Greek taxi and traction battery

It's possible, that taxis in europe slowly go mostly in EV mode while ICE keeps going in and out all the time to recharge the batteries. That would not only heat up the batteries as Bob explained, but put tons of charge/discharge cycles, that eventually kill the battery. Every battery has only finite number of cycles. Shallower cycles are better tolerated, but there are limits here too.

 

The weakest component in any electrical or electronic system in my experience has always been capacitors. Especially the soda can sized electrolyte types. In pictures of the Gen II and III power modules there are quite a few of these type devices in the build. It's possible that sitting in ready mode keeps these Caps charged to high and for to long thus shortening their life. The effect might be like cells slowly going bad in a lead acid battery putting extra load on an alternator or in this case the traction battery. The big Caps I used back in the 80's screwed or bolted into the circuit so they could be replaced with out soldering. Similar to the way AC/Fridge starter Caps are done.

 

I'm not expert here, but I always thought caps life depends on temp, voltage, and design quality. Typically 10-20 years, save for the taiwanian counterfeit cap plague.
Besides, how exactly caps in inverter and such would kill batteries?

 

Yeah, I'm not sure I'd say capacitors are the least reliable component across the board. In a well-designed system, they'll probably be one of the most reliable components. (At one of my previous employers, we made highly-reliable computers, and derated capacitors by 2-3x - so if we needed a 5V capacitor, we'd buy a 15V or better one... I forget what (if any) derating we had on temperature.) I don't know that I've ever seen a capacitor fail on one of those, save for the time I accidentally applied a reverse voltage, and one of the tic-tac-sized capacitors exploded and shot off a 3-inch flame, then continued to glow orange for several seconds after I removed power.

And there have been several capacitor plagues. At least one of which was supposedly the result of industrial espionage; one company stole the electrolyte recipe from a second company, but didn't get it quite right, so a couple years down the road, all their capacitors would burst and quit working.

 

Recently was on vacation in Berlin.
Lots of Prius Taxis - I believe more the half the Prius + - 7 seater.
In Israel see an occasional Prius taxi although yet to see a Prius + , in fact I have only seen 1 or 2 altogether

 

I have just found this thread.

I am operating a gen III as a taxi, but, unfortunately, do not have the technical know-how to provide any metrics on the battery heating. I have to say that I have not noticed any unusual heat around the battery area as Grumpy has reported, but, then again, have not tested for this. Will at least try to monitor the area over the next couple of months, and report any findings.

As a rule, I keep the power on all day, with the cabin a/c set to 23.5 C - windows up to maximise the effectiveness of the a/c. My taxi currently has done 130,000 km, so I am moving into the danger range based on the reports from Greece.

 

Is there any discolouring of the rear carpet area above the battery too? Mine started to blacken - not with heat but the attraction of dirt caused by the heat. I know Oz will hot but is this caused by outside heat or the heat generated by use? Are you an Aussie born n bred or have you come from here originally? If the latter, you'll probably understand the issue of continuous start stop traffic rather than the open road type driving of the US or Australia. Obviously I can't record this data as no longer working as a cabby and am not prepared to spend 10 hours hard driving around town.

If there is no issue with heat in taxi use in Australia, then I'm convinced its use on the more crowded European roads causing heat build up inside the battery. If it is the latter, then the gen3 Prius is of no use here as a taxi.

 

Others following this thread may want to have a read of this link from a Canadian taxi operator;

600,000km taxi report | PriusChat

This snippet here seems to confirm what both Socrates and I have indicated to much consternation from die hard members on here!

"I do have to say the 3rd generation cars are not holding up very well compared to the second generation. The 2010's have all had transaxle problems and a few have had to get the battery replaced already. The improved fuel economy on the 3rd generation is greatly offset by higher cost for repairs."

The improved fuel economy is greatly offset by higher costs? Unfortunately mine and Socrates experience too. Here economical diesels are not that far behind the Prius in terms of economy and the additional purchase, service and repair costs of the Prius are making it unviable as a taxi. I'm disappointed as I trusted Toyota and didn't expect them to take a backwards step in terms of longevity or reliability.

 

I wouldn't bet on purchase, service and repair costs being higher in a Prius than a diesel counterpart...

Diesels...Specially in urban taxi service, DPF and EGR tend to be choked quickly and regeneration may be a source of problems if "delayed", clutches are very expensive (DMF) and turbos don't last as longer as expected. When oil gets diluted (regen) or contaminated (turbo failure), the ICE is at risk.

Hybrids...if some component fail, we can plug-n-play another, and it is easy to assess condition...and is very difficult to make a chain of multiple failure event...

 

I appreciate your sentiment BUT having driven many cars as taxi's I can assure you the problems encountered by the diesels is no higher than the gen3 Prius I own. The original argument for the Prius was that there are no dpf's or Egr's but we also have expensive inverters, batteries and steering motors.

I don't wish to repeat myself but my Prius is on its 3rd steering motor at £1,500 each and an inverter replaced at about £2,000 fitted. All this was before 70,000 miles (112,000 km). Hardly high miles. My HV battery is also starting to play up in that it cycles much much quicker than it used to and the car hesitates more when switching the engine on - an indication of a failing battery.

The Prius needs servicing at 10,000 miles whereas a diesel can be anything upto 20,000 miles, though one would not want to go that high in taxi use.

Very few hybrid specialists outside of California and thus any troubleshooting needs to be implemented via the main dealers at greater expense.

So no, the Prius is no better than a diesel and my experience is that it's probably worse. Not impressed. Perhaps I'd be happier if the gen3 had had the reliability of the gen2, but it doesn't.

 

Maybe you look too much in your "back yard"...
You had probably a lemon, and/or bad assistance (when replacing 1st steering motor on warranty, nothing else explains subsequent failures). If you check reliability studies, which represent probabilities, not deterministic assumptions, Prius still have a strong lead over...
(see Truedelta site, for example)

Your HV battery if regularly checked, is warranted for the next 6 years or 60k miles (see Toyota Europe). Cycling more quickly does not mean failure or even MPG decrease, noticeable.

Prius does not need "servicing", its an intermediate oil change. Its maintenance is every 20k.
Diesels that strech oil condition are a bit new, and when turbos are involved, its probably a bad decision in the long term. Injectors, glow plugs, diesel filters, and the others mentioned before, are not meant to last, because they do not...

 

We agree to disagree. I have driven many cars as taxi's and this has been a lemon, as has Socrates and his friends. Oh and the Canadian taxi owner who runs a fleet of them and has gen3 issues too.

Do the sums and the Prius is no competition to a diesel if used as a taxi. I hate to say it, but it isn't. I sang from the Prius hymn sheet 4 years ago but my experience of the cars and my history of bills from diesels and petrols even, is proof.

Personally if I were still in the market for a taxi I'd probably get a petrol and convert it to lpg. Then you can extend the oil change intervals and have no worries of dpf's or inverters and your emissions will be much lower.

As I'm no longer a taxi driver, my next car will probably be a second hand Leaf or maybe a Fluence ZE if I'm feeling brave. The second hand values of a Fluence ZE are low, much lower than the gen3 Prius. A 2012 Fluence is less than a 2009 Prius with 120,000 miles! But it's a Renault, so that worries me

 

Socrates battery, as his friends', have been a sole problem, all Hv batteries, as I recall. No transaxles, no steering motors.
As I said before, you should look broader than your yard...You got a lemon and/or bad assistance.

Your history of bills from diesels may have been much earlier from current emission controls...
How much have you paid for repairs during your taxi service time with the Prius? How much less in fuel when comparing?

Those prices for Fluence ZE you have to add monthly payments for the battery rental...

 

Most was under warranty granted BUT I would normally want to keep the car to at least 200,000 miles, and one was upto 300k. Depends if the car is running well or not. I ran the Prius to 60k and had many more issues than ever. I have only had a few cars break down on me, an old Datsun when I was 17, a Rover 214 when I was in my 20's, a London Taxi which blew up on me when only a few months old and my Prius twice.

Regarding fuel, the Prius was saving about £1,500 to £2,000 compared to a Mondeo or similar BUT the parts replacements would negate that saving. The Prius now costs much more than the other cars in the class and isn't available under special taxi deals that are out there. It's a shame as it's a smooth ride and the passengers loved it, but at the end of the day it was a work horse and similar sized, much cheaper ones can be had here.

If the age rules weren't as strict in my area for taxis, I'd consider a 2008/9 low mileage gen2. Seems they're ok.

 

To add balance. My Prius did pass its annual safety check with nothing needed and no advisory notices. That doesn't happen on cars with 80,000 miles. (ok it does happen, but not often).

 

Toyota to Showcase Future Mobility at Tokyo Motor Show

 

OK, here is an idea. There is a parallel thread on Colorado gen3 taxi that mentioned $400 battery calibration service. This may be the key in the taxi battery failures. If one uses prius as taxi in low speed European city taxi service, one can easily accumulate 10,000 charge/discharge cycles in 2-3 years of constant use. If there are slights differences in the each battery cells and the cells cannot be individually compensated at the each cell level, eventually the differences will result in polarity reversal and destruction of one or few individual cells. This being a serial battery arrangement, a few bad cells can cripple the whole battery.

Heat can be a contributory issue that can speed up the cell destruction. We do know that middle cells are hotter than the outside ones. If that persists due to long hours of taxi service, the hotter cells will be further thrown out of balance.

Here is another related thing. I have a RAV4 with low miles but distinctive engine knock under load when engine is lukewarm (warming up). The issue is caused by the fact that some time in mid 2000's Toyota stopped matching pistons to cylinders and started using a cheaper policy of one size fits all.

Here is how it may relate to gen3 Prius. What if they stopped carefully matching cells in the battery and just put them together randomly allowing for some minor differences between cells in the first place?

 

OK, why everyone is speechless?
Have I offended everyone (again)?

 

;-)

Mobile on my SGH-i717