Maintenance Mode and Battery Voltage

It sounds right (in the sense that this is pretty normal dealer practice), and you also are being ripped off.

Unless your local independent guy is trained on Toyota hybrids, I would not entrust the job to him.

The price of 2 gallons of Toyota SLLC coolant is around $45.

It sounds a bit strange that your car has two separate problems: the inverter coolant pump (which I can believe based upon your symptoms), and the coolant valve which is in the engine coolant loop. I recommend that you ask for the DTC to be recorded on the repair invoice, and post them when you can.

 

Ok, I looked on the invoice and these are the codes they say were found:

P0A93: Inverter Pump

P1121: Coolant flow control valve

Invoice also states that the aux. battery tested at 12.67v. Much higher than the non-tool MFD read out test.

 

The DTC shown on the repair invoice are appropriate for the work that was done. I suppose your car had the two separate problems. Glad that you got it fixed.

 

Ouch, that's really steep isn't it. Just wondering, what was the total cost (diag, part, labor etc) that they first quoted? And did they ask you if you were sitting down or make sure you didn't have a heart condition before they gave it to you.

It's annoying, but sometimes I think that they (the dealers) see themsleves as pretty much a monopoly when it comes to Prius repairs.

The measured voltage of a battery is highly dependant upon the conditions under which it's measured. The state of the charge, how long since it's been under charge or conversely under load, and whether or not it's currently supplying power. When you measure the voltage through the MFD then of course some of the cars systems are powered up and so the battery is under a small amount of load.

The dealer would probably have measured it very soon after the car had been in ready mode (hence charging) and also with the battery under zero load, both of which would tend to give a higher reading.

 

I think the batt was tested after it had been sitting for maybe an hour or so, but the reading didn't specify whether or not it was unloaded, which I assume it was. Been driving the car since they finished work yesterday and it seems fine and no more warning lights.

So after all was said and done, total bill was about $785, which included the diagnostic, all parts and labor. It would have been a bit over a grand without the 25% discount.

More good news is that I thought my main battery warranty was about up since my odo was about to turn 100k, but I was informed that in CA, I get 10 years & 150k, so I'm good for 4 more years or 50k more miles.