I need to disable my TPMS system

BEFORE I START:

PLEASE DON'T BOTHER TO REPLY IF YOUR SOLUTION CONTAINS ANY OF THE FOLLOWING:

- "Just ignore the light"
- "Black tape over the light"
- "I don't even notice the light"
- "Put the TPMS sensors in PVC pipe under 30 PSI and stuff it on the car someplace"
​

I own 6 rims for my 2013 Prius V, and rotate them a lot. I also believe in full size spares. I drove for Uber in the pre-pandemic days. Having a full size spare behind the garage means that when a tire blows out on a Friday night, I can limp home on the donut. In 20 minutes, I can go back to driving on a real tire. The tire can get fixed on my day off.

I have read a lot of threads filled with suggestions of ignoring the light or black tape. Having warning light or a piece of tape on the dash as an Uber driver looks unprofessional, and is a non-solution. Putting the TPMS sensors inside a PVC pipe with 2 end caps actually works. It won't work for me because I would have to buy 4 new TPMS sensors, and then have to pay get those sensors added to the computer.

My daughter hit a curb, and ripped a hole in the side of one of the front tires, and I am getting $40 back for the Sears road hazard warranty on that tire. The other front tire has at least 25K left on it, and one of the two wheels in the back of the garage has sidewall damage. The logical thing to do is to put the two new tires on the two wheels that have sidewall damage. I was informed that will cost an extra $25 for TPMS service to add the non-current wheel to the computer in the prius. But I am already paying $25+ to replace the TPMS sensors with new ones, isn't that computer voodoo included with the new TPMS sensors? Apparently not.

OK I have had enough, I don't need TPMS. I already removed the wheel locks when I lost the stupid wheel lock key. That required the purchase of 4 cheap 1/2 inch drive 19mm sockets ($15 total) , and pounding them onto the wheel locks with a hammer. I then bought 4 new lug nuts. I am now free from the tyranny of wheel locks. Should have done it when I first bought the car, and still had the key.

THE SOLUTION I AM LOOKING FOR HELP WITH:
I have been reading a lot of threads about TPMS on toyota vehicles. Buried deep in the mire of all the not funny jokes about black tape and ignoring the lights, I have found an occasional mention of actually useful solution to permanently disable the TPMS system itself!

The solution is to find the TPMS module, which is stuffed someplace up inside the dashboard. Apparently, there is a pink wire that comes out of this module. On some Toyotas, If you cut it, and tie it to 12 volts, freedom from the TPMS light will be achieved. On some posts, the pink wire is shorted to ground, or another wire, or +5 Volts. You can get an idea of what this module looks like by searching eBay for "TOYOTA PRIUS TPMS TIRE PRESSURE MODULE 89769-47030".

What I need help with is:
1) Where is the module located?
2) Does anyone have access to the tech info to verify what actually needs to happen to the pink wire?

I made an appointment in three days to have the tires installed. If I can successfully disable the TPMS, I also won't have to buy new TPMS sensors!

 

You may have misunderstood what I was looking for. I want to go "Old School" when it comes to my tire pressure. I have been driving for 36 years, and never needed a light to tell me that the pressure is low. A digital tire gauge lives in the console. I always check the tire pressure at each oil change, or if a tire doesn't look right.

I really need to get access to Techstream. Prior to this car, I always paid about $125 for the factory manual whenever I bought a new car (right after I bought a full size spare). I would be willing to do the same for the Prius, but the rental of an online service is too expensive for someone who works on their own car.

BTW: I too am "Outside Philly", near Willow Grove, PA

 

THANKS Georgina R. !

You have given me the information I was looking for!

So I won't need to pay an extra $25 to have a wheel added to the computer. Even better, I no longer need to pay for 2 new TPMS sensor kits, saving me another $25 plus tax.

 

I paid $129 for the Factory Manual on CD for my 2001 Chrysler Voyager in 2005. TechAuthority sells Chrysler manuals, which are not very good. It came as one very large password protected .pdf, which makes it very slow to search or use. Still better info than a than a Haynes manual. I miss the paper manuals that I bought for my 80's-90's Hondas from the dealer. Those manuals were extremely well written, and the diagrams actually made sense.

When I looked into renting access to the Prius V manuals in 2017, I read that downloading all the manuals for a single car would take about 30 hours. In order to get that with one rental, you would have to do it over a weekend. I bought the Prius V specifically to drive for Lyft, so I had no free weekends to devote to doing this. Then I had the concern about how to organize all the .pdf files I saved, so that the hyperlinks in one .pdf would open the correct location in another .pdf. Seemed like too much work at the time.

 

Most web browsers do the best they can, which isn't much. They are basically doing the same thing as hitting control-p and sending the page to a printer, that is actually a .PDF file. Links within the page might be saved, but the page's relationship to any other page is lost. Without experiencing TIS for myself, I don't know how much of a problem this actually would be.

The "subscription manual" model is meant for people who do repair different Toyotas as their day job. They need up to date information on whatever Toyota is in the shop that day. For this the TIS subscription is priced accordingly. I (as a driveway mechanic) would be willing to pay a few hundred dollars for a snapshot of TIS for my specific vehicle, so I have it when I need it. That is not an option (or is it?)

 

Silly question: Is that pinout illustration as viewed from the plug side, or the side with the wires coming out?

 

I got a close up photo of the wire side of the connector. I noticed a'7' on one corner with the turquoiseish green wire, and the '12' on the other corner with the blue wire. I will post photos when completed.

 

WELL IT SEEMS That shorting pins 5 & 7 DID NOT DISABLE THE TPMS!

I found the connector, and found the relevant pins. I created and inserted a shorting paper clip. I bought two tires and had one of the new tires mounted on a rim that was not in the computer. The light stayed on for a few days, then went out. Because of the pandemic, the Prius did not spend much time away from its normal parking space for a few weeks, and the light stayed out. I then did a five hour drive away from the house, and the light came back on.

Note: I stored the rim that had been registered with the TPMS system behind the garage, which is about 100 feet from the location where I park the Prius. Apparently this is close enough for the TPMS system to turn the light off.

When I inserted the paper clip, I noticed that pin 6 is the "pink" wire. Also, I have noticed that the Prius V shares a lot of chassis components with the RAV-4 (exampled the Radio / Information center is from the Rav4, not a gen 3 prius). Perhaps I should go back to the YouTube video showing how to do it on a RAV4 (that involved shorting the pink wire). Another point: After inserting the shorting clip, I plugged the connector back in. Maybe I need to leave the plug unplugged for the shorting clip to work.

BTW: what is the purpose of the button under the steering column that resets the TPMS?

 

OK, I found this sticky on a Rav 4 forum:

How to disable TPMS (How to turn off TPMS light) | Toyota RAV4 Forums

It looks really close to what I am seeing in my 2013 Prius, except the wire colors are all different. Also, the module in my Prius V is deep red, not green. I got really nervous, because the module has "ABS" stamped on it in several places. That is to identify the type of plastic, and is not "Anti-lock Braking System".

Here are the colors on my 12 pin connector:

Pin 1: Yellow (fat wire)
Pin 2: Purple (thin wire)
Pin 3: Medium Blue (thin wire)
Pin 4: Gray (thin wire)
Pin 5: Yellow (thin wire)
Pin 6: Pink (fat wire)

Pin 7: Pale Green (fat wire) [ground?]
Pin 8: No Connection
Pin 9: Black / White (fat wire)
Pin 10: Pink (thin wire)
Pin 11: Brown (fat wire)
Pin 12: Light Blue (thin wire)

Note: There are two pink wires and two yellow wires! Connecting pins 5 to 7 probably will ground the thin yellow wire on pin 5. That appears to have done nothing to disable the TPMS on my car!​

From reading that forum post, the consensus is that the Pink wire is connected to the TPMS LED on the dashboard. If the pink wire is open, or held to ground, the TPMS light is on. If the pink wire is held somewhere between 4-6 volts, the TMPS light will be off. The trick is:

1) find a wire that has +5 volts all the time, and short the correct pink wire to it (perhaps disconnecting the pink wire from the module), OR
2) find a wire that has +12 volts all the time, and connect a 3.3K ohm resister between it and the pink wire.​

The Rav4World thread claims that the Red wire is +5 volts provided by the module, to power the TPMS antenna mounted on the roof. I don't have a red wire. Perhaps the larger of the two pink wires is supposed to be red, and is my correct wire.

What I am looking for is:
information to identify what each of the 11 wires do on my 2013 Prius V which has a deep red TPMS module with the part umber: 89769 -47040. I'd rather have information up front, and not damage anything with a wrong assumption.

Anybody with access to Techstream able to help me?