30,000 mile service

You can see the pictures here:

http://priuschat.com/Huge-SuckageIn-An-Acc...ius-t11868.html

Clearly no sump for the CVT

 

Well DAN with all the money you'd save not feeding the dealers what they want for these mileage interval services, you probably could replace the tank every year.

 

Jayman, I am not trying to be argumentative here. Among the images in the thread you cite, #8730 and 8743 both show a sump with a drain bolt pointed towards the transmission case.

Again, my 2001 Prius has 2 sumps. These images are the only time I have ever seen under the new model. If the sump I refer to above does not contain WS ATF, I *still* wonder what's in it. I also find it curious that if there has been such a major structural change between models, it has not been commented upon.

If there has been such a change, I am interested in learning more about it.

 

I think this is more to do with semantics. I was taught a "sump" was a conventional sheet metal pan, like the ICE uses for motor oil.

The CVT case, at least on my 2004 Prius, is magnesium in two pieces. It is bolted together and there is a drain plug at the bottom, with a fill plug about halfway up the case.

Some folks have commented on a pan gasket and such. The only gasket you need is the crush washer for the drain plug, and quite frankly mine was in such good condition I saved it in my tool box.

 

I wonder if the Prius should have oil changes depending on hours of use like aircraft? I think others have brought up the idea before and it makes more sense to me than miles. From what I have read of the various ECUs it would be fairly easy to keep track of if Toyota wanted to do it. Maybe that will come with plug in hybrids and other modifications that make the car less like an ordinary auto with ICE, transmission etc. There is no reason for the Prius to do some of the things it does except not to confuse the peasants. I remember the old SAAB that free wheeled after you had gone around a few corners it became second nature to provide your own breaking. FWIW

 

That is one thing I really miss about my 2000 GMC Sierra SLT: with the motor off, press and hold the Odo button. First the display would show total km's (Miles in the U.S.), then after 5 seconds it would show total engine hours.

I changed the oil based on the Oil Life Monitor, and it would never let me put more than 100 hours on the oil in city driving. A few summer trips of all highway driving I could put on 180 hours no problem.

 

I had a bad experience at a Shell Oil & Lube with my Prius, they overfilled the oil and the car shut down. Had it towed to the dealer who cleaned the entire intake assembly and refilled the oil, put a new 12v battery in (the other died by me trying to restart) and had the Shell guy pay for it (under threat of a suit) The dealer attested to the overfill and helped. I have taken it only to the dealer since, as I understand the Prius is a quirky car to fill with oil and can easily be overfilled.