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C2310 and P-lock malfunction

Discussion in 'Gen 3 Prius Care, Maintenance & Troubleshooting' started by jishi, Jan 2, 2019.

  1. jishi

    jishi Junior Member

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    2010 Prius
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    I have been reading through this forum several times to try and figure out how to troubleshoot my P-lock malfunction error. It started to warn me intermittently, to later on be a permanent error. However, the P-lock does engage (it wont roll), both on P button press, and ignition off, but the indicator LED on the button doesn't lit up. The P-mode in the dash will show the correct state though. The car drives and behaves normally, but occasionally (and more often recently), the battery will drain completely over night which might be related to the dashboard sometimes actually lit up with the warning, even though the car is off.

    My "easy" remedies so far has been to replace the 12V battery, and replace the big white relay in the engine fuse box (I have access a second identical car that I can "borrow" parts from).

    Now, none of these has helped, and I have gotten the error code stored from my shop (C2310), which says according to documentation I've found:

    Open or Short Circuit in Battery Circuit

    And possible causes

    - P CON MAIN fuse (I've checked the fuse, of course, and the P-mode works)
    - Transmission control ECU assembly
    - Wire harness or connector

    Now, the questions I have are:

    How do I reach the P actuator thing? That is mounted onto the transmission (to check the connector and the wire harness)? I've figured out I have to reach it from below the car, but can someone give more details on what side and if it is facing front or rear of the transmission?

    Anyone know where the Transmission control ECU assembly is located?

    The shop is gonna charge me around $350 just for troubleshooting, so I just wanna see if there are some means of troubleshooting I can do myself first and foremost.

    Any hints would be greatly appreciated!
     
  2. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    welcome!

    p-lock may be one of the most difficult to diagnose, or there may be no solution

    iirc, you have to pull the engine/tranny for access.

    have you tried the on line service manual for trouble shooting?

    how many miles on her? any chance of rodent damage to the wiring harness?
     
  3. JimboPalmer

    JimboPalmer Tsar of all the Rushers

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    One frequent 'mis-reported error' for P-lock is a low 12 volt battery. Before tearing apart the car, make sure that the 12 volt battery is over 12 volts after sitting over night and not started. Also check the jump point under the hood, as it might be bad 12 volt cables. If both of those are over 12 volts, start the car and it should jump to near 14.5 volts.
     
  4. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    was his post too long for you to read jumbo?
     
    Raytheeagle likes this.
  5. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    The C2310 code does say "battery circuit" in its fortune cookie, which will often send people rushing to the 12 volt battery ... and yes, that could be part of the picture, but not necessarily so. The detection condition for the code is that the voltage arriving at the BATT terminal of the transmission control ECU is 8 volts or less, for 1 second or more, when the car power is ON.

    There are three pages in the manual for troubleshooting, which mostly amount to confirming the resistance of the P CON MAIN fuse (below 1 Ω) and later of the whole circuit from there to the ECU's BATT terminal, asking the ECU what voltage it's actually seeing at that terminal (happy is 9 to 14), and checking for no shorts in the wiring (more than 10 kΩ resistance is good from the circuit to body ground or other terminals).

    I think the transmission control ECU is one of those living in ECU-ville behind the glove box.
     
  6. jishi

    jishi Junior Member

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    I managed to find the Transmission control behind the glovebox, it was the black box in there with two white connectors. Following the wiring diagram I read the voltage on pin 15 on the A23 connector which should have a permanent 12V on it, and it reads 0V. No measurable resistance to GND, so it is at least not shorted.

    Now, There is 12V on both end of the P CON main fuse, so seems that the wire somewhere in between has got damaged. There is supposedly a junction connector which is labeled A52 and A53 in the wiring diagram, however I haven't found any documentation on where the junction connectors reside, which makes it a bit hard to verify the voltage there. On the plus side, this should confirm that the Transmission Control is intact at least :)

    Someone (probably the initial dealer) has installed an engine heater and zip-tied the heater cable onto the harness close to the center of the engine room, which if I'm unlucky has teared off the cable in there. The zip tie is proorly placed, just outside of the harder, plastic tube that hosts the harness, which means that the only thing between the cables and the zip tie is some black tape. However, it is really tight and impossible to visually inspect in place, I need to either make room by removing stuff, or it would be possible to get the harness out for inspection...

    If I could just find the junction, I could at least identify which section of the harness that is damaged.

    And just to repeat, I did change the 12V battery first thing when this started to occur. It was 7 years old so it was due replacement either way, and I've now verified that the BATT cable for the transmission control is indeed lacking power.
     
    #6 jishi, Jan 3, 2019
    Last edited: Jan 3, 2019
  7. jishi

    jishi Junior Member

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    I think rodent damage is unlikely, I don't think that is very common here in Sweden, but I don't know. It has done around 110k kilometers, which is around 70k miles. It's the first year of gen3, 2010 and produced in 2009.
     
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  8. Chuckx

    Chuckx New Member

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    My solution was passenger door handle malfunction l disconnected the good sized electrical plug behind the handle its self 2 screws whole door panel just pulls off a little force needed 5min fix

    Others possible causes listed...

    1. ToyotaPartDeal web site 33820 47020
    CABLE ASSY, TRANSMISSION CONTROL

    2. Transmission Moisture build up was causing a high voltage leak error code P to engage error, changed fluid.

    3. Transmission plug on park control motor being loose. remove plug and spray some contact cleaner. Then look for any likely spots for water getting in.

    4. Fuse number 34 is P CON MAIN fuse 7.5 amp Parking controlsystem, hybrid vehicle immobilizer system P Con Main fuse swap out worked triangle P lock error gone