Mileage Has Tanked Since Maintenance

[cmansour]

I had the 30,000 mileage maintenance done on my Prius and my mileage has tanked....can't get it over 42 and now it is at 39. No I have not changed my driving pattern. Used to be 46 at the lowest and average around 48.

If I look at the consumption monitor screen the battery shows blue lines....never changes to green. Also it never changes the level of the blue lines even if I am coasting down a hill or have my foot on the break....

Did they forget to hook something back up correctly???

[Patrick Wong]

Sounds like you are reporting two problems, so I'll comment on each:

1. Reduced mpg: Check your tire air pressure.
2. MFD battery SOC gauge doesn't move: Make your Prius READY, leave the car in P, and make the requested temp low enough so that the air conditioning compressor turns on and is cooling the interior. Sit there and watch the traction battery SOC gauge. Eventually the gauge should drop down to two red bars, at which time the engine should start to recharge the battery. If the gauge does not demonstrate this behavior then you should make this issue known to your dealer's service writer. It is not likely that anything would have been done during the 30K mile service that would adversely impact the SOC gauge.

[cmansour]

Originally Posted by Patrick Wong

Sounds like you are reporting two problems, so I'll comment on each:

1. Reduced mpg: Check your tire air pressure.
2. MFD battery SOC gauge doesn't move: Make your Prius READY, leave the car in P, and make the requested temp low enough so that the air conditioning compressor turns on and is cooling the interior. Sit there and watch the traction battery SOC gauge. Eventually the gauge should drop down to two red bars, at which time the engine should start to recharge the battery. If the gauge does not demonstrate this behavior then you should make this issue known to your dealer's service writer. It is not likely that anything would have been done during the 30K mile service that would adversely impact the SOC gauge.

I went out on my lunch and tried your #2 directions...after 10 minutes I was down from 6 to 1 Blue bar, the engine did come on for about 30 seconds and still had 1 Blue bar. Then it cooled on the battery for about 2 minutes and then the engine came on for about 30 seconds and I still had 1 Blue bar...finally turned the car off after 20 minutes. When am I supposed to see the green bars on the battery indicator? Haven't seen any in awhile...

I will check the tire pressure when I get home but the tires don't look low and they aren't very old.

Thank you for your help!

[Patrick Wong]

The 2G SOC gauge has eight bars. From one to two bars, the color is red. From three to six bars, the color is blue. When seven or eight bars, the color is green.

So when you say 1 Blue bar, do you mean that you had three bars appear?

If you want to see seven or eight green bars you usually have to proceed downhill for a while so that the traction battery gets lots of charging. If you want to force charge the battery to satisfy yourself that it can charge up to 7 or 8 bars, make the Prius READY, shift to D, step on the brake pedal with your left foot so the car can't move, then floor the accelerator pedal with your right foot. The engine will rev up to around 2,500 rpm and if you watch the SOC gauge you will see it slowly move up.

I do not recommend that you do this for more than 40 seconds at a time as you are placing stress on the transaxle. Actually I don't recommend that you do this at all, unless you have a very strong need to see the SOC gauge move into the green.

[yardman 49]

Probably should check to see if the oil was overfilled or/and the wrong weight oil used??

[cmansour]

Originally Posted by Patrick Wong

The 2G SOC gauge has eight bars. From one to two bars, the color is red. From three to six bars, the color is blue. When seven or eight bars, the color is green.

So when you say 1 Blue bar, do you mean that you had three bars appear?

If you want to see seven or eight green bars you usually have to proceed downhill for a while so that the traction battery gets lots of charging. If you want to force charge the battery to satisfy yourself that it can charge up to 7 or 8 bars, make the Prius READY, shift to D, step on the brake pedal with your left foot so the car can't move, then floor the accelerator pedal with your right foot. The engine will rev up to around 2,500 rpm and if you watch the SOC gauge you will see it slowly move up.

I do not recommend that you do this for more than 40 seconds at a time as you are placing stress on the transaxle. Actually I don't recommend that you do this at all, unless you have a very strong need to see the SOC gauge move into the green.

No there is only 1 bar and it is blue...no red bars showed up??? My commute to work has me going down some good size hills and this is where I would normally see the bars go to green but that has not happened. This is actually my second Prius...the first one was totaled by someone running a stop sign and plowing into me....and this is the first time I have ever experienced the huge drop in mileage. It is so strange and I think that you are right that there shouldn't have been anything in the maintenance service that should have caused this but I can definitely pin-point it to right after it was done....strange....Thank you again!

[Simtronic]

I would take it straight back as soon as you can, I am sure they will fix it or tell you what has happened pretty quickly, they can see so much more than we can with their diagnostic equipment. Let us know what the outcome and goodluck.

[jayman]

The weight of oil shouldn't make much difference in summer temps. I tried running a heavy duty 15W-40 (Esso XD-3) one summer in my Prius. About a 2 mpg loss.

Check the tire pressure, and also check the oil level

[ThePackage]

You might also want to check if the rear brake shoes are dragging as a result of the service tech adjusting the brakes to tightly. I know that happened to me and mpg went down as the brake shoes were dragging.

[yardman 49]

Originally Posted by ThePackage

You might also want to check if the rear brake shoes are dragging as a result of the service tech adjusting the brakes to tightly. I know that happened to me and mpg went down as the brake shoes were dragging.

Thanks, TP. That's another good point to keep in mind.