Let me know if you or anyone else wants some of those copper connectors for the hv battery. You could have them cleaned and ready if you are going to swap cells.
I just bought all new strips with the plates.
$free
Let me know if you or anyone else wants some of those copper connectors for the hv battery. You could have them cleaned and ready if you are going to swap cells.
I just bought all new strips with the plates.
$free
Indy - Guy said:Quick update. Battery refresh is still doing good. This is now my highest mpg Prius. Last tank averaged 46.7 mpg.
I've been driving this one in and off for awhile, and it's time to dive into the non functional A/C. Hit it with some R134 and it's working again. Posting here to document the start to see how long the charge lasts.
Funny. I get about 42-44 regularly but have seen as hoigh a 50mpg. I notice that the greatest fluxuation in mpg has to do with the use of the HVAC. That's both AC or heat. Both have an affect that causes the engine to run more often. I have gotten my best MPG in 50 degree temps driving near 55 mph.
So, when I saw you were getting 47 mpg my first thought was to wonder if you've been keeping the AC off. Turns out...not intentionally.
I had a Prius that I could hit with a can of R134 and it would be good for 2.5 months. That meant that two cans at $5 each kept me in AC all summer long. I just kept a second can in the center console for "immediate use" if the AC got weak.
In reply to John Welsh :
Yeah, I too have a "just periodically add R134 to the system" approach to A/C repair, I've just been delayed getting around the checking in on this one. The recent heat wave is what finally motivated me to get it done.
On a related note, now that we have A/C, I wanted to get it deep cleaned. It's turning out quite well :
I just worked on the AC on the Freeus (my last remaining Prius, gotten for free). It looks like my leak was at the low side service port; I bought a new sniffer and that's the only place we could get a hit. It held a vacuum for 30 minutes, hope it'll blow cold for a while this time.
Y'all are getting quite a bit better mileage than mine; I have ~315k on it, it's burning oil pretty badly at this point and I tend to drive 80 with the AC on, sort of the worst case for MPG.
In reply to Kendall Frederick :
My other two Priuii (Prius') are only getting about 37 mpg. I'm in the process of rebuilding/refreshing those batteries now to improve the mileage.
Also, how'd you get a free Prius? Keep me in mind if you want to get rid of it.
Link.
In reply to Indy - Guy :
Wow, center console removal type cleaning!
In my Prius ownership I have been amazed how well the cloth cleans up with a Bissell Little Green Machine (or a wet vac) and lots of water. The soft cloth in these cars looks weak but I'm amazed at how durable it is. I've had multiple Prius with more than 200k and never a rip, tear, or broken stitch/seam.
In reply to John Welsh :
Yup. It was your sharing a similar observation about the interior in another thread that convinced me to give it a deep clean instead of trying to replace everything. It really is pretty good material that cleans up nicely.
While I had the center console out, I went ahead and recovered the central armrest. Which ironically does NOT wear well or clean up nicely. Here's some pics of the process:
I've been inspired. I ordered the same armrest cover off Amazon today. $12
I also added a $10 replacement key fob case for the Prius too.
In reply to Indy - Guy :
This is my second free Prius! This one was owned by a co-worker and it sat around for about 6 months with a bad brake actuator; the dealer quoted him ~$4k to repair, as I remember. My wife had totaled her Prius and I had a lot of parts.. you see where this is going.
I am going to hang on to this one for a while yet; I was planning to replace it with a new Ford Maverick but gave up and decided to keep the Prius and buy another big truck.
I have a confession to make. I’ve been mildly obsessed with the whole hybrid concept since we put 1,300 miles on a Ford Fusion Titanium hybrid using Las Vegas as a base camp in November of 2018. (My son did his senior fall college semester at UNLV, we visited and hit the Grand Canyon, Zion and a bunch of lesser know places). I really enjoyed sucking up highway miles in a nice car that got mid to upper 40’s MPG while driving like everyone else.
Fast forward to December of 2022. My wife’s 2013 Fusion was closing in on 100K, the transmission was doing some odd things, the rear shocks were going again for the third time. It looked new inside and out but....
I started looking online casually in late December and noticed that a Toyota dealer about 20 miles from us had a used 2022 Camry XSE hybrid with just under 7,500 miles on it. Pretty much every available option other than cooled seats. They had had it listed since October, I thought about it and typical of my Scottish heritage decided to wait and see. Fast forward to late January and they’re still sitting on it and have dropped the price almost 8K from where they started. I noticed it’s now Toyota CPO as well. Highly optioned Camry, 208 HP combined, fancy paint, 19’s, JBL sound system, kind of a “unicorn” especially in the recent market. So we took a test drive and the rest is history.
We ended up paying about what the original sticker was new but they own all the maintenance for the first two years, balance of the original warranty plus they extend the power train to 100K / 5 years and the battery to 150K / 10 years. We’re up to 12,800 miles as of this weekend.
I love it, my wife loves it and it’s arguably the nicest driving car we’ve ever owned. The hybrid system is almost seamless, it rides and handles very well, far from the “appliance” meme that the Camry carries. The best part is the fuel efficiency. Apparently we’re the hybrid savants as this car rewards “anticipating” traffic ahead. Take your foot of the accelerator and it’s in regen mode, gently brake and gain some more battery. Growing up driving stick may have helped?
Bottom line, the car says we’re averaging 48.1 MPG since we bought it. I just checked manually, filled up and came up with 49.7 MPG over 328 miles of driving / 6.6 gallons (and that’s just half a tank!). Drive home tonight, 150ish miles mostly highway and driving at 70-75 with traffic the computer says 53.2.
Why don’t we have more of these? I don’t hate the idea of an all electric car but I think we need to do some infrastructure stuff first. This works, right now.
Off the soap box, can a Camry boy play in the Grassroots hybrid club? 
Apologies to Indy Guy for the massive thread jack.
In reply to 11GTCS :
Yes, you absolutely can play in the Hybrid sandbox with your Camry.
Doing a quick update, the A/C is still functioning about two weeks out, so that's good. It had a bit of a hit to the mpg though, I'm only getting 44.5 mpg now.
Mostly highway miles resulted in this:
48.2 mpg.
Saturday I finally got around to repairing the broken rear lift gate handle. Not wanting to do this again I spent the extra $$ and bought the one with the metal reinforced handle bracket.
It's a fairly simple and quick repair. (Why did I put it off so long?)
While we had it in for Maintenance, we went ahead and took care of the intermittent "no gauge cluster working" problem. (This is a fairly common flaw on Priuii & is cured by soldering on a replacement Capacitor. Search "combination meter" )
That's Indy-kid #3 on the "assist" ( he's taken a good interest in helping out 
)
The Tribble was treated to a new (dent free) pair of passenger side doors last night. Thanks in part to Nocones Pri-hard build.
So, I sold this car last December, (shortly after getting the new doors installed)
I stayed in touch with the new owner. . . . Long stor short: car was totaled, and I stumbled upon it on the IAAI auction site today. I'm going to throw out a bid on it ( a low bid ). Let's see if it boomerangs back to me.
There's no mistaking my mesh grill insert and bumper stitch repair there on the driver's side.
Man, this Prius is being beat to within an inch of its life!
In reply to Thomas :
Oh Grasshopper, you underestimate the life of a Gen2 Prius. 
In reply to Indy - Guy :
Do you still have contact information to the recent owner to get some insight of accident damage, general running condition at time of accident?
I looked closer at the listing and its a little confusing. Erie insurance is selling the car stated to have a pre-accident value of $3,754 and an estimated repair of $5,253. What is the point of impact that is the accident? Best I can tell is the bent front fender near headlamp.
The listing also says second damage is Mechanical damage. The listing says key present but does not start.
Here's my guess. Minor front bump results car going to body shop. It sits at the generic body shop for so long that the 12v battery dies. Generic body shop knows nothing of hybrid and generally fears hybrid. Add in also that its a non-lucrative car also. Write a $5k repair order just so they don't have to work on it or try to figure out the starting.
I think this car needs a jump to the 12v battery via the jumper point under hood. From there, the 12v battery needs to be replaced or charged (probably just charged and driven regularly, not sit at body shop parking lot indefinitely.) Put some air in the front tire (or patch the slow leak) and she's back on the road. The fender damage isn't enough to bother with. An Uber Eats driver of International origin will buy this car all day long for $3k.
In reply to John Welsh :
All good observations. Yes, I'm in good standing with guy I sold it to. He's the one who told me it was in an accident and "totaled". It was a running driving car before that.
You are making some really good observations. It could be even simpler that you describe to get it "running". I know for 100% when I sold the car, I had teh "Smart key" function disabled. Look at this picture:
See the key in the lower left? If you were to put the key in the slot it would probably turn on. I don't know if the lot worker tried that before they declared it "doesn't start".
Please don't anybody bid against me. I'm going to bid it up until my total coast "all-in" after fees (but without delivery) is $775.
In reply to Indy - Guy :
Ahh, a keen observation. Notice the red light on the dash for the door being open. This means there is power. If it wasn't enough power to start the car, it would at least be enough power to bring the dashboard alive and get a picture of the odometer (the typical reason that IAA takes this photo.) Since the car is listed as miles unknown this implies that they never put the fob in the dashboard slot like you suspect.
Well, It's not coming home to me again. I was disciplined and stuck to my top bid....
Lost it by $25.
Do those auctions put up your highest bid or just slowly increase your bid up to your max?
eg could the winner have put in a $1000 bid but you were the next-highest so they just went in increments of $25 to get above yours?
jfryjfry said:Do those auctions put up your highest bid or just slowly increase your bid up to your max?
eg could the winner have put in a $1000 bid but you were the next-highest so they just went in increments of $25 to get above yours?
It works just like your example. Bidding on my side stopped at my Max of $425. The other bidder may have had their max at $450, or $1000. We'll never know. All it took was the highest bid, which in this case was $450. (plus fees)
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