Why so many unsold 2017 Prime models ?

that should get you to 10 years, unless there is a design problem we don't know a bout yet, like gen 3.

 

Yep. Me too. I will drive this sucker to the ground. Or at least 125k miles. I went ahead and got their extended warranty just for piece of mind. It includes everything bumper to bumper. Only thing I would have to pay for is the annual emissions inspection in NY state.

 

Probably because they are so aggressive and too sharp for those of us that grew up with the prior generations of Prius! I truly despise the redesign! Plus to get the worthwhile upgrades you have to go to an Advanced which is really pricey!

 

How much for the Prime??

What design problem??

 

When I inquired about a 'plugin' at a local dealer most had no idea what I was asking them. Finally found someone who knew more. He said they only have seen two all year and one customer still has one on order and waiting. He said maybe toyota wasn't making many, No they all all stuck in SoCal !!

 

oil from the blowby clogs the egr and can cause the head gasket to fail around 100k

see @danlatu 's thread 'oil catch can'. it can be solved, but not by toyota

 

No, the southern Toyota distributor is independent of corporate, and they want nothing to do with the Prime. Many wanting the car in that region ended up buying from a Northeast state.

The fix in the gen4 was to take cooler exhaust gases from further downstream. Hopefully, this works out long term.

 

May want to check into their policies. Such as support, parts and warranties. Lots of first gen teslas coming out of warranty or for those in any kinda accident most are totaled because of cost. Also nightmares with different things failing like door handles, etc. $$$ for teslas to fix and if not in warranty or a rebuild there is no support. Also reports of tesla shutting off stuff like supercharging, updates, nav , etc. for not having them fix something. Check out rich rebuilds on YT channel. Good info there!

 

I almost purchased in MD myself!

 

Ask me next year.

Bob Wilson

 

First in line!! Remember me .......

What did you end up doing?

You could buy four more at that price and sell them for $20K and have yours for free then!! Let me know!!

 

careful what you repeat about tesla. a lot of these reports are coming from people who are trying to dive the stock price down, or oil industry shills. they mix enough truth with the lies to make it believable.
although there have been problems (like every car company) they have come a long way.

 

Specifically, the problem is the independent Toyota distributor for the Southeast Region, who doesn't want anything to do with these new-fangled low-profit-margin plugins. Toyota Dealerships in the southeastern states are required to go through this distributor. Toyota set up this arrangement back when Toyota was trying to break into the U.S. market, and they still seem to be stuck with it.

 

In fairness, Southeast did put out a Prius commercial that showed the car like a normal car while Toyota was still doing the artsy, cute ads.

Toyota, and others, have incentives for the dealers that would cover the lower margin. They are worried about the loss of service revenue with plug ins.

 

Lot of these the guy is actually calling tesla in the video and you hear their non-supported response! Can't beat that for straight from the horses mouth so to speak

 

Why, because their mechanics wouldn't know how to work on them??

 

no, because there's not much to work on, starting with oil changes, air filters and etc.

 

It's true. It's a little bit like maintaining a computer... run diagnostics, swap out boards. Tough stuff is little things like cooling fans which can pose mechanical problems which don't always show up on system diagnostics.

Even so, there's no reason to believe that various other components like brakes, tires, A/C, wipers, seat adjusters, mirror adjusters, door locks, window motors, mechanical switches, etc. would be any less in need of maintenance and repair than on any other car. Although, because the ICE is so lightly used, there is probably much less degradation of exhaust system components.

Other service intensive components are the many of sensors which can become damaged or knocked out of alignment.

Parts logistics is now simplified by over-night just-in-time FedEx, thus freeing dealership service departments from carrying large inventories of seldomly needed parts. The much bigger problem is training service techs to diagnose and repair novel systems and components.

Above and beyond the usual work done by the body shops, minor collision damage may now require dealership recalibration of things like adaptive cruise control and lane departure alert.

And, Right-to-Repair laws aside, many of these tasks require specialized tools and service equipment beyond just having access to service manuals, diagnostics and the ability to purchase OEM parts.



Sadly, the day of the infallibly reliable vehicle has not yet arrived -- even though the day of the shade tree mechanic may have already passed.

 

Corporate provides the training, but much of the dealerships service department's work is basic, routine maintenance. There is simply isn't much of that for a BEV. The oil change cash cow is gone. So a dealership or distributor could start resisting the PHEVs before the BEVs arrive.

Even then, hybrids reduce the required maintenance. Toyota sticks the Prius and prime with the same oil change interval as their traditional cars, but the Volt could go two years between changes. Regenerative braking reduces brake wear, and even more so in a PHEV with its larger battery. So another common service job is rarer for the dealer.

Accident repair costs have gone up for any car with advanced safety systems because of the sensors, but many dealers aren't doing that work to begin with.

 

>... the mitigations:
> Front Defrost - turns on ICE. Use heater with windshield direction which is fast enough.
> I am an old man less tolerant of silly and arbitrary control laws.

Me, too. 95% of my trips are under 5 miles, and therefore in summer, I basically NEVER use the ICE. It's very frustrating if, here in New England, I have to drive around in hybrid mode from October through April. I bought a plug-in so I wouldn't have to do that. Aren't there any other work arounds or some kind of really comprehensive manual/description of how to deal with this problem?