Any way to keep inverter pump alive once it starts croaking?

That's just it... the OEM ones tend not to fail after three months. That's the specific property that makes them worth more money.

The Amazon ones are for when you're about to sell the car.

 

Well looks like you learned your lesson. You can buy another amazon POS pump and gamble or get a factory one and have it last 200K miles. Sorry but this is common on lots of car parts and I have been bitten too. Cheap subaru brake discs(2 cars!) cured me.

 

I learned this lesson with two fake pumps they both worked about 90 days then in order not to pay the whatever it is $140 for the original pump which is not unreasonable for a mag drive type pump I used them in my koi ponds I took another pump and put it in place of the inverter pump and plugged it up to the vehicle and it's been sitting in there for about 2 years now not missed a beat and that pump is the 14.1 volt iron might spa circ pump looking pump that is between your brake stroke simulator and your brake actuator right behind the inverter a flashlight will show it to you It already has barbs on the pump that fit the hoses that the inverter pump is connected to now I can't post pictures here easily so I don't. But that pump has been in there and it's dead quiet you can't even hear it You have to get out of the car and open the hood and put your hand on it or look at the jug to make sure it's running this is the 14.1 volt spa pump that's up there where I said it is I tried to use the one that moves the coolant heat tank water that's rated at 12 volts with a sticker on it from nippondenso. That pump rated 12 volts lasted exactly 15 or 18 days and died I don't know why both of the pumps look exactly the same but the heat tank storage pump is marked 12 volts The one between the brake parts is March 14.1 it's been working ever since I'll probably never have to change it.

 

And don't worry about a year and a half ago during the winter time here in North Carolina which should be similar in Indiana You're probably colder I drove a whole winter with a non-working inverter pump without any consequence highway and City driving No problem and we drive the car it doesn't drive us never once did it get hot cut back the power anything worked flawlessly I even did it in the summer a couple of times on the highway but not in town with the heat saturation If you're moving smartly down the road and air flow is coming through the front of the car that inverter is sitting practically smack in the air path so it should maintain operating temperature It's when you would be stopped or going extremely slow that would be the problem usually we don't have to experience these things out where we live. Then I swapped out my inverter pumping situation and haven't looked back.

 

But... you can buy 5 cheap aftermarket ones for the price of one OEM one... So if you don't mind swapping them out early (1/2 the time they last just as long as OEM) it's a great way to save money.

 

$25 pumps are a great way to save money compared to price of OEM... I've learned my lesson that it's the best way to go, they are far more reliable than you think and once you get good at changing them, swapping the ones that occasionally fail early is no big deal.

 

Pennywise and pound foolish. It isn't hard to change this pump, but it is inconvenient to have one fail, and inconvenient to have to replace it. To me it is easily worth the $100(ish) difference between the super cheap noname and OEM pumps to avoid that inconvenience.

 

Lol, the friends and family I work for would rather save money with slightly increased risk... Have gotten so fast at changing these that I charge like $30 labor in labor to replace a $25 pump and if the pump fails early I don't charge for labor to put another one in, but there's usually other maintenance, cleaning and detailing I do that make up for my loss.

 

To get a genuine part with a little bit of savings, I would suggest ordering from a Toyota dealer that operates an online parts sales operation. Only some of them do.

Here's a search result from one that does. I've never done business with them myself.

As always, verify part application yourself.

 

Agreed. There are many such dealers in SoCal and the amount of price variation can be significant.

I have seen posts claiming that Aisin makes the OEM pump for Toyota. Don't know if it is true or not. But if it is, then buying one from a reputable online parts source, like rockauto.com, would be another way to go. The Aisin is $95 there now. Buying a Dorman pump is not a good choice - I had one and it failed in short order. Not outright, but sometimes when the car started it didn't. Intermittent failures are in some ways even worse than just giving up the ghost. Too bad about the Dorman, because it was a pretty decent pump, other than that "not working all the time" part.

 

My Prius is 12 years old with 295,000 miles and still has the original oem water pumps, front pads and all rotors. OEM is the way to go. So it is much more than five times 3 months better on the water pump, it’s more like 48 times and counting. Changing coolant once in a while helps as well.

The online Toyota dealers vary in price but are usually 11-25% off msrp. For example inverter pump G9020-47031 for a gen2 is $186 msrp, which is what you would pay if you just walk into the dealer.

But in my area it is $142 if I order it online and pick it up at the dealer. That is 24% off with no shipping cost.

But you have to shop. Another nearby dealer was 22% off while a third was 11%. Last week there was a national online sale that took another 25% at select dealers in another state but included free shipping. So it is worth it to shop for oem.

 

If Aisin is really making pumps for Toyota, that's hilarious because I bought one of their pumps for $25 and it didn't work for very long. Right now I'm waiting for the next car with a bad pump to test this OSIAS pump I got for $30: OSIAS Electric Inverter Water Pump For TOYOTA PRIUS 04000-32528 G902047031 | eBay

 

I appreciate your brake pad longevity experiment. I'm at 285K on orginal brakes and just ordered the pads & shoes because I'm getting intermittent ugly noisy at times when braking below 6mph and as much as I want to push it to the metal on metal sound, I don't want to push it during the holidays when I'll be driving 1800 miles.

 

That's assuming it was a genuine Aisin pump and not a counterfeit. The counterfeiters latch on to big brands.

 

If you do anything online, buy from a "reputable" source - such as a Toyota dealer or maybe rockauto. There are lots of stories about counterfeit parts, esp from ebay and amazon.

I get pumps from the local Toyota dealer and really don't expect any problems for around 100k miles.

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