Is this normal?=Prius has not been driven much lately[corona virus], hybrid battery discharges fast.

IF.....the battery is 12 years old, there might not be anything you can do.......since it might not be capable of a "full strong charge" anymore.

Otherwise, a long drive might be helpful.
All downhill with a tail wind would work best.
(sorry)

 

might be worth investing in a prolong charger. that will help rejuvinate the cells.

you can try flooring it with the e brake on and foot on the brake tocharge it up, but idk if that helps in any way.

 

I don't think either of those things is a really good piece of advice for your average owner.

 

I use Prolong charger and discharger once or twice a year to keep the battery on my '07 with 227K miles in good shape. So far so good, but I do drive the car quite a bit, even now.

 

you're welcome to your opinion

 

Play old car games, win old car prizes.

 

Ski dive you have been on this site for 12 years but always ask a question that has beaten and flogged to death like this question.

Every single tiny issue on the g2 battery has been Examined ad nauseum.
Do you not ever read any posts?

This just in you need to drive an old g2 every day or its hybrid battery will die. Your doing all you can to kill yours.

 

Thanks!

As I've posted elsewhere, my G2 was put out of commission nearly a year ago and hadn't been started in 6 months when I got it,with the red triangle on. I've tried starting it up, even driving it on short trips, just a few times. Resetting the codes and it seems that the more I drive it the longer it takes to turn on the red triangle. (Kind of like the 12V battery which was also 0V dead and wouldn't take a charge at first. Now it works fine, starts the car, charges up to 12.9V works all the accessories, etc.)

I work about a mile away and normally just bike there. But I wonder if there would be a benefit to just keep driving the Prius to work and back to see if that works the battery's problems out. Suggestions? Thoughts?

Meanwhile I have a Bluetooth OBDII adapter ordered so I can track actual battery progress, if there's any.

 

Seems like that's what you'll need to do. Or at least every other day. I'd install an engine block heater so the cold starts and idling aren't as hard on it. Or start it right after the hottest part of the day. Or both.

 

a mile each way doesn't even warm up the engine. take the scenic route

 

I'm afraid the car might leave me stranded. I guess I could drive back and forth a couple times. There's a loud noise coming from the drive train that is either the busted bumper rubbing on the tires or a wheel bearing or something. It looks like I got the bumper taped up so it's not touching anything. The CV joint boots look fine.

I do plan on getting a block heater and plugging it in both at home and at work.

 

you'll need to read the codes, but a battery conditioner might help. although, that wouldn't explain the noise

 

Ya, I've thought about that. But those conditioners seem a bit expensive ($400-$600). I'd hate to invest in one and then have to come up with the money for a new battery anyway. I guess I'll know more once I can read the codes. But it does seem like a convenient way to keep the battery up and running, if there aren't cells that are too far gone of course.

Just a question. Why do you think the hybrid battery [self]discharges fast? Is this just by looking at the dash after a few days? How many days? Or is this with an app that monitors actual voltage numbers?

I'm no expert but NiMH batteries do have a high self-discharge rate. And from what I understand, normal driving doesn't full charge these batteries. (Going down a long mountain pass does, although it's not good to put a battery through that often.) So put two and two together and yes, it would make sense to start it up and charge those batteries from time to time.

I guess the question is how much are they really draining? A low battery simbol on the dash doesn't necessarily mean the battery is dead and being damaged. I do believe that keeping cell voltages over 1.1V is best, or about 184.8V for the whole battery. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you had a way of measuring the entire battery voltage every day and ran the car only once it self discharged to that voltage you should be fine.

Another thought, I'm thinking of perhaps doing, maybe... I was thinking to take apart the entire battery, put the modules on bus bars in a completely parallel configuration, and put a 6V battery maintainer on it. The maintainer would keep the voltage around 7V, or almost 1.2V per cell. Of course it wouldn't keep the cells balanced through cycling, but at least should help keep the battery from self-discharging.

Anyone ever try charging individual modules with something like this: Tenergy Charger for 2.4V-7.2V NiMH/NiCD Battery Pack - Tenergy ?

 

It's kind of guaranteed to work like that. It's just a question of how much time there is between buying the conditioner and buying the new battery, and whether that's worth the price.

 

I've help rebuild batteries with the equipment .

So an additional way to get more for your money with the Prolong equipment .

Just depends on what options you want to consider and then go after.

 

What is a prolong charger?

 

Welcome to PriusChat!!

Toyota | Hybrid Automotive

 

It is a device that plugs into a regular home outlet (aka the grid) and slowly charges your hybrid battery while the car is parked. The idea is to charge all the way up to capacity SLOWLY and keep it there for a several hours in order to balance the battery modules at the top. To do so at the bottom, there is a dis-charger, which is a separate piece of equipment and it dis-charges the battery SLOWLY to a preset level. This balances the modules on the bottom. It takes two or three full charge-discharge cycles to recondition the battery. It can take a few days. I have a set of these machines and do a recondition about once a year on my 2007 Gen 2 with 228K miles. Been doing it since 175K miles when I first bought the car. Seems to work well since my battery (which is original) shows no signs of weakness (knock on wood). The system is expensive to buy, but I got a really good deal on the car and figured I'd put the money into the hybrid battery prophylactic measure. So far so good. I love my Prius! Best car I ever had (and I had many!).