Broke down 700 miles from home! Help!

Glad everything finally turned out well. This whole thread shows that all dealerships are not the same and perhaps, when confronted with "non-answers" it may help to get Toyota Customer Service involved early.

 

I apologize for not staying on here more, family matters have taken precedence in recent weeks. Regardless, I have another update and someone here might have an answer for what's going on.

Since I picked up the car from the dealer, due to my schedule I haven't had ample time to tinker with it and really work it's legs to make sure it's good to go. Due to this, the car only made the trip to work and back a few timesand due to the weather i've been driving my truck because the dirt road is murder on smaller cars when its muddy. Regardless, the parents made their way back to ABQ on Friday and planned on driving back home this morning. This is when their plans started going south.

They started the car, and according to the screen the battery looked like it was half charged. After getting on the highway, the voltage meter went from blue to red and they decided to get off the highway. After driving around town the battery charged some and they tried the highway again. about 10 miles down the road the battery was back down to 2 or 3 bars and they've decided to turn back to ABQ and have service look at the car tomorrow.

From what I can tell, the vehicle has a disconnect at the ability to maintain a charge on the HV battery while at highway speeds. while in town the car is coasting more, braking more and providing a recharge capability while the highway conditions aren't allowing at this point. I don't want to say that any specific component has failed, because at lower speeds everything seems to work fine. I'm thinking that maybe the component that provides electrical current to the inverter from the gas engine isn't putting out enough power to provide both traction and charge juice at high speeds?

Regardless, the car is going back to Karl Malone because everything i've read about the other dealer doesn't give me much confidence in my options. I'll be keeping this updated as I can on this development.

 

If there are no warning lights on and your parents do not notice any driveability issues with the car when on the highway, then I would say they should continue their journey home.

The traction battery SOC gauge can drop down to 1 or 2 red bars in the course of normal operation especially when climbing a hill. Now, if the gauge drops down to zero bars or if you see the master warning light come on as well as warning icons appear in the MFD, then I would worry.

 

I would give a serious look at the 12VDC Aux battery again.....first. How is the temp of the inverter coolant after a drive? Should be just slightly warm to the touch. ( Good! Pat beat me to it, always great advice ). PS In looking over this thread, if we are still talking about the same car. It is a 2004 with 172000 miles on it! The HV Bat may be due for replacement. The batteries can always be checked with a multimeter.

 

Unfortunately, they hadn't been on I-40 more than a mile before the gauge went to red. We're going to take the car out today and see if it dies on the interstate, at least here in ABQ there is a readily available tow truck if we need it.

I'll keep you posted.

 

Update, with Patrick's advice they went ahead with the drive. I'm suspecting the colder night and inital incline is what was effecting the battery performance.

Pops and I took it out after they returned to the house, the battery stabilized and it's been running great since then. They're currently in Oklahoma doing their best to make it home before 1 AM

 

Great, I hope their trip is without drama, and they make it back home as planned.

Keep in mind that with 172K miles on the odometer, the traction battery certainly has lost some capacity (as Andy pointed out) so it should not be a big surprise when it finally gives out. One sign of diminished capacity is that you'll see the SOC gauge swing more frequently between extremes, such as 1-2 red bars up to 7-8 green bars.

If/when that happens and you are in a position to assist, then we'll give you advice re: how to install a salvage battery...

 

Once the battery stabilized yesterday, it was still fluctuating more than what I would consider normal. Figuring between the high mileage and the critical discharge it went through last month I'm anticipating a faulty HV battery as one of the culprits when they have the car looked over at home.

All of you folks have been a huge help in getting us through this, having another side to the story on this determined the outcome that we were hoping for (getting the car home on its own 4 wheels!) Thank You.