My brother in law is from Montreal Canada where they salt the road during the winter snow storms. He and his wife are visiting me in Florida for a few months and he drove down with his 2016 Prius. Anyway, he ran over something in the road and knocked the exhaust pipe heat shield off and I crawled underneath the car to reattach it. In doing so, I noticed that what I think is the rear brace was nearly rusted completely alway. It is a round tube that is a foot or so behind the rear axle that is bolted to the frame on each side of the car. It looks like it just plain steel that is not even painted or galvanized. A BUNCH of other frame parts are also rusted but they look structurally sound. He took it to the local dealer who charged a $110 'diagnosis' fee to basically look at the part and say 'yes it is rusted' and it will cost over $1,200 to replace. Besides being ripped off for the diagnosis, in looking at the web I can find what I think is the correct part for anywhere from $150 to $225, so the labor part of it seems really high to me. How critical is this part and how difficult is it to replace? I do not have a car lift, just a set of drive up ramps, but I have just about every other tool in the universe including air tools.
