hybrid battery damage

1 What kind of failure?
2. Certainly if the gasoline engine refuses to start and you persist in repeatedly trying to start it, thus draining the traction battery, that is not helpful to the traction battery state of charge or its longevity.

 

i don't think so.

 

You didn't say which battery was replaced. If you mean the traction battery, then certainly, just as Patrick said - every unsuccessful attempt to start the combustion engine uses an amount of charge from the traction battery. Eventually the traction battery will reach a low state of charge where the car will no longer even attempt to start. Recharging the battery may be possible, but requires special equipment. That used to be available only through dealers, but now there are versions for sale in the PriusChat shop.

Or did you mean the 12 volt battery?

-Chap

 

Assuming you mean the expensive hybrid battery, when you say "new" battery is that new Toyota or new re-built battery, and was there any warranty.

 

We need more details amitbd.

If it genuinely was a new traction battery rather than a rebuilt or second hand one then no it should be unlikely to be that badly damaged by the "fuel engine" problems. As others have pointed out however, you can drain the HV battery badly with repeated attempts to start and/or drive it when the engine is not delivering power.

With an older or reconditioned battery then yes, it's certainly possible for something like this to finish it off.

Can you post some more details of exactly what type of replacement battery you got and what happened during the engine problems.

 

That's a simple, sound argument. From what I've the second gen is perfectly happy to run the battery down, disastrously low, say if you run out of fuel. With a normal car you'd be stranded, in need of some gas. With the Prius you're stranded, in need of some gas, and looking at a massive bill. They'll fight this I'm sure, since it's not a manufacturing defect, it's a design "feature".

Good luck!

 

I tend to agree with this, and I think that they should honour the warranty.

I thought the whole idea of the Prius was that it behaves and drives as close as possible to any normal car. That you don't need to be an electrical engineer or have a PhD in Nickel chemistry batteries to drive one.

It's true though that you should avoid doing what you (or your wife) did. There have been quite a few cases reported here where there has been a loss of engine power from some simple cause (running out of fuel for example, or sometimes just an oil overfill and subsequent intake fouling) and that has been enough to finish off a tired worn battery. Yours however is the first case I've heard of where this has happened to a battery in prime condition.

Anyway, you should escalate this case to Toyota head office. It would be in their interest to settle this asap in your favour, as the more it is discussed the more it makes the Prius look overly weak and fragile in my opinion.

 

If this happened in the USA, I believe you would have got a new Toyota battery (never heard of Primearth brand) and it would have had a 12-month warranty. Here on Prius Chat, somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I do not recall a single case of a genuine Toyota replacement HV battery ever failing, and certainly we have no reports of a genuine Toyota repalcement batt failing under 12-months. Even if we did have such an exeprience reported to us, Toyota USA normally just covers HV battery replacement if under warranty with no questions asked about how the owner might have been at fault for causing the demise of the battery.

Since we have few or no reported USA cases (on PriusChat) of Toyota replacement battery failing, we here don't really know if Toyota requires a higher burden of proof of the owner's no-fault for the failure of the second battery.

One USA battery replacement expert is Lucious Garage...perhaps they could advise their experience if Toyota refuses to honor replacement battery 12-month warranty. But that would be unexpected since Toyota basically asks no questions when the orig batt fails under warranty. Toyota simply replaces it free of charge.

Gen3 Prii fixed the low-fuel battery discharge problem and may explain why Gen3 batts seems to be failing less often. But we shall see when they get to 10-years old how well Gen3 is doing. There is also a recent thread that low fuel is not good for the fuel pump, so maybe that's what happened.

 

We have no way to know that this (Primearth) was a new battery as opposed to a local equivalent of Dorman/Greentech or other battery rebuilder.

Also, I believe that the design of the Gen II (not sure of other models) is to allow the battery to go extremely low where safety overrides system preservation in the event of a fuel out scenario. This is to ensure that the vehicle can be moved to safety as opposed to leaving one stranded in the middle of high speed traffic. The idea though, is to get you to safety, pull over, stop and await recovery, not drive to the nearest service station, which you do at your own peril.

The fact the battery appeared to be fatally damaged, points to the fact that perhaps it was not in great shape in the first place. A good battery should survive a deep discharge event so long as it is externally recharged before doing anything else.

Maybe the local garage is not fully trained in dealing with this scenario.

 

Primearth is the name of the company that produces new traction batteries for Toyota, and was previously named Panasonic EV Energy Co. until 2010 when Panasonic sold much of its ownership interest to prepare for the acquisition of Sanyo.
Development, manufacture, and sale of a hybrid car and the battery for electric vehicles (battery) | Primearth EV Energy Co., Ltd.
Primearth EV Energy Co - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The OP's situation is unfortunate. I don't have any advice to deal with that, other than to make sure he keeps the fuel tank filled for his wife.

 

Thanks for that information, Patrick. I think a few of us just learnt something new today.

 

I think a different title would be more appropriate:

Wife Killed my Car. Will Warranty Cover Damage ?

 

NO, but it is possible to damage the battery by draining it down to zero. One way to do that would be to ignore all the warnings the car and the manual gives to NOT drive the car without fuel.

It is also a very bad idea to drive the cars without tyres, or with no coolant in the radiator. Even though the car will let you.

 

Yep wjtracy, that is what I thought would be the case also. I would have thought that Toyota didn't even need to know how it happened. If it really is a brand new genuine Toyota hybrid battery that's only 6 months old then I'd just drive or tow the car back to them with the error codes and tell them to fix it.

Though it wasn't entirely clear from amitbd75's postings whether or not "the garage" that it originally got towed to and which was doing the initial diagnostics was in fact a Toyota dealership. In that case then obviously they are going to know the full story already. Can you please clarify what garage did the original work and diagnostics amitbd?

 

AmitBD is in Israel. I very much doubt there are independent hybrid garages.

 

Ok you are correct, I was assuming all work by Toyota dealership or authorized shop. Might be a different story in USA too if a new Toyota batt was installed by a non-Toyota shop. Good question how the 1-yr warranty on the replacement Toyota batt is impacted by DIY-type installation.

 

Hey, just opinion here, but I think Toyota should replace the battery under warranty. Because it STILL is under warranty.

Everyone should strive to NOT run out of fuel, but running out of fuel once, shouldn't be reason enough for that early of a failure of what is suppose to be a brand new battery.

My understanding, or from what I've read in this very forum is that The Prius does have self protective safe guards. That is if you run out of fuel, like any vehicle The Prius will shut down and NOT run. You might get X amount of distance on battery power, BUT as soon as the vehicle tried to kick the engine in, The Prius will shut down. So IMO running out of gas, isn't reason enough for Toyota to deny your warranty.

Also nobody can really prove WHY your fuel pump failed, It might of easily been because you ran out of fuel and it got gummed up with "residues in the fuel" but again, IMO fuel pump failure is a separate issue, and a good Hybrid Battery should be able to survive a fuel pump failure.

It was unfortunate, arguably unwise (OK...stupid) to run out of fuel. But both running out of fuel, and then secondarily a fuel pump failure, IMO isn't tangible reason to deny warranty coverage on the Hybrid Battery.

To me the standard has to be this. Did anything happen to your vehicle that falls outside of things that could happen and do happen to everyone with normal usage?

People run out of gas all the time. People also experience fuel pump failures. The Prius IS designed to survive these scenarios. I think the burden should be on Toyota to prove damage to the battery due to inflicted behaviors OUTSIDE of the realm of things one could consider "normal" or expected scenarios.

My agreeing with you that you have a case? Won't necessarily or probably help you win it. But I would certainly fight and lobby for Toyota to back their 1 year warranty in this case.