My Prius will not turn off!

There is a technical service bulletin on this issue, you may be able to Google it and print it out. Search prius combination meter warranty

 

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Combination Meter Warranty Enhancement | PriusChat

 

I need to replace the combination meter in my 2005. I live in the Kansas City area and wonder if anyone knows of a place in the region that does this kind of work besides the dealerships. I am pretty sure I can change it myself, but I would like to see if there is another option locally. Also, if I have to changeit myself, how do I go about getting a replacment?

 

You would buy a replacement combination meter from a Toyota dealership, and the odometer would read 0 miles. If you want the odometer reading of the new meter to be adjusted to the reading from the current meter, you probably would have to have the dealership do the installation because the dealer would need to verify the odometer reading prior to ordering the new part, and ensure the car does not log any miles while waiting for the part to arrive.

 

Also, can a failing combo-meter cause the p-lock error message? In my case I have bought a new battery in December and the p-lock error went away for awhile but has come with a vengeance in the last month.

 

Sorry, what do you mean by p-lock?

 

Oh, I see from your other thread, that's what Toyota says, in a dash warning. Great, lol.

 

Is your 12 volt bad or flat? That can cause such a bogus message. I've seen it before.

Can you measure the voltage of the 12 volt w/a volt meter after the car's sat overnight?

 

I can, but the battery was replaced in December. I have used the MFD display to show the battery charge and it is normally at 12.6 when I check it. The problem seems to occur most frequently when the car has been sitting overnight and then we take a short trip (less than 3 miles) and shut the car off. When attempting to put it in park we get the error message. Most of the time it will still let us put the car in gear and drive but we can't put it in park and the car won't shut off unless we put the parking brake on. At some point the error message clears, and it will go into park again. I have used to method of pulling the 7.5 fuse and re-inserting it to clear the problem, but that doesn't work every time.

 

what brand of battery? who installed? you may want to check the connections, especially ground to body. maybe it needs a charge.

 

I bought the battery from the Toyota dealership and put it in myself. I have had no other battery related issues with it. I can check the connections, but assuming they are good, has anyone found any other cause for this problem?

 

you should check the voltage on the 12v battery. If you have some way to read the DTCs logged, you should try that too.

If the car won't shut down, most likely culprit is the combination meter, which is warranted for 9 years.

 

Aloha 2007 Prius Owners, I have one solution to your problems with the Dashboard Display, Vehicle not able to turn off? You may need a new battery if your vehicle is 10 or more years old. Hybrid Battery is still good, there not suppose to be going out just yet. This is what I did! Located in the rear right side under the floor panel is a storage tub. Figure out how to remove floor panel, Black plastic tub and rt- side corner floor panel simply by pulling slowly until you figure how it dislodges safely. Then you will see the 12 Volt Battery. Remove the RED protection cover with screw driver, 1 on the top and 2 on the sides. Make sure to don't contact any battery terminals during this step. Then you will see 2 white electrical clips inserted into the sensor located on top of the battery. Dislodge the Middle Clip and let stand for 30 seconds or more. If that doesn't work dislodge the other clip on the re right of the middle one. Be careful that clip is fragile so take your time and you'll be happy after you do as I did. Be patient, things won't happen right away

Aloha continue from where I was unable to guide you to completing the
Task, after 30 seconds plug both clips back into their respective slots and wait to see what happens. If the multi display light and the energy light is on don't panic the vehicle has to recharge the energy to function properly. I just took it around the block to charge it and everything is back to normal. The dealer will give their sales speak to bring it in and all the BS so they can charge you $3-400 dollar to change your battery. I purchased my battery who carries the factory battery to order for $189, $194+ tax Total. And I installed it myself. Check out the YouTube How To Video on how to change your 12 Volt Battery Safely. Goodluck!!!!!!

 

New too Prius but not to electronics. In the Op's first post and the few following the problem I figure, it is quite possible to reoccur after replacement. At first I expected you could reset your ECU as a program crash condition but, as I took the time to review all of the posts/pages here. the most likely problem, not being only a cold issue is, a crummy soldering condition. In cold temperatures metal retracts and that can cause crummy soldering to separate temporarily and reconnect once it warms.. And this condition could happen in the cold or, after rattling, sudden jolt or simple stopping in warm weather. . Moreover cold conditions might make it appear easier but cold or hot, poor soldering will turn into a short one way or another on any condition eventually. .

An old fix-it trick, but not actually' a 'trick' in TV repair is to hit all the soldering points on a circuit board with hot iron. One of the quick tricks especially for finding an intermittent problem to do this is, to power on a board confirm it's working and then use a cold spray on it which freezes the connection. it's a hit and miss test where you spray different spots, one at a time until ya find the spot. And if I've found just one, I'll re-melt any spot I can find.

I've personally magnified circuit boards on my computers and other modern electronic through the past 20 years with 40X and found poor soldering spots, heat em up and wala fixed it!.

So, while I do not have this issue, those who are electronically astute ought to try it, and perhaps confirm. When in doubt just re-melt every spot you can find.

If correct, you wouldn't need a whole new board nor require special instruments, (there's plenty info on the net to do this without dealer too) to provide the proper mileage.

And If I am correct, the issue is a poor quality problem. That would be why there've increased the warranty. Toyota also discovered a problem in quality control.. Hopefully, but not guarantied, they got a different manufacture to assemble them. If not, or not until years after, the same problematic parts are still out there.

Disclaimer: I am not a 'professional' electronics tech, nor a "professional' mechanic too. However, as need required through my years, with exception of need to learn basic programming, there's nothing I have not discovered how to fix.

Determination has always been my greatest tool.

 

OK - I am replying to my own post because I am 99.99 certain the Toyota dealership found the issue and fixed it. The problem seems to be that the wiring harness from the ECU to the trans axle was not pushed in to the point of locking in, ie it was in almost all the way but not to the point it 'clicked' (according to the tech). I am pretty sure the dealership is also the cause of the problem, as they worked on the car last November (14) and the problem first started happening in dec-14. Over time it gradually became more frequent to the point it was doing it almost every time you tried to put the car in park. Nothing else was effected by this as the car would still drive when you could get it into gear.
Anyway, since I took it into the dealership and they clicked the connection together it hasn't done it a single time. So while the 12 volt battery is definitely a suspect in this type of problem it isn't the only suspect. What made this difficult to resolve was it seemed to occur at random times until it reached a point where it was loose enough to do it almost every time, which made diagnosing the cause easier.

 

glad you got it resolved, thanks for getting back to us.

 

Essentially, You were, if it's fixed, experiencing an intermittent short by not having the plug/connector tight.. It would be corroding when electricity had to jump across the connectors, making it harder and harder to pass the signal/electricity. If that fixed it, 'click to lock in position', those connectors would need cleaning before calling it resolved. Plus if loose, dust oil and dirt may be in there too. If it happened to me, I'd want to know that both sides on the connectors were cleaned well for those two reasons, carbon build up from arcing and dirt from lose exposure. .

 

I am a driving instructor and while en route to a student it happened to me exactly as posted previously. I am in San Diego and in beautiful weather, no cold temps so its not cold related. My student was an advanced student and had a road test in a few days so I kept the appointment and used my Garmin GPS for speedometer. But the car ran for 2 + hours and the dash never came back on. At home I tried to disconnect the negative lead to the battery in hopes that it would at least turn the car off, but no go. After reading these posts I tried the holding the start button in for a few seconds turned it off. If the dash lights are still off tomorrow I will go to the dealer. I will post here whatever I find.

 

it's the combination meter that has an issue. there's an extended warranty for 9 years on this item, you can get a new one at the dealer.