Toyota Increases Warranty on Replacement Prius Hybrid Battery. Now 3 years, Unlimited miles

Ok, understood. Yea, I called 6 dealerships in the Bay Area in CA, all of them claimed that they don't have USED options to sell. They only are selling NEW and that's it.

 

don't they also offer new cells in new cases, and new cells in old cases?

 

I have asked JeffD (jdenenberg) about this and he said that the new cells in old cases was only a short limited time trial in CA. He said they stopped doing that.

 

interesting, thanks!

 

I wonder if anyone has lifted the cover off a -84 refurbished battery, and checked the date codes on the modules.

I do not know whether the refurbishing process involves putting in new modules, or older ones (and, if older, whether those have been reconditioned in any way).

-Chap

 

Right! "New Vehicle Dealers" should (by their contract with the manufacturer) sell ONLY parts that are obtained thru the OEM parts channel. Not one OEM sells "used" parts thru their distribution channels, but most, if not all offer "rebuilt" (remanufactured, rebuilt, reconditioned, etc) parts at a lower price point than new.

New means ALL new materials.

Used means just that, a part with experience, removed from a vehicle to be installed on another. Nothing more than a visual inspection of condition is generally done.

Rebuilt... well there is an entirely different kettle of very smelly old fish.

 

I'm a little late to this thread but better late than never. Someone did purchase a -84 battery last year and they did take off the cover and find that the pack had remanufactured, used modules which was a big disappointment for those hoping for a cheaper replacement option.

My Toyota dealer is selling refurbished traction batteries | Page 2 | PriusChat

 

Thanks, I guess I should remember that thread, it looks like I posted in it.

The main takeaways I get from that other thread are:

• A look at some module serial numbers dated them to 2006
• A discussion with KBI (believed to have handled the module remanufacturing) reflected them saying "the protocol they are using to recondition the cells was Toyotas/Panasonic mandated and approved".
• A poster wondered "what KBI is doing to the modules; if anything, that makes them confident" and suspected it could be nothing more than cherry-picking.
• A later poster wondered whether electrolyte replacement might be involved.

I am thinking that last poster might be on to something, given that Toyota and Matsushita (Panasonic) filed a patent in 2002 on doing exactly that and it's been discussed in threads here on PriusChat for years, and KBI claims to be following a Toyota/Panasonic procedure.

That would also fit with my past experience suggesting Toyota doesn't put their name and a -84 remanufactured number on anything that doesn't meet quite exacting standards.

But this complicates the question. If the serial numbers aren't the whole story, we might have skeptics until somebody buys a -84 pack, disassembles it, and weighs the modules (and/or looks for signs of re-done plastic welding). The patent seems to suggest they might be on the order of 9 g heavier than identical but depleted modules (though that figure appears in an example, so I'm not sure where it would fall in the real range seen in practice. Some of the PriusChat experiment threads came up with larger differences).

I don't know if the tare weight of the rest of the battery case and components would be consistent enough to pick out a ~ 9 g / module difference times 28 modules just by weighing the whole assembled shebang....

-Chap

 

Haha I shall be your anecdote then. I have a new replacement hybrid battery in my Prius gen 2 from Toyota that is currently dying after less than 20k miles, so I am trying to make Toyota honor their warranty.

 

Interesting.

Please do post back with your results. And good luck!

 

What codes is it throwing? Some failures occur inside the case but it's not the battery cells per se but rather the electronics; often a connector that is slowly burning out or the small, fragile wiring harness for the sensors.

GOOD LUCK!

 

Hi Fotomoto,

Its throwing the code P0A9C that has to do with the hybrid battery temperature sensors, but Toyota says it doesn't carry/sell the sensors for replacement and is pushing me to pay for another new HV battery (which I'm not willing to do considering I only got 20K miles out of it and replacing the battery again exceeds my car's value). Others on Prius Chat think the sensor could be indicating a dying battery - do you have any experience with this code?

 

Between not honouring the warranty, and proposing to toss the battery for defective temperature sensor (if that is indeed the problem), that's not very good "corporate" behavior.

 

I agree! It seems so wasteful to toss a perfectly good battery for a temperature sensor issue, and very detrimental to the environment (not to mention my pocketbook). I tested the battery temps 1-3 at length w/an OBD with the car in park and on the freeway, and the temps are fine and the battery holds a good charge, so I'm guessing it's a faulty sensor.

 

My first thought when somebody in California reports that their new Toyota battery failed after 20K is that they probably got suckered into one of the rebuilt batteries that those dealers were selling a few years back. After seeing the trouble code I think maybe that's not the case. The 3 temperature are clipped to the bottom of the modules, one in the center and one on each end. The one on the end opposite the ECU is easy to bump loose when handling the battery. It doesn't normally break anything but instead of being clipped right up against the module it hangs down an inch or so and this will cause a much lower temperature reading on that sensor compared to the other two. This difference is what causes the trouble code to be set.

The way to check this would be to drive the car around for 30 minutes with plenty of stop and go stuff. This should get the battery good and warm and hopefully get the cooling fan running. Use your OBD tool to check the 3 battery temps. If TB3 is reading considerably lower than 1 and 2 (say 10 degrees) then that's your problem.

The easy fix would be to take the trim out and remove the exhaust ducting from the battery. Once you do that you should be able to see the sensor and snap it back on where it's supposed to be. Even for a first timer this wouldn't take more than a few hours. This doesn't require opening the battery or touching anything potentially dangerous.

Now is this Toyota's fault and should they take responsibility? Absolutely. Will they acknowledge the mistake that they made? Unlikely

The funny thing about these batteries is that when they are new they don't get nearly as hot as when they are older. This means that a tech can do something dumb like forget to put a cooling duct on or knock a temp sensor loose and many years can pass without it causing a detectable problem. By the time codes set the dealer will say "It worked fine for 2 years, clearly we didn't do anything wrong" and you will have to pay for their mistake.

It should look like this.


Yours probably looks like this.