Engine Failure.

There are very few reports of Prius engine meltdowns, specially early. Can you point some links?

Thank you for the advice.
Toyota owners manual refers that 0,5 litres per thousand km is somehow possible (but also referred as limit), so regular level checks are needed when oil consumption is reported.

You might get an engine swap by a third of that price, in a salvage yard.

Please update when possible.

 

looks like they start at $1200 on ebay.

2010 Toyota Prius Base 1.8L in Complete Engines | eBay

 

Still to find what caused the oil to go away...
Ring wear? valve seals? A leak?
There is no outer routing of lubricant so maybe one of the first two. If so, you might be under warrant?

Nevertheless I would fix it. Almost new car (3 gen) and not many miles in it.

 

I'm sorry that this happened while you were in the Stan.
Thanks for your service!!!

7800 bucks is indeed sodomy for an engine replacement, but let's face it. You're going to have a tough time getting to that little tinker project yourself. DO NOT let Toyota do this work. Think about this for a moment.
They're the ones who gave your motor a clean bill of health before you went OUTCONUS......riiiiight?
I would advise that you get your wife to check some of the independent shops for a quote on a used engine replacement.
The good news is that you live out on the left coast...or you WILL once you get back INCONUS. There are lots of Priuses out there that are getting killed in accidents and this means that you can get a low mileage used motor for less than a thou.
SoCal has, I'm sure, several shops that specialize in all things Prius.
Even if she only saves a few hundred bucks---it's worth the effort---right?

Most Priuses do not suffer from oil related meltdowns despite the ludicrous 10k oil change interval, but they DO suffer from neglect sometimes, because let's face it. 99.44 percent of people do NOT check their oil even semi-occasionally. Some people let the dealer check their oil... When they go in for an oil change.... Every 10,000 miles.
Sometimes people that change their oil every three thousand miles will detect that little problem that's causing oil usage about 7000 miles earlier than the folks who only swing wrenches on their car every 10K. SO....if you're down for the whole 10K change interval?
Check your oil at least every other tank....which on a Prius is still every 1000 miles.

Good Luck!

 

Something doesn't seem right about this. 120k miles on a Prius should be easily doable with very little ICE wear. Maybe the combo of hi-speed highway driving or severe driving conditions caused it to use more oil than typical, but likely oil wasn't checked regularly. Maybe the oil level got low once for an extended period of time and cause irreparable damage. Maybe one oil change was over looked. Who knows as we don't have all the facts in this story. If all the maintenance was done by the dealer, and no anomalies were noted (low oil, overdue service, deferred maintenance), it seems Toyota should offer some kind of 'good will'.

 

Well, it's a gen3 with the cartridge oil filter, it's possible the mechanic screwed up and all the oil leaked out.

 

That would mean a very large pool of oil. Difficult to miss that?
Anyway, I read again and OP said that noticed oil burning from 65k onwards...

 

There is simply no excuse for driving the car (especially hard and long) without checking oil. This is user problem. As for oil burning issue, it possible in any car, especially at high miles. While, say 90% cars don't burn oil, the remaining ones do and one is supposed to check oil.
I have oil burning in my kids' Corolla and I watch it very closely (like every week).
Oil control rings is usually the weakness, especially with high miles. If one can catch the problem early, it can be partially reversible.

 

Even with engine oil abuse (ie letting it run way low, even below the dipstick) a modern engine still manages to hang in there for thousands of miles. It'll rattle, it'll clank and will burn oil once you top it up again, but it'll let you know for a LONG time that it needs filling with oil. I even ran a works taxi for a whole shift with no oil in it and God knows how long the previous drivers had driven it in that state, and still it was fine.

Modern engines don't just suddenly melt down. Many years and hundreds of thousands of miles in abused company cabs is my experience of this.

 

An issue is that many, if not most, new vehicles seem to operate needing no oil added between changes. This really intrigues me since every marine and stationary engine I have ever known (CAT, Perkins, Volvo, Yanmar) uses some oil from the getgo and throughout its lifetime -- and these engines use considerably heavier oils.

So I'm thinking that auto manufactures design engines to use virtually no oil because that is what buyers expect. And, because of this, owners become completely complacent about checking oil on a regular basis.

My take is that every vehicle should have a low oil level alarm, not just an alarm that sounds when the oil pressure disappears.

 

If this is a California car isn't the inverter covered by warranty?

 

Yes, the inverter should be covered under the CA warranty.

 

So,your kids have no excuse?
steve..........

 

This sounds fishy to me. What if you shell the money and the engine is goner? One should be able to turn the engine by wrench to see if it's turning.

One more thing, I saw used inverters sold for $500 on ebay.

 

My understanding is that the gen3 inverter is much cheaper than the gen2. When mine was replaced earlier this year (outside of warranty), I was informed the cost was £1,500 before £200 fitting (including 20%vat/sales tax). That makes $2,600 which appears much less that the $3,700 quoted by the op.If you minus our 20% tax, your costs in the US should be much less!

The op indicates they have a 2010/gen3 Prius.

 

But do your kids watch it closely? If you were deployed overseas for a year, would they watch it close enough to prevent lubrication failure?