Rapid full/empty battery cycling

Nearly identical situation to another PC member: HV battery out of warranty, but they had made another Toyota purchase relatively recently, Toyota replaced HV Battery in Gen2 free of charge. Toyota Cust Care covered the out of warranty HV Battery b/c of "loyalty." Guarantee you no 2014 vagon purchase for current OP, no HV battery assistance.

I bet OP could achieve same outcome by buying another Toyota from any dealership. A price is agreed. Before signing contract, drop the HV Battery contingency bomb: this current vehicle purchase is contingent upon a new HV Battery replacement free of charge (or for a few dollars), if not, I will leave and go buy a Honda, Mazda, Ford, etc. Guarantee you, dealer or Toyota will cave, esp the more expensive the vehicle purchase. Loose a vehicle sale over a part that maybe costs them $1000, which a large percentage can be written off on taxes (say 60% write off, meaning $400 loss on the battery, but way more money on the vehicle sale and manufacture sales incentives). A sale is a sale, and manufacture's want to move cars. You probably have heard of dealers selling way under invoice just to hit their sales number, b/c they will be getting more money from the manufacture by hitting/exceeding the sale goal.

CARB is determined by State law. Each State legislature chooses to opt-in or opt-out of CARB. If they opt-in, they can choose to require the manufactures to give the Battery Warranty, or Not. The State's will also specify what model years it will cover when signed.
Washington State is worthless-CARB; adopted the CARB emission standard, but not the longer warranty, so Washington State Prius only have 8year/100,000mile warranty.

 

Not convincing, exstudent. You are talking about another guy in Maryland who got a new battery for reduced cost by buying another new Prius. Interesting approach but unrelated to this case, except to say both cases could be "out-of-warranty assistance". The current case my understanding the dealer told him it was covered under CARB warranty even though purchased in AZ. So the facts (as we understand them) in this case is not a case of "out-of-warranty assistance".

As far as your CARB law interpretation, my understanding is similar, each state will show two dates: CARB Date adopted and CARB date effective (eg; 2011 for MD). But Toyota is the only company looking at these dates in the warranty language. FORD and GM simply say if your CARB certified vehicle is registered in a CARB state, you qualify. That's because they would not have sold a CARB certified vehicle outside of CARB. Since Toyota has elected for manufacturing efficiency to only make one version of the Prius (the CARB certified version) Toyota feels the need to disqualify the CARB warranty for some vehicles in accordance with a lengthy policy about where you bought it, when that state joined CARB, etc. But I don't know if that applies to all model years and all states (I asked Toyota to explain the exception case logic to me, they told me they like to keep this case-by-case managed basis).

 

I think we are thinking of two different cases.

As you know, all Prius for the US market meet CARB emission standards. The longer warranty is dictated by each State. Toyota wants to save money by following what each State requires in terms of warranty. Toyota can make exceptions if they want, which they did for the OP.

• 2006 was purchased and registered in AZ.
• Moved to CA, some years later, changing vehicle registration. Toyota would likely know AZ purchase & subsequent CA registration.
• Assuming the inverter pump recall was performed in AZ, and this would show-up in the Toyota network.
• The California dealer perphaps knew they could get it covered under warranty/Goodwill, b/c they can make a strong "loyalty" case to Toyota Customer Care: 2014 Prius vagon purchase, and possibly a lot of overpriced maintenance done at AZ and this CA dealerships.
• Toyota Customer Care apparently made an exception to cover under CARB (due to "loyalty"). Toyota could have said NO, and still be compliant with the warranty rules.

Bottom line, exceptions to rules exist and you are at Toyota's mercy.

OP is fortunate and a very happy camper, and we all want his good fortune too.

 

Do you have a full Toyota service history? Do you own other Toyotas?

 

Usually if you look after Toyota they look after you.

I had an inverter replaced out of warranty because I always use my dealers (who can price match if required to remain competitive) for servicing work and Mrs Cabbie also bought a new Toyota from the same dealers.

I always have a car serviced at a main dealer for that very reason. Go elsewhere to save some money on service and Toyota draw the line on the warranty to the day and mile. Use their dealers and there is a bit of good will after warranty - mainly on the larger items that shouldn't have failed.

Like you said, you'll use this place again.

 

Alls well that ends well!
You are a good customer. If my battery fails I have to consider getting a new Prius, and getting some good will from Toyota, and giving the 2006 to my daughter. I hope Toyota remembers my '84 Camry too.

 

Drew, I'm assuming they wanted to replace the fan and filter assembly that is used to cool the battery down? If so, did they tell you that it had failed?? If the fan either failed or the filter became clogged somehow that would explain why your battery died. Did you ever clean the filter out previously? When your battery was on it's last legs did you not hear the fan going all out? Do you folks have pets? Sorry for the multiple questions but there could be something to be learned here. The service rep at Toyota that I was talking to a few weeks ago told me that their investigations into battery failures led them to believe that most of the failures that they saw were related to a plugged up battery fan filter. I really think Toyota should come out and a make a statement that these filters have to be serviced on a given schedule...

 

The US Gen2 does not have a filter, so that's part of the problem. The fan itself gets lint-filled and needs to be inspected and cleaned. Having said that I have not had it done yet at 140k miles. They say it depends a little on how you use the back seat, and frequent rear seat passengers especially having dogs back there (as dog hair tends to get in there). Gen3 I think has filter. The question I always have is, did anyone inspect at say 150k miles and find it not too bad? Or is it always bad. The other reason Gen2 *may* have more batt failures than Gen3 (Gen3 is not old enough too see trends) is the programming allows the HV batt fully discharge on empty fuel tank.

 

Oops, right I forgot there it's just the screen in front of the fan, it's the actual fan that has to be cleaned. And yes, it should be part of a maintenance program, unfortunately Toyota doesn't list it. Luscious garage does recommend that it is cleaned on a regular interval...

Luscious Garage | Blog | Prius battery cooling fan cleaning, P0A82

 

If I only had a Luscious Garage ...I'd get my fan inspected!

 

Where are you located, wjtracy? You may want to add it to your profile.

 

But it is in my profile! The fair state of Northern Virginia better known as NoVA.
We got a ton of Prii here too due to a combination of reasons including HOV incentives to some lucky "grandfathered" owners, hybrid incentive$ in DC/Arlington VA, and other regional factors. So come on out here and set us up a hybrid shop...we need one.

 

I thought Nova = Nova Scotia.

 

OK I spell it out if it helps, but nobody ever asked before.