New owner of 2004 Prius

welcome and congrats! sounds like a great find. first, everything you need is in the owners manual. get all your supplies from a dealer or online dealer for better pricing. don't mess with non oem supplies. a block heater is not necessary, but some people like them. find out how old your 12 volt battery is, if you don't already know. a weak one can be a source of trouble. ICE is infernal combustion engine. read up on pulse and glide technique for mpg's, you can find all sort of helpful vids on youtube and check out member john1701's web page, he has a ton of useful info. don't watch the screen too much while driving, the battery will show anywhere between 2 purple bars and full light green at different times, mostly half to 3/4 full, completely normal. 2004 was a great year, all the best!

 

Welcome! The best thing to do is just drive it. You'll understand more of the details and tips later.

 

Your Prius probably isn't equipped with VSC, my 2005 isn't. Therefore their is no light on start up, it depends on what package you have. I do believe mine is a package 2

 

Use a quality 5W-30 oil. I use full synthetic brand oil: Mobil 1, Valvoline, Castrol, Pennzoil, whatever Walmart puts on sale. Use the Toyota oil filter and engine air filter, they are high quality and very inexpensive if you buy from one of the dealers that sell parts at a discount over the web. Regarding tires, Costco sells Michelin and Bridgestone Ecopia, either choice is great. If you have substantial winter snow you should get quality snow tires for use in that season.

Use Toyota Super Long Life Coolant and Toyota ATF WS. Replace the transaxle ATF now, and at 60K mile intervals. Change the engine oil at 5K to 8K mile intervals. Change the engine and cabin air filters at 30K mile intervals. The coolants should first be changed at 100K miles; then at 50K mile intervals.

If the car has a block heater it should have an AC cord sticking out of the radiator grille. You don't really need one unless you want to eke out the last few tenths of mpg and are willing to trade off a higher electric utility bill for that.

Regarding mpg, maintain constant speed on your commute, avoid sudden braking, gradual braking allows maximum regeneration (converting motion to electric power). Inflate tires to 44/42 psi front/rear.

Inspect the brake pads and brake shoes. They should be in almost new condition given the low odometer reading. Brake pad thickness when new is 11 mm while brake shoe thickness when new is 4 mm.

Mini VCI is the best (and cheapest) diagnostic tool that you can obtain for any Toyota but especially for the Prius. You need a Windows XP or Windows 7, 32 bit OS laptop to run this. If no warning lights remain on after the car is READY, maybe your car does not have VSC functionality.