How many years do you expect the electronics to last in your Prius?

I expect the electronics to last as long as the rest of the car and to be completely outdated when it is time for the new one.

I've read more stories here about traction battery failures than other electronic failures. Yup, electronics are expensive so don't fry them.

The guy in the story you mentioned was lucky and as I remember it, they spent more than an hour on the battery.

Diagnostic time doesn't pay. Swapping parts does.

 

shouldn't be a problem for the next 10 years. i haven't ever had an electronics issue.

 

Techs at the dealer are limited by what Toyota says to do. There is nothing to be done to the battery. It is considered non-servicable by the OEM. Ditto modules. There are places which can repair them, but most places, and all dealers replace with new.

Be thankful you bought a Toyota, where module failure is rare, and they are re-programable. Some manufacturers make the modules where they can only be programmed once. If you have a failure, and the OEM doesn't make it anymore...no used parts for you, and your 2005 car is now a brick on wheels.

FWIW, 14 year old Prii are still all over the place in these parts, and sell for way more than any comparable 14 year old car.

 

some have had the mfd carp out.

 

If I had a fish in my dash, I'd want it out, too.

 

My '05 is still going strong,,,and I hope my '12 C is just as reliable.

SM-G900V ?

 

2013 C2. Hopefully 10-15 years. My other car is a '92 with no electrical problems but there's obviously a lot more going on electronically speaking with a 2013 car.

 

I bought an Apple ][ in 1978, and I asked whether to turn it on and off every time I used it or leave it on all the time. Woz said that if I turn it off and on the thermal expansion should cause failure in 30 years. If I left it on all the time, charge migration should cause failure in 30 years. It is still fine, I still have it, although to be honest I use it less lately.

 

I give dealerships a pass on not troubleshooting down to the component level.
Although they charge by the hour, they get PAID by the job and component level diagnostics can be tricky.
Traction battery replacements done by the dealer have come way down over the past few years because people are discovering that the battery is connectorized, and can be replaced fairly easily by a motivated home mechanic.
Market forces respond slowly, but they DO respond.

Almost every major component in a Prius can be bought 'gently used' on the market.
Or?
You can just trade out cars every 4-6 years and live with a lifetime of car payments.

Your call.

FWIW?
Over my five years of Priusdom I haven't seen a very high failure rate for the on-board electronics.
I'm guessing that they're designed with a 10/250000 life cycle, so the statistics Ninjas will probably snap the chalk line somewhere in the 6-7 year time frame.

You want a car to break often enough to keep your sales force happy, but rarely enough to keep your customers thinking that your car is reliable.
Toyota is pretty good at this.
If their dealership network were a little bit better, they would be WORLD CLASS.

So.....Put me down for a MTBF of 7 years.
YMMV

 

Mine too is going strong by the grace of God.

 

Most of the things that can go wrong simply cannot economically be diagnosed and repaired to the component level at retail shops. The needed equipment and technical expertise are very high, and the low level of demand per shop simply cannot support it. On the stuff I designed for a high price / high performance electronic test and measurement company, much of that work as reasonable only at the design center or factory. Other facilities would just swap boards.

Once a bad component or contact was found, repair could be quite cheap and easy (in those days, of thru-hole R's and Cs and 16-pin DIPs.). The real cost was the expertise and equipment to find it, easily exceeding the cost of a board swap.

I'm was an electrical engineer. The wires, connectors, motors, switches, incandescent lamps, etc., were 'electrics'. The modules, displays, LEDs, LCDs, etc. were 'electronics'. The batteries were 'chemistry'.