ScanGauge almost killed my traction battery

[abq sfr]

OK, might have been *partly* my fault, you decide. Please excuse the lengthy details. Timeline:

Wednesday kids said the check engine light on in Sienna. I take the SGII out of the Prius and use in Sienna to get the code, looked like loose or faulty gas cap. I tell the kids, they say they found a bunch of parts in the filler hole and thought they came out of the gas pump. I put the parts back in the gas cap (at least they were smart enough to keep the parts) and tell them to let me know if the light is still on after driving it a while, put SGII back in Prius.

Thursday kids say check engine light still on in Sienna, move the SGII again and reset the warning light and put the SGII back in the Prius. No further Sienna problems.

Friday I start the Prius and the red triangle comes on, I figure from the SG remembering something from the Sienna. I reset the codes and had no trouble with commute.

Sunday I drive the Prius the first time since, fuel is full, Red Triangle comes up and I figure SGII is still remembering fuel system errors from Sienna and I reset codes again and start driving. I go around a mile and see that SOC is down to 42% and think it should be higher, and notice ICE is not coming on. A few seconds later I look again and it's down to 32%, I pull over and shut down the car. I restart and the ICE still will not run. I shut down, pull out the SGII plug, start again, and ICE fires up and starts charging the battery, I plug in the SGII again, and I start driving when its back up to 40% SOC and car runs normally.

I'm not sure what happened here but I'm certain it involved the SGII. I also could have a few details not right in the description of events above. I assume my main mistake was plugging in the SGII with the Prius not running. I think maybe when the Prius booted up it got some garbage Sienna info from the SGII and it blew its mind. I doubt if the traction battery was damaged from going down to 32% once, but it could have quickly turned into a disaster.

Lesson learned: Be wary of swapping ScanGauge between vehicles!

[Rokeby]

abq_sfr,

Thanks for the "heads-up." The situation as you describe it is cause for more
than a little concern.

I think you should pass info on this incident back to ScanGuage and see what
they have to say/recommend.

I have a ScanGuage but have never taken out of our Prius. However, I do
anticipate doing so at some unspecified time in the future.

I don't expect you to answer the following questions, but I'm hoping
subsequent posters can:

* Is there some way to "zero out" or "dumb down" the SG while its still
plugged into the second vehicle?
* Is it significant that the second vehicle was also a Toyota? (My son
drives a Tacoma.) It sounds like a brand specific code is being transferred
like a virus with the SG as the vector. A particularly virulent "bug" to be sure!

[narf]

Although I could be wrong....

I think it's virtually impossible that the SG could send a code to the car's system and cause a MIL light to be triggered. I don't think the SG outputs data that way.

One guess I have: In some cases the SG can overload the data communications on the CAN bus, especially if your are pushing lots of buttons rapid fire on the SG. That can cause all kinds of errors.

A few questions....

Did you read any of the codes on the Prius when the triangle came on? Did you make sure that all the setup parameters were set correctly when you reinstalled the SG in the Prius?

[abq sfr]

Originally Posted by narf

Although I could be wrong....

I think it's virtually impossible that the SG could send a code to the car's system and cause a MIL light to be triggered. I don't think the SG outputs data that way.

One guess I have: In some cases the SG can overload the data communications on the CAN bus, especially if your are pushing lots of buttons rapid fire on the SG. That can cause all kinds of errors.

A few questions....

Did you read any of the codes on the Prius when the triangle came on? Did you make sure that all the setup parameters were set correctly when you reinstalled the SG in the Prius?

I think before this the only red triangle my Prius had thrown was door ajar, I don't think it could be coincidence that when the ScanGauge was moved back to the Prius, it threw 2 check engines, each after it had been plugged into the Sienna. I had not pushed any buttons on the SG except to reset the check engine light, and I didn't push them very fast. I didn't read any codes on the Prius, and I didn't check any setup parameters on the SG. It seemed to remember it's display on the Sienna and the Prius, I think the Sienna had a SOC of zero if I remember correctly. Since I got the SG last January, after I had programmed what it displays I haven't touched the settings since. I had to look at the book to see how to reset the Sienna's check engine light. I recommend everyone be cautious when moving the SG from Prius to another Toyota with a problem and then back to the Prius. You could have a disaster in short order.

[Highly ImPriused]

When I first installed my SG, I didn't read the instructions carefully enough and plugged it in prior to starting (you are supposed to start first and then plug it in for the initial set up). It threw the red triangle of death at me and a couple of error codes. I cleared the codes, shut down and waited a few minutes, and then started it again and all was fine. The codes were for CAN communication errors. Somehow the SG gets in the way if you install it prior to starting. I subsequently searched on here and found others had the same problem. This was about 8 months ago and I haven't had any problems since. It sounds like what happened to you was something similar.

[abq sfr]

Originally Posted by Highly ImPriused

When I first installed my SG, I didn't read the instructions carefully enough and plugged it in prior to starting (you are supposed to start first and then plug it in for the initial set up). It threw the red triangle of death at me and a couple of error codes. I cleared the codes, shut down and waited a few minutes, and then started it again and all was fine. The codes were for CAN communication errors. Somehow the SG gets in the way if you install it prior to starting. I subsequently searched on here and found others had the same problem. This was about 8 months ago and I haven't had any problems since. It sounds like what happened to you was something similar.

I agree, sounds exactly like what happened. I don't remember starting the car before plugging in the Scangauge first time when I installed it, maybe I just got lucky or maybe it makes less of a difference when it's never synced up with a car before. In the future I'll definitely start the car before plugging it in!! It could have been a $3000 mistake.

[zeeman]

Originally Posted by abq sfr

OK, might have been *partly* my fault, you decide. Please excuse the lengthy details. Timeline:

Wednesday kids said the check engine light on in Sienna. I take the SGII out of the Prius and use in Sienna to get the code, looked like loose or faulty gas cap. I tell the kids, they say they found a bunch of parts in the filler hole and thought they came out of the gas pump. I put the parts back in the gas cap (at least they were smart enough to keep the parts) and tell them to let me know if the light is still on after driving it a while, put SGII back in Prius.

Thursday kids say check engine light still on in Sienna, move the SGII again and reset the warning light and put the SGII back in the Prius. No further Sienna problems.

Friday I start the Prius and the red triangle comes on, I figure from the SG remembering something from the Sienna. I reset the codes and had no trouble with commute.

Sunday I drive the Prius the first time since, fuel is full, Red Triangle comes up and I figure SGII is still remembering fuel system errors from Sienna and I reset codes again and start driving. I go around a mile and see that SOC is down to 42% and think it should be higher, and notice ICE is not coming on. A few seconds later I look again and it's down to 32%, I pull over and shut down the car. I restart and the ICE still will not run. I shut down, pull out the SGII plug, start again, and ICE fires up and starts charging the battery, I plug in the SGII again, and I start driving when its back up to 40% SOC and car runs normally.

I'm not sure what happened here but I'm certain it involved the SGII. I also could have a few details not right in the description of events above. I assume my main mistake was plugging in the SGII with the Prius not running. I think maybe when the Prius booted up it got some garbage Sienna info from the SGII and it blew its mind. I doubt if the traction battery was damaged from going down to 32% once, but it could have quickly turned into a disaster.

Lesson learned: Be wary of swapping ScanGauge between vehicles!

wow

that is some story!

i think that you are on the right track by assuming that some garbage from previous vehicle has somehow put scangauge into a strange mode that caused the situation.

thanks for the warning. you are lucky that car started with only 32% of batt capacity.
i guess the moral of the story is not to plug in scangauge from one car to another without a full gauge reset!
if you would have done that maybe all would be well?!

[statultra]

sometimes when the prius gets a master warning light the car doesnt charge the battery AT ALL, this happened to me on my 01 prius when there was a throttle body problem, resulting in the main battery warning and afterwards it wouldnt start the vehicle.

its honestly a bad design, if theres a engine problem the computer should not start the car unless it can charge the battery.