2007 Prius will not move after an engine swap.

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Care, Maintenance and Troubleshooting' started by saj77777, Jan 22, 2025 at 5:27 PM.

  1. saj77777

    saj77777 New Member

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    Performed an engine swap on my own in the backyard in the northwest Ohio cold. Got done and turned on the car and it sounded wonderful while in park. I got excited and declared victory then placed the car in reverse.

    At this point I heard a terrible revving and groaning noise coming from the engine bay. The vehicle did not move in reverse or drive, although it would let me select between reverse and drive. It would not let me put the car back in park. Pressing the power button was the only way to terminate the situation. I repeated the process several times, with the same results. There are no codes. The car was able to move and reverse and drive just fine with the old engine.

    I don't want to precondition anyone, but is anyone knowledgeable enough to say whether or not the input clutch damper assembly could be the explanation for these symptoms? Since that got swapped along with the engine, The new engine came with a different input clutch damper assembly, and that's the only thing I can think of to attribute the symptoms to.

    12 volt battery has been replaced and another vehicle was hooked up and parallel to the 12 volt battery just to ensure that that the problem was not a low 12 volt battery. It did not behave any differently.

    Again, the engine revs while in reverse along with the sort of groaning or grinding or I don't know how to describe this sound. I will try to post a video if I can.
     
    #1 saj77777, Jan 22, 2025 at 5:27 PM
  2. saj77777

    saj77777 New Member

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    It won't let me post a video because I have not posted at least 4 times. That's a weird requirement lol.
     
    #2 saj77777, Jan 22, 2025 at 5:33 PM
  3. saj77777

    saj77777 New Member

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    I uploaded a 16 second video on YouTube. Search "2007 Prius in reverse post engine swap." to see and hear it while in reverse.
     
    #3 saj77777, Jan 23, 2025 at 1:37 PM
  4. saneesh8

    saneesh8 Junior Member

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    Somewhere i read/saw that reverse uses the hybrid system exclusively. That's the reason why a car with bad hybrid battery won't have the reverse.

    Can you try moving it forward? The sound, seems like coming from the MG area.

    Also any error code?

    Just my thoughts..
     
    #4 saneesh8, Jan 23, 2025 at 6:25 PM
  5. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    Can you post another video from the other side of the car, showing the right-side hub and driveshaft while doing the same kind of test?

    The transmission input damper is also used when the transmission cranks the engine to start it, and that worked, seemingly without incident, so that's not really on my list of likely suspects.
     
    #5 ChapmanF, Jan 23, 2025 at 6:34 PM
    Brian1954 likes this.
  6. Tombukt2

    Tombukt2 Senior Member

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    You only have electric motor for reverse The engines coming on because it knows the battery needs to charge or you have the heat on and it's calling for heat. That's perfectly normal The grinding business is not in the car is not going backwards that's quite interesting so is the damper and everything slid completely on it shaft and all of that business I don't have one of these apart to go look at All I have is Gen 3 stuff out and in pieces which is the 1.8 l versus our little 1.6 but it should be similar. So this would seem to be all in the transmission not really the motor going forward You could bring the motor in but if the transmission is not connected or something for some reason then I would expect a racket no movement.
     
    #6 Tombukt2, Jan 23, 2025 at 7:31 PM
  7. mr_guy_mann

    mr_guy_mann Senior Member

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    I can only think of two possibilities. 1 is a problem with an axle shaft (inner joint not fully seated in the trans?). 2 is an internal transmission failure.

    Unless the transmission completely seizes, the MG2 motor should be able to directly drive the front wheels and move the car.

    Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
     
    #7 mr_guy_mann, Jan 24, 2025 at 7:18 AM
  8. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    I'm still hoping to see another video shot from the right side, suggested in #5.
     
    #8 ChapmanF, Jan 24, 2025 at 12:59 PM
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