Battery Questions

The traction battery will very slowly lose charge while it is stored. Don't know if two months is long enough to do any harm. Is your roomy able to read the MFD to see what the state of charge is for the traction battery? It is probably a bad idea to let the 12-volt sit there dead. Is it possible to hook up a battery charger to it while it sits in the garage? The jump point under the hood should do for charging up the 12-volt. Even if the 12-volt is mostly dead it could sit there on life support until you come home and can deal with it.

 

The 12V auxiliary battery has a label warning against using a charging current in excess of ~4A, so if a charger is used I suggest that it should be set to a low current position. Also if the battery is quite dead, the charger may refuse to provide power to the battery for safety reasons (not knowing if it is connected to a battery or not). In that case it would be necessary to use jump cables (observing correct battery polarity of course) or else install a new 12V battery.

Regarding the traction battery, Toyota recommends starting the car and leaving it READY for 30 minutes every two months, when in storage. See TSB PG007-03.

If you leave the car for a total of three months, its probably not the end of the world assuming that you started the storage period with the MFD SOC gauge in the green or blue zone. If you started with one pink bar then you might be in trouble.

 

Expect to replace the 12V battery. Next trip, instruct the person left to care for the car and watch them do it a few times to see that they do it right and don't walk away afterwards with lights on or doors open.

I would *not* trust any Prius-inexperienced person to jumpstart it or connect a charger. If they reverse the polarity it can do thousands of dollars of damage to the electrical system (wiring harnesses, computers, inverter).

 

+1. Even worse are the tools who hook the jumper cables up to the car, then briefly touch the clamps together and make a spark, to "prove" there is a good connection. Do that to a Prius, expect bad things to happen

 

Your course of action is reasonable. US dealers will charge from ~$110 to ~$160 for the correct Toyota battery sold over the counter.

 

The world has tilted on its axis by two degrees, and because of your friends actions he has caused global warming to increase, it's all your fault too!

I would ask him to put the 12V aux battery on a float charger and leave it alone. Just make sure the polarity is correct.

good luck.....you opened up Pandoras box by letting this happen...how could you?:mod: the world will never be the same.....darn
PS dont have him try to start the car while the 12V battery is hooked up to the float or trickle charger.

 

Why not have a new 12 volt battery fitted now and ask your room mate to be careful about doors and lights. Then the car will be ready to drive when you get home, no hassles. Use guilt to get your room mate to let the battery guy into the car and warn the battery guy he can bugger the works if he puts the battery in wrong.

 

The 12V auxiliary battery will be totally dead after that period of time.

If your traction battery SOC was registering blue or green bars the last time the car was running, then the traction battery should be OK after the storage period has elapsed. Some Prius owners store their cars for 6 months at a time, moving back and forth between their summer and winter homes.

You don't have to worry about harm to other parts of the car at this point.

 

I left my Prius for 5 months (was expecting 1-2 months). The 12v battery was dead but a jump start did the trick and it's been fine since. The traction battery had all blue segments lit when it was left and the same number 5 months later.

 

Since you have a 2008 you should be OK regarding warranty coverage of the battery.

 

Be careful what kind of battery charger you use. I use Battery Tender, I normally leave the charger connected if the car is sitting idle. My neighbor's battery was low on charge, he took it to a local auto shop who said no problem charging it. They put it on a typical charger, the battery went bad. A new battery at the dealer is $300. These are gel batteries. My battery was idle for over 4 months and I hooked it up to a Battery tender, it took about 3 days , but my battery is doing good.

Good luck

 

Well, Pickering isn't Winnipeg as far as cold temps go, but it gets cold enough. I even block the grille on my FJ, it sure is nice to have good heat at -40 C.

My dealership has never said anything about blocking the grille on either vehicle. Perhaps if I drove in on a +35 C day in August, they might be concerned

As far as "overheating" the inverter, ask that tech if the dash would light up like a christmas tree if you even got close to overheating.

 

If you have a garage to park in, and anticipate being away on business a lot, do what I did and hardwire the VDC Electronics Battery Minder charge harness directly to the 12 vdc battery.

All my equipment is kept safely charged by Battery Minders. I can expect to be away 1-3 weeks on business, the batteries last a lot longer if kept properly charged. Here is how the charge harness is hooked up to the Prius 12 vdc battery

http://i653.photobucket.com/albums/uu256/jayman_photo/Prius%20Stuff/Closeupchargeharness.jpg

How the cord is run out the rear hatch

http://i653.photobucket.com/albums/uu256/jayman_photo/Prius Stuff/Chargeharnessouthatch.jpg

The hardest part was removing that large red plastic cover over the positive post. I just about started yelling the F Bomb at it