Panel lights Skid - Engine Check on, Won't Start

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Western_PA_Bob @ Apr 12 2006, 01:02 PM) [snapback]238598[/snapback]</div>

Hi Bob,

Take a few deep breaths and try not to panic, which of course is easy for me to say since it's not my Prius being loaded onto the flatbed. Prius have great reliability figures, so we know you haven't made a general error buying a Prius. Even with well made and well designed equipment, there are some failures, and your Prius is the lucky (or unlucky) statistic. It's going to be a bad control box or some such component that the dealer will swap out under warrenty, and everything will be good as new.

Hang in there,
Tom

 

[

hi!

terrible when this happens..... i think warranty should cover this anyway
as far as i know there are not much faults on the prius,, If You search the forum You will se this.
few post with error compared to numbers of members and total posts

anyway , could be some of the main electronics gone bad in your case,, or i guess that if You have a fault in "break by wire" system the prius computer will not allow you to drive at all.... no brakes no driving....

Cheers
Andreas



Anyway, if anyone with more experience can shed some light, or just some assurance that this wasn't the most expensive mistake I've ever made- it would be appreciated.

Bob
[/quote]

 

This sounds suspiciously like what happened to my wife's car yesterday.

http://priuschat.com/index.php?showtopic=18213&hl=

She had all the dash lights that you show lit up, such as the VSC, ABS, and brake.

Has anyone had a major problem with their Prius and have not had all the dash lights come on. From the various posts I've read, it seems like whenever something significant comes happens, all the lights turn on.

For instance, my wife's car acted like it ran out of gas and the engine won't come on anymore. What does the engine have to do with VSC, ABS, or for that matter the brakes? The brake hydrolics don't require the engine.

 

What did it say on the MFD. I can see a red icon there at the top corner, but not what it said. The Prius can be helpful in that it gives relevant messages.

 

i think you did make a smart choice, even if something's up. the prius has one of the lowest problem rates around, as well as one of the highest customer satisfaction ratings.

it's a brake issue the car may have gone into kind of a "safe mode", which would be indicated by the power button light changing to amber color.

interact with the dealership, talk to the tech, make sure he completely understands what happened. this is a job for a good diagnostic tech and they represent a minority of guys out there in the shop. how long it's out of service depends on who is working on your car- use this as an opportunity to evaluate that dealership and decide if you're going back. and as an opportunity to find out more about your car (by lots of reading here on PC) so you feel more comfortable with it in the future.

have them tell you the error codes they read and we'll be able to help more.

good luck.

 

Bob, thank you *very* much for sharing.

Galaxee and others will provide explanations; i'll just reassure you that there is a close to 100% likelihood your car's bug will be found and fixed, and you will have a long and satisfying ownership experience thereafter.

Why can I say this ? I've never read otherwise, and I have been reading *all* Prius related news for 3 years now.

So hang in there, and thanks again for allowing us to peak over your shoulder.

 

Sounds kinda fishy to me.

If you initially got brake and abs/vsc warning lights yesterday I would suspect a problem in those systems.

The trouble codes you posted are present on most new priuses and have nothing to do with the brakes.

There are probably a few more codes set that they did'nt mention.

Good Luck.

JaymanVA

 

Those codes don't sound like OBDII diagnostic trouble codes. The
Prius [and indeed, most modern cars] is very good at telling a tech
what ails it -- but the tech has to be paying attention, and the
chain of "telephone" back to the service writer has to be reliable.
So you're not getting the real story yet. You're a nuts and bolts
guy who can probably tell when the BS meter starts tickling -- be
persistent and keep asking for *exactly* what they found and what
they fixed. Even if it's "replaced hybrid ECU", or some other big
hammer that doesn't really localize it...
.
_H*

 

are you sure they said "b" or could it be "p" instead?

will have to do some digging...

also: any part replaced under warranty goes back to toyota- for analysis of reasons why it failed.

 

Go to http://techinfo.toyota.com spend $10 for a day and download all the PDFs. It took me a few hours and i'm sorting everything out but its well worth the money. I actually bought 2 days because I did not have ehough time to download everything. I also bought a day at http://techdoc.toyota-europe.com for 16euro. I bought a day there to get info on some of the Euro Prius stuff that I needed.

 

The stuff from TIS is not only useful if you want to work on your
prius, it's a good read for just generally understanding how it and
many other modern cars work. Be sure to grab all the "technician
training" stuff while you're there; it also reveals much.
http://techno-fandom.org/~hobbit/cars/TIS/ has random indexing
material which may help in constructing file lists, but it's mostly
geared to '04 prius and a couple of other cars and is approaching
a year out of date by now.
.
_H*

 

http://wiki.ehow.com/Respond-When-Your-200...ta-Prius-Stalls

How to "Respond When Your 2004 Prius Stalls"

Respond When Your 2004 Toyota Prius Stalls

This is a recalled problem from Toyota. Contact your dealer.
Having problems with your Prius? Try these suggestions next time your hybrid car acts up.
There appears to be more than one failure mode that causes the computer to lock up.
Start button doesn't work normally when starting with a cold start (Just won't boot)
Prius operates normally but stops, with all lights on. Some have happened at highway speeds and sometimes it happens in a parking lot. Note, in this failure mode, if the key pod is in the "keeper" it will not allow the key to be removed.

Steps for problem #1

If it won't start, try to "reboot" the computer by pressing down the start button. Hold it down for at least 45 seconds.
If all the warning lights come on, press the brake-pedal down as hard as you can, and then press the start button.

Steps for problem #2

All systems are operating except that you cannot put the car in gear.
Hold down the Start button for at least 45 seconds with your foot on the Brake.
Release the button, Wait 10 seconds or so... all lights might remain on.
Remove your foot from the Brake...press the Start button to turn off the car. It should shut down normally. See if you can remove the key from the pod.
If fixed, start the car normally with your foot on the brake.

 

I just left a big ol' comment in that "ehow" thing to the effect
that this MYTH about holding down the power button has to be cut
off at the pass. My dealer had this misimpression too, and I have
found NO substantiation that it does anything. It's the quantity
of reboots, not how long you hold the switch. I'm not going to
screw with actually editing the entry; I want whoever created it to
go fix their mistake. Sheesh.
.
_H*

 

i second what hobbit said.

in fact, to quote directly from the training module:

"once the condition returns to normal, the MIL will turn off after 3 warm-up cycles."

holding down the start button basically is like an emergency shutoff. it shuts the car off. period.