Am I out of gas, or is the hybrid battery dead?

you right on the 10 year cusp. do what jc recommended in post #18, many have had good luck with toyota helping to pay for the battery.

 

they always sound like that, just interns taking info. you can also ask the dealer to call them. all the best!

 

You cannot run out of gas and continue to drive on the battery alone to safety in a Gen II. (How do I know this????)
It will simply run out of gas and leave you stranded like any other car with only very quick warning signs.

Unless you are driving it very aggressively, the gas engine will stutter as it starves of fuel....but you will not feel or hear it because it is so smooth, but the car will loose it's "pep" if you press the gas. But it will continue to roll along just fine as the battery and electric motor drain themselves supplementing the lost power as the engine dies. You will see your SOC meter drop precipitously over the course of about a mile or so, but by then, it is too late. The engine continues to run....but only staggers as it starves of fuel. By the time it stops altogether, your HV battery is dead and you are rolling to a stop. No gas, no charge, and stranded.

I too, monitor my miles since last fill-up and use the average mpg over my tank capacity to determine when to fill next time on my odometer plus a generous safety cushion....and I too, was burned when I ran out less than half way to that estimate. It does happen and it is freakishly odd, since I was only 167 miles into what should have been a 450 mile tankful. I usually put between 8 and 10 gallons in a fill-up, and have found that the tank will take up to 11 1/2 gallons on an experiment. You also have to watch out, because the tank can get very stubbourn on filling and act full when it most definitely is not.

The good news is, once you fill up, everything is fine once again. I had no issues as a result of the event.

 

Well, he's tried fill up (4 gallons), and no joy. I'm still wondering if the dealership is being remiss, have heard there's some special charger they can bring in, can recharge batteries drained extraordinarily low, typically due to the out-of-gas scenario.

 

I would double check on "car will let the battery get dangerously low on a gas run-out situation" theory.

I personally do not know, but it just doesn't sound right. Perhaps a real techy guy could weigh in on it.

It may be a weakness of the HV batt that was triggered by the run-out causing it to discharge low, but not an allowance by the battery computer sensing an emergency. Before I'd let a dealership or garage mech sell you an expensive "treatment", I'd get somebody here who knows better to clear it up.

 

i ran out in my '08 and drove until the battery quit and the dash lit up. a few gallons of gas, and i was on my way.
perhaps it depends on the health of your battery to begin with.

 

From your attached image it appears that the battery was at least trying to charge. That is a good sign. If you left it to idle in park did it eventually recharge that battery to 3+ blue bars? Did you try that?

 

Hang on, I'm confused now. That was your photo wasn't it?

 

Exactly! A fuel run out or any scenario that prevents the gas engine from running is very stressful on the hybrid battery. Healthy packs can bounce right back but weak packs typically do not. It's the same thing I tell my customers about their 12 Volt batteries, "you left your dome light on and completely drained your battery but it's only 2 years old so it should re charge and be fine, if it was 6 years old and you did that it would be done".

In my experience there are typically 2 things that can make the ICE stop running 1) It ran out of gas, or 2) The MAF sensor and or intake got so dirty that it wouldn't run anymore. It's normally a 50/50 split between the two causes so before I ever attempt to restart a car in this situation I fill it up, clean the intake and MAF and disconnect/reconnect the 12 Volt battery for a few minutes to reboot the main ECU.

When you run your hybrid battery down this far you'll only have a few shots at starting the ICE before it won't have enough voltage to role the motor generator anymore.

Matt

 

Ok I see. That energy monitor display was an anomaly then.

I recently had a failed HV battery, but the energy monitor display still seemed to work. It would drive ok for a while with all the warning lights on like yours, and seemingly still using what limited battery capacity was there.

If I drove it for too long like that however, then it would get really bad and suddenly stop using the battery at all, high engine revs but barely any power. The battery cooling fan would start roaring in the back and the SOC bars would fall, but nothing would make it produce any charge going into the battery. When it did that I stopped straight away and let everything cool for an hour or so, and then it would drive normally again (at least for a while - like it got me home).

 

CONGRATS!!

You can ask Toyota corporate to negotiate the price of the battery and price it as "warranty" pricing. That will be much less than "retail" labor rates.

If they are providing $2500, that should cover almost the entire battery if they price it with "warranty" pricing and not "retail" pricing.

I suggest you don't do the other repairs yet. They seem very expensive and it's probably a very minor leak you're dealing with. Best to address the battery first.

 

You can call back and ask that they price the repair at the "warranty" price rate. That's actually standard practice for them. You can call your Toyota representative as many times as you want. They are just here to help

What you accepted is $2500 towards the repair.....that's not going to change.