My 2006 Prius Wrecked! :(

Hi Mylar

Sorry to know that the dealer did not take care of the details. Good luck with your diminished value claim. I hope at least the car will drive flawlessly in the coming days.

About my side of the story: today my insurance took the car to the shop that I authorized. I already authorized before writing the mail to you . The shop just called me and told me there are damage in the package tray area as well, and the insurance simply did not acknowledge that (the initial damage report was made by the insurance adjuster) She also told me that the package tray is part of the car's structural part, which got compromised. And there are also some minor roof damage. I am still desperately trying to make the insurance company total the car. I will post update about my situation. BTW, do u have any idea what package tray is? And how important structural part it is of the Car?

Thanks.

 

The package tray runs behind the rear seat back cushion. If that was damaged, then I guess your Camry was hit very hard in the rear.

 

I got an updated estimate today. Now the estimate is 16,097.97. Yet the insurance is vehemently refusing to total the car. I paid autoloss.com to submit a DV claim also. Let's see what happens. thanks for all of your help.

 

Foyzur,

do you have a list of the repaired work ? and part replaced ?

our 2004 Prius just got wrecked, somewhat similar to yours and Allstate is declaring it total, with the repair cost of at least $14K. The assessor stopped adding once it was over the vehicle value.

Since there is no liquid leakage; i think it may be just cosmetic. Although the radiator has definitely been moved back a couple of inches. The coolant reservoir may be shot and am thinking of taking it out all together; since the vehicle doesn't really need it for operation. Toyota even did away with the reservoir in later models.

The Prius front end is kinda of a joke, with the aluminum U-bar bolted on to the soft "frame" members, who are at an angle. It looks like it was really design to bend and give at the slightest bump. Does any one have access to a drawing of how the front end is put together ?

Thanks in advance..

 

The coolant reservoir tech was replaced with exhaust heat recovery tech in the GenIII. Removing it all together wont be a net 0 change.

The hood area was designed to give on impact, that is the point. Remember back to physics and collisions. If the entire frame was rigid, then you would smash into something and either stop very suddenly or bounce back. By adding things that crush and bend, the car "gradually" slows so it doesn't injure the weakest link in the vehicle (the humans). And the hood area is designed especially to prevent the maiming of pedestrians when they are smucked in a cross-walk which happens more than you may think.

For drawings on how things go together, I find exploded views helpful. On the online parts catalogues where you select which part you need, generally they are exploded views with the parts numbers.

 

the coolant recovery is really meant for speedy warm up right ? am just wondering if the ECU still allow the vehicle to run without it.

I hear you about the crumper zone, but may be a spring/coil or something; or a design to protect vehicle damage, say up to 5mphr

Great idea on the parts catalogues exploded view, thanks

 

My '04 Prius has over 182Kmiles, so they deducted $2K from "market" average and came up with $12.7 K; unfortunately it was driven by my teenager, who was clearly at fault. We're offered $8.6K and keep the wrecked, which is probably what I'll do.

 

I don't think anyone has tried, however it seems like it is just a relay operated device, so your relay will still click on as if the thermos was supposed to be pumping but nothing.

To total your car, you were going more than 5mph. There is a "5mph bumper" law actually, surprised you brought it up. A vehicle must be cheap to repair if involved in a low speed (< 5mph) collision on the bumpers. This is why even extremely expensive cars, have very plastic like bumpers.

A spring or coil wont work at all. It is against physics. Remember that the yield strength of metal is different than the flex strength. If you don't crumple, then the human suffers. If you crumple, you will not ever get back to normal. Plain and simple.

 

Hi pbui

State Farm finally decided to total the car. The settlement details isn't here yet. I am attaching the final estimate of repairs (after redacting). I will keep you guys posted.

BTW, I believe they decided to total the car after I submitted a 9K diminished value report from autoloss.com and along with that I personally wrote a fiery mail (which I also copied to the supervisor of my adjuster). You can also take similar action if you want to total the car. Thanks.