Good bye Prius 2010-2017

I got my civic earlier this morning. Black interior. Looks great. Car salesman was very polite and not pushy. We agreed on a fair price. I know they need to make money and get paid on commission as well so we were able to negotiate on something that works for both of us and I traded in the Prius. It was fair for everyone all around.

The new Hondas look great. If you are bored, go to a Honda dealership after hours if you don't want to be haggled. The 2017 Civics and Accords look very stylish and slick. Even the hatchback civic looks sharp.

The Mazda-3 is ugly as a dog.

Anyways, hopefully this makes everyone more aware. I'd hate to see someone's engine get shot over this oil issue. I can assure you after the powertrain warranty is up you are only your own............if your engine gets trashed over the oil issue ALL the money you have in fuel economy will be lost in engine repairs.

 

The sun is already set here so it's dark outside. I'll have to take pictures another time. I got a 4 door Civic Sedan with a black interior. It's the EX. The LX is the base, and the EX-T is identical all around except the engine has a turbo. There's one more version above that I believe EX-TL or something.

These are not actual photos, but pretty much what I got. It's the lunar silver with black interior, 4 dr sedan.

 

Maybe. Toyota has a larger car portfolio than Honda, but I'm sure they employ all the same mfg strategies. I actually used to work for Honda over 10 years ago. Not at a dealership, but the actual manufacturing plant in Ohio. They made the Accords and Acura TLs at the time I worked there. In fact while I was browsing the lot today, I saw the accord that was listed as being made at the place I worked.

Nothing against the Big 3 and I think their quality is in line with the Japanese, esp after the bankruptcy in 09, but I'm not really into anything they are selling. The GM Volt looks cool if I were to get a plug in hybrid, but I'd never spend the money they are asking for the car, even after the discounts and whatnot.

 

I really don't care about the loss on the Prius. If someone picks it up later on and it runs to 900,000 miles I'm happy for them.

Prius is gone and I consider this discussion to be over. I like the Civic, it's new and meets my needs.


Not to mention based on my driving conditions it's pointless to have a hybrid anyways. I drive on the California freeways 99% of the time so the hybrid system is a feature being underutilized.

 

I really don't know what the condition the car is in 100%. It could be nothing, it could be serious. I don't know. That's why I sold it.

Your location is also SoCal so you know how these freeways are already. It's either dead stops in traffic or extremely fast pace driving. It just depends on the day you drive. I work long hours, so I generally leave at "non-peak" times so I can shorten the driving on the road I need to do.

With a Prius (not sure if it is the same with other), the only fuel savings you are getting hitting the highways is primarily the weight reduction due to the usage of more aluminum vs. steel.

 

The way I understood it was that it was bad rings and a leaking timing cap. Both would be fixed if the engine was rebuilt.

It is certainly possible that oil was merely leaking and falling on a hot portion of the engine somewhere inside, but not likely even though I did not have it examined again a second time. I really don't know 100% what condition the car was sold in aside from what I noticed and was communicated to me from the dealer I went to.

The way I found out about the issue was that this light kept flashing on random turns and braking and it wouldn't stay on. I don't know why it was engineered like this but it was at least 3 weeks before I could actually read what it was saying.....I fill air in the tires etc, etc,....


so when I finally saw what it was, I opened the hood and I could immediately smell burning oil. At the same time, I pulled the dipstick and there was nothing. After 10 wipes then putting it back in it looked like there was maybe 1 drop on the dipstick so it was clearly low on oil for sometime.


Also, the engine was making strange noises for those 3 weeks. Again, I didn't know what it was so I attributed it to low quality gasoline then I got it at another place as I assumed it was just knocking.

When I finally saw the message, the car had been driven about 6,000 miles since the last oil change which appeared to dry out the engine. I can't tell with the leaking as there is a splash guard underneath if it was also leaking I didn't see any immediately but it could have been a slow bleed.

And the knocking of the engine likely due to low lubrication since I drive so much I probably drove at least 1,000 with the engine doing that which I don't know what condition it is in or if it damaged it.

I personally don't know why Toyota does not have the warning message stay on longer and have the low engine oil pressure trigger sooner.

So with all that said, that's why I bailed. The dealership has professionals who know more about this than me and can fix it for much cheaper than me.