles doesn't leave you a lot of time until some of the inevitables. As long as that doesn't bother you I guess it's all good just be careful with that You may be out of a car quicker than you get in it that close to those mileages
     
    #6 Tombukt2, Feb 24, 2024
(You must log in or sign up to post here.)