That type of driving, heavy urban use, is the hardest on battery life. 2fast4u, who has 450,000+ miles of mainly hwy use, is still on his original HV battery. I consider the car in this thread to have 600,000 miles on the chassis. I wonder if he's still on the original drivers seat?
What makes you think different now? Tuffnutz sounds pretty awesome, but I'd wager he has a better idea today how to pick used traction batteries and recondition modules than he did two years ago.
Just had the car in for another oil change 603,405. He bought the car used with 6,000 miles and the traction battery was already replaced. (I don't know why). He then had to replace his first battery at 360,000 miles. It is still going strong.
6,000.. Perhaps an accident? Wow 360,000 I could live with that! It would take me 29 years to get that many miles at my current rate.
603k miles !!! Anyone ever uses the term 'throw away car' on Prius, I'll be using this statistic on them!!! :cheer2:
Great point! It wasn't as if TuffNutz was going out and getting a new battery, he was getting a used one (with who knows how many tens of thousands of miles on it). Thanks for posting this thread TuffNutz!
Congrats to you and your customer! The repair is definitely costs beneficial. Especially in his case where he needs a workhorse. I think you mentioned before that the customer is some sort of courier?
Gee, 6000 miles. I wonder if the original owner didn't drive it much, so the original pack often sat with low SOC, which might have damaged the original pack. It was probably recoverable, but the owner and/or repairer probably didn't have the knowledge or patience to recover it. For used hybrids, low mileage is good, but very low mileage is probably not a good thing.
My experience with two 2001 Priuses. Main battery life is about 8 years. Both cars required a replacement in 2009. One had 197,000 miles, the other 126,000 miles. Is that why the warranty changed from 10 years or 100,000 miles to 8 years or 100,000 miles in 2004? Catalytic converters required replacement at 153,000 miles. One car also required both O2 sensors and ECM. Still not fixed and may require MAF sensor and throttle body. I had a courier job from Oct 2007 until May 2009 and put an additional 97,000 miles on the first car during that period. It is now at 230,000 and has all sorts of electronic problems. Unless you have a mechanic who is an eletronic miracle worker, I advise Prius owners to buy late models that still have a warranty and trade just before the warranty expires. Otherwise the interconnectedness of the electronic system will eat you up.
I have the exact opposite opinion. I have found the electronics to be extremely reliable and love the fact that older model used parts are readily available.
I own a Gen II 2006 with 286,000+ miles. Original everything. Battery runs great, engine runs great. Great car!
My experience is that the HV battery life is around 8 years. My 2001 HV battery failed in January 2009 at 197,000 miles. My sister-in-law's 2001 HV battery failed in September 2009 at 97,000 miles. Original warranty for the hybrid system for 2001 - 2003 was 100.000 miles or 10 years. For 2004 and later it changed to 100.000 miles or 8 years.
You will be due a HV replacement this year (car will be 8 years old) although the Gen II batteries are different and may last longer than Gen 1.
My Gen One had it's main battery fail at around 147K miles. I finally traded it in with 204K miles on it. It was a great car, however, I much prefer the Gen Three with the larger 1.8 Liter motor.