Hello all, My prius started making a weird noise today. There are no check engine lights, or anything lit up on the dash, or anything out of the ordinary. The engine starts and there's this horrendous vibration all over the car. It sounds exactly like a subwoofer in the vehicle. Its so bad that the rear view mirror is vibrating. It only does this at low throttle response. If I floor it, it goes away. If I hold the brake and hit the throttle i can get it to keep doing it. I searched, but the only thing close to this was in very cold weather, and don't believe this is my problem as it was in the upper 80's today. Any help you could provide would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time, John
Sounds like a dealer visit is warranted. If you feel like experimenting, remove the negative 12V battery terminal cable where it attaches to the body, and leave the battery disconnected for five minutes. Then reconnect and see if that helps. The idea is to give all of the various ECUs a chance to reset. Maybe the hybrid vehicle ECU is being weird and MG1 is fighting the engine, so that the engine cannot idle normally.
Another question was there any maintenance done on your car recently. (even if it seems unrelated) The only other possibility I can think of is maybe you are driving with a rear window open, without the front window on the same side being opened also they sound like a helicopter is about to land on your car.
All of the windows are up. Oil level is good. The next day it stopped. Can not recreate the noise now. The other night I could hold the break down, hit the gas (to make the engine start)without the vehicle in motion and it would start. The noise that is. I have an appointment monday with the dealership. Was hoping someone might know something I might be able to do myself and avoid the dealership if at all possible. Thanks for everyones input.
how odd... the only time i had something similar to this was when i had a spark plug failure... your problem sounds different though... and "new"..
Before I bought my 2010 prius, I test drove a different one that sounded like what you're explaining... like a bass sound system. I told the dealer. He said its just because its cold. Which it was... about 5 degrees. So I took it for about an hour at 60 - 70 mph, brought it back and it still made the noise. Asked the dealer again, now that the car was warm, and he claimed he didn't hear it. He was obviously lying. Never did figure it out, but passes on that car. It was a 2010 IV with 18,000 miles. Good luck.
as a follow up... check ignition coils. 1 can fail for quite a bit before any codes get thrown. gas mileage drops... the engine rumbles funny.. still almost as quick but not quite.. reduced top speed...
My 2004 Prius is doing the same thing as your Prius. Did you ever find out what the solution is to this problem?
