Every shop marks up parts excessively, they make no money otherwise on those easy jobs.
Every shop marks up parts excessively, they make no money otherwise on those easy jobs.
That interior was savagely attacked by small kids and never cleaned up. Ugh. I should however mention that tan interior is total crap. You look at it wrong and suddenly a stain appears. Source: good friend with a 2004 Prius.
Good Lerd that interior.
clutchsmoke wrote: That interior was savagely attacked by small kids and never cleaned up. Ugh. I should however mention that tan interior is total crap. You look at it wrong and suddenly a stain appears. Source: good friend with a 2004 Prius.
Close- one small child and two adult-sized (and aged) children, judging from my interactions with the previous owners. 
Looks like they birthed a child in that back seat 
Had the chance to get the car up in the air yesterday and check out the brakes, suspension, and everything else under the car as well.
Front brakes look good- the right rotor was, as I was told, replaced with a new one. Since I don't have any clue whether they replaced the pads at the same time, I'm going to replace them anyway- I think it's worth the $10 to be able to say definitively that it has new brake pads. Will install the new driver's side rotor too, and will probably clean off and paint the calipers while I'm at it since I have silver caliper paint handy and it will make the front wheels look a bit cleaner.
Rear drums themselves don't look terribly bad, but like the front pads I'm going to replace them anyway- both together are only about $30, and they'll look MUCH nicer than the old ones and along with replacing the shoes (which do need replacing, though perhaps not as badly as the shop implied they did...) and hardware will let me say that the brakes have been completely re-done.
The suspension seems to be OK from what I can tell- I'm not seeing any sign of leaking struts/shocks, and the car passes the 'bounce' test. Would new ones be better? Almost certainly- but that's several hundred dollars in parts that if I don't need to spend, I won't.
The PO had said they thought there was an exhaust leak, but in looking over the pipes under the car I'm not seeing any noticeable holes or breaks. It's hard to tell with the engine running as well since the exhaust sound seems to be about even all around the car. I'll be keeping an eye on it though, since one of the codes that has come up several times has been P0420: Catalyst Not Performing Efficiently.
General condition of the underside is good- with only being 9 years old I wouldn't expect to see much rust and I don't- there really isn't any except on the body in a few places where the paint was damaged, and that I'll be fixing and touching up.
Pulled the MAF and cleaned it, and cleaned out the throttle body too. If I had to do it again I'd probably pull the airbox off completely to make it easier, but it worked well enough as is. Hopefully the MAF & TB cleaning will eliminate the IAC code that it has thrown a few times.
Oh, and one more reason for me to not like tire shops- they replaced the lug nut that was cross-threaded... with one that is a) needs a different size socket than every other one on the car and b) is a different finish (brass vs. the chrome of the stock ones). So now, I need to either source a single factory lug nut or do something like put a set of locking lug nuts on it. I won't lie- in some ways this could be good, since tracking down a lug nut is an almost passable excuse to make a run up to the salvage yard. 
I am going to need to track down, either used from parts cars (sadly there are NONE in the salvage yards nearby...) or from online several bumper trim pieces/splash guards. Sure, they're not wholly NECESSARY- but anyone looking halfway closely at the car is going to notice they're missing if I don't.
Finally- I dropped the car off this morning at the detail shop for them to attack the interior. I'll find out later this afternoon just how successful they were- here's to hoping that the interior looks (and smells) worlds better than it did before.
P0420 is commonly an O2 sensor going bad. I'd search for that code on a Prius-specific forum and see what the likely culprits are.
dj06482 wrote: P0420 is commonly an O2 sensor going bad. I'd search for that code on a Prius-specific forum and see what the likely culprits are.
The prevailing opinion on PriusChat is that P0420 means the cat is going out. It's not impossible that it's the O2 sensors (there are sadly multiple sensors, costing >$100 for the upstream one) but pretty much every case of it I've found in searching has been the cat. We'll see what happens with it down the line though- with luck, the code (all of them actually) will stay away.
Can you move the O2 sensors around and see if the code moves with the potentially bad sensor? (I'm not sure how detailed the codes are for that model.)
dj06482 wrote: Can you move the O2 sensors around and see if the code moves with the potentially bad sensor? (I'm not sure how detailed the codes are for that model.)
Unfortunately, I don't think the sensors are interchangable- the upstream one costs almost twice what the downstream does.
So, the good news is that the detail shop did a FANTASTIC job of cleaning the interior. I've uploaded the pictures of it cleaned up, and hope later to do some side-by-side comparison images. I am calling it VERY worth the $160 I paid ($140 + a $20 tip).
UNfortunately, when driving it out on an errand later in the day the check engine light came back on, so I need to go out with the code reader and see what it was for.
Woah.
ProDarwin wrote: Woah.
Yup, the back seat was incredible. They couldn't get EVERYTHING out, but it now just looks like a well-worn car and not like a hazardous waste dump. The carpets are very worn though, so I'm weighing whether getting some nice floor mats to cover that up a bit.
Datsun1500 wrote: My first thought was a set of floor mats would be worth every penny. At that point the interior looks used, not abused.
That's what I was thinking too. The problem will be finding a good balance of quality and cost. The 'real' Prius mats are $100 but I don't think they'd get me that much more in sale price, so I'll have to find something more reasonable.
ProDarwin wrote: Woah.
Are you sure that wasn't a crime scene??!?!!
Had to drive in today instead of biking, so hooked the code reader up and checked/reset the codes. Only one was the P0420: Catalyst System not performing to efficiency. 
Glad it's down to just one (so far), but it's also obviously not going to be cheap (best price for a bolt-on replacement from RockAuto is $250 shipped) to replace the cat if that is what is wrong.
Ashyukun wrote: Brake drum hardware kit (may not need this): $15
Yeah you need it. Those springs have been heated and cooled a million times in 275,000 miles. It would really suck if one of them broke and you had to drive your brand new brakes 20 miles with one wheel dragging. Makes the job go faster dealing with non-crusty hardware too. Also, replace the rear wheel cylinders as well because they're ancient. Otherwise, you'll be replacing fluid-soaked brake shoes well before their time. Do all this correctly and never worry or even think about your rear brakes again.
Well, you're gonna have to bit the bullet. Could be worse, there were no aftermarket bolt in cat solutions for my E39 540, the whole thing cost around $1300 from the dealer because the piece was basically attached to the whole exhaust manifold. And there were two.
That interior, who does that to a car? Why would you not wipe up stuff like that when it happens and/or take it to a car wash and have them vacuum it once in a while? You have to be a real berkeleying pig to leave your car like that.
Great job on the detail though.
How much is a carpet for the car?
Ashyukun wrote: Had to drive in today instead of biking, so hooked the code reader up and checked/reset the codes. Only one was the P0420: Catalyst System not performing to efficiency.
Based on my experience with a P0420 I would throw a cat at it last. Chances are the ignition missfire prior to the spark plug replacement set that code.
Thinkkker wrote: How much is a carpet for the car?
Looks like $500 or so. And unfortunately they seems to be VERY rare in salvage yards so finding one to pull seems unlikely.
MCarp22 wrote: Based on my experience with a P0420 I would throw a cat at it last. Chances are the ignition missfire prior to the spark plug replacement set that code.
I've got a new set of spark plugs coming too- there was a good rebate deal on them where a full set of iridium plugs ended up under $10, I figured that I'd rather know for certain that the right kind were put in and that taking them out would give me the chance to look at things like the Coil-on-plug units closely and to see what the plug tips looked like after a bit of driving.
After doing a bit of searching, it looks like weld-on aftermarket cats can be gotten for about $70. The question is, will I be able to find a shop that will install it PROPERLY that will charge less than the $180 the full setup costs? And would it be worth it to just get the full setup and be replacing 75% of the exhaust system (it includes pretty much everything except the muffler which would be another $80) vs. just replacing the cat?
Ashyukun wrote:Thinkkker wrote: How much is a carpet for the car?Looks like $500 or so. And unfortunately they seems to be VERY rare in salvage yards so finding one to pull seems unlikely.
Find some beige speaker cabinet carpet and stick it down with spray adhesive? You should be able to contour it to the floor pans, and it should be pretty cheap.
Rear o2 spacer and ignore the cat code. Bet it doesn't come back. Should be a five buck fix.
Remember, its a high mileage flipper. Keep what little profit margin you can.
Dusterbd13 wrote: Rear o2 spacer and ignore the cat code. Bet it doesn't come back. Should be a five buck fix. Remember, its a high mileage flipper. Keep what little profit margin you can.
That might be an option... would be cheap to pick up and keep around even if it didn't work. Some digging outside of the Prius forums also seems to indicate that an exhaust leak prior to the converter could also cause a P0420 code because of pulling in fresh air- I don't THINK it has an exhaust leak, but then it is VERY hard to inspect things around the manifold/downpipe junction.
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