I love these cars

Just a re-intro; I've not posted here in a year or so and not very often at all. But not because y'all haven't been amazing - the car is just amazing. I bought my first Gen 1 in '02. It had a salvage title from being in an accident, but had been repaired like new. Everyone in my family has used that car at times, and we were still loving it when I sold it with 159k miles to a nice family for their daughter's first car. I never felt more confident that a car buyer would be happy with their purchase from me. Never a problem once I finally replaced the troublesome original battery. It looked and ran great.

I have three more now, all bought at auctions, the last from a Texas flood auction this week. The first of these was beautiful. Only 90k original miles, clean and ran perfect. So, I bought another several months ago, but it's still in my Dallas storage lot. I've not even looked at it, and it's very low mileage, but I'm told nothing lights up when you turn the key.

But, last week someone wrecked my beautiful car - crunched the driver's front side. Still drives perfect, but all those body parts, including the hood, have to be replaced. I'm a DIY guy, so I go look for another Prius at the auction to use for parts, and buy the flood car.

However, I think it might be salvageable. The adjustor marked the water level as only reaching the bottom of the doors and from a quick inspection, that appears to be accurate. No water in the oil and nothing over the floorboard level appears to have gotten wet, although there is some moldiness from sitting in the auction yard. I haven't actually even looked at it yet, but my son says there's no juice When he jumped it, the dash lights up, but it doesn't try to start. He also says the shift lever moves too freely.

I'll post more later, just wanted to give any Gen 1 experts a heads up that I could use some help. Has anyone posted a checklist for diagnosing no-starts on these cars? If so, I'd love a link.

 

Well, thinking that third car might be salvageable, I bid on a fourth car, another flooder, and just found out I won it too. It looks great, but I think the water went higher. I'll take the parts off it to fix my first one, and maybe the other two. BTW, I'll probably have some parts available, if anyone needs something. Are hybrid batteries worth anything if they get wet?

 

mistake

 

Yeah, I'm mostly a Ford diesel guy and live on those forums. I got the first '01 for my daughter's graduation. She moved on and gave it back, and we passed it around after that. I bought it in Chicago and spent less than $30 in gas to drive back to Texas. I drive my trucks all over - just came back from a 10,000 mile trip to Anchorage. Amazing drive.

I think of the Prius as balancing out my carbon footprint.

Haven't paid more than $1000 for any of these recent cars. The driver's insurance gave me $4000 for the one that got wrecked, but I'm negotiating to keep it so will get a little less. The parts car was just a few hundred, plus painting and I'll have my wrecked one looking good for about $1000. Some more of the money bought the salvageable and will fix it. I figure to have it looking good for, maybe $1500. Then, I sell the parts car carcass to the scrap yard after removing easy parts. I should end up with two nice cars and my initial $1000 investment back. I'll sell the original (clean title) for about $3500 and keep the salvageable car with the flood title. Still gotta figure out what to do with the one in my storage yard.

But, if I don't get either one to start, or it costs too much to fix them, I'll still get my original fixed with money left over.

 

BTW, I've bought around 70 cars for personal use in my life (60). Lots of BMWs, including the first Z3 shipped to Texas, lots of VWs, 4 LandCruisers and one Lexus 470, these Priuses, lots of Ford diesels trucks (I drive a F450 now), the first XK8 Jaguar in Texas, a Chevy truck and van, three Ford F-450 ambulances (still got two - great campers), a F550 bucket truck, open trailers, enclosed trailers, a gooseneck, a classic lineman's trailer (powerlines - still have it), a Nissan Sentra. I'm probably forgetting something.

 

Thanks. I probably just need a basic checklist to go through at this point. I've worked on a lot of cars, but I've never had to work on my Pruis or any hybrid, so I'm a bit lost. Definitely not an expert at anything, but I can kinda follow directions.

 

And I should have added, that the Toyotas performed better than all of them. I've also have a Camry right now and had a Previa in the 90s. I'll reach out to Bob. Thanks

 

OK, I checked the car. The ignition is messed up. It won't rotate left to the OFF position and the key won't come back out of the ignition. I had to force the key out in the ON position, which leaves everything lit up, which is probably why the 12v battery is dead, and I assume the hybrid?

There is no sign that the water got to the hybrid. The owner left personal stuff in paper bags in the trunk, which is below the battery level, and they don't appear to have gotten wet. No signs of water touching the seats. I think it just got in the floorboards.

I'm thinking the owner just abandoned it after seeing it in water. It's an old and unusual car, and maybe the tow truck driver didn't know where the transmission release was and broke the ignition to unlock the steering wheel and put it in neutral. Probably pulled hard on the shift lever; it is kinda sloppy.

When you try to start, the Info display and seems like some other lights - maybe the aftermarket CD player - go out or dim like the battery is dead. But the upper display - MPH, gas, etc., stays on. I know the battery I'm jumping with is good.

I guess it might also be the security system. I don't know that this is the original key, or that it has the right chip inside, or even if it has one at all. What happens when you try to start with the wrong key? Does the dash dim out?

 

LOL, reading some old threads here, it seems I might not love my car as much as I claim. I read that on some newer models, when the key is struck it's a battery issue. Forcing it out, as I did, is not a good thing. Now, I'm at square one again. Definitely the 12v is discharged. I'll put it on the charger tomorrow. But wouldn't a fresh 12v via jumper cables overcome that? Is the big battery dead too? The security system? Hmm where to start?

 

Thanks, I'll message him.

Heard back from insurance and they only deducted $250 from my payout to let me keep the car. Woohoo. Also found out that the second flooder I bought, the one I thought would be my parts car, still has a clean title. Either that's a mistake because the system down here is inundated with a million flood cars, or it really didn't get enough water to deserve that notation on the title, or most likely, the seller was a private owner dumping a flood car that he didn't have C&C insurance on. I'll go pick it up next week. Don't know which of the two to keep and which to part out to fix the others. Honestly, all four look like great Gen 1s with years of life left.