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All Fuel Level bars flashing. No check engine, no triangle, no start

Discussion in 'Generation 1 Prius Discussion' started by nimblemotors, May 1, 2021.

  1. nimblemotors

    nimblemotors Re Member

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    So I searched and never found a real answer to this condition. After cat number 3 stolen, I have a straight pipe on it now, and it has been working great for weeks. My wife went to borrow it, and fill it up with fuel, and it got this condition and would not start the engine. I think she killed the HV battery driving it 1 mile home on just battery.

    It will crank it once, but not start.

    My 12v battery is all good, I jumped it with another good one just to be sure, same result.

    I saw in one search this indicates a "Link Error". What is not linking? Why engine not start?

    BTW, the last one I bought, the actual engine finally died, blown headgasket or rings, so took straight pipe off it and put it on this one that had cat stolen.
     
  2. landspeed

    landspeed Active Member

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    Has the car run out of petrol? I ask because it isn't possible to drain the battery driving it on just the battery, and the NWH11 doesnt even have an EV button;

    However your HV battery may be drained if the engine cut out and it was then driven on battery?
     
  3. nimblemotors

    nimblemotors Re Member

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    Car has 3/4 tank before wife went to fill it up. She also tested the A/C before this, which requires the engine to run, so it was running then.
    Makes me wonder if running the a/c created the problem, as it has not been run in a long time. She said it worked but not great (was about to drive it 600 mile trip)

    You can drive a gen1 prius just on battery power when the engine stops running.
     
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  4. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    I think what landspeed was saying is the engine normally won't stop running if the battery needs charge. Of course if there was an engine problem that already prevented it starting.

    You probably knew this question was coming: what are you doing to get the trouble codes?
     
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  5. nimblemotors

    nimblemotors Re Member

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    I did not have my odb2 scanner yesterday, today I checked it and it has a P3106. (note there is no check engine light on)
    This is link failure from ECM to HV ECU. So I am hoping just a fuse blown to the engine computer caused it to stop running,
    or failed relay? Checking those now.
     
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  6. Josey

    Josey Active Member

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    The P3106 has 4 subcodes. Does your scanner give you those?
     
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  7. nimblemotors

    nimblemotors Re Member

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    I just have basic odb2 scanner, so no subcodes.

    Checks all the relays (swap with horn relay, check if horn still works) and all good.

    It was the IGN 15amp fuse. Swapped it with the DOME fuse and engine starts up, and now I get triangle and check engine light.
    Since I guess then, the engine computer is the one that is setting those lights, and it was dead, which must be why they flash the fuel gauge instead.

    I suspect the problem may have been the o2 sensor wires, since no cat or rear o2, the wires were dangling, and probably connected and shorted out and blew the fuse. So i've secured them.

    Good news is the HV battery was not run dead by driving it on EV power, good to know.

    Hope that helps someone searching in the future.
     
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  8. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    Seems to be a common complication of cat theft.
     
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  9. Paul Schenck

    Paul Schenck Active Member

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    I had this happen once when I ran out of gas and drained the high voltage battery trying to getting to the gas station. The car was dead it wouldn’t even start when AAA got there.
    I charged the 12 volt (it didn’t need it but what the hell) over night, reset the codes in the morning and it started (a little rough, but started, and then seemed to be fine


    iPhone ?
     
  10. Jonicraw

    Jonicraw Junior Member

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    Thanks for the post! I was able to solve my issue with your troubleshooting. Not the IGN fuse but the EFI. Attached pictures. CAT theft problem + Dangling O2 sensor = Instant fuse short. A year later problem solved (Many more life priorities and not urgent) but car runs. Thanks again!

    Posted in my original forum post as well.

    2001 Prius Won't Start | PriusChat
     

    Attached Files:

  11. Marcelo J Aliberti

    Marcelo J Aliberti New Member

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    I can only see 8 15 Amp fuses: EFI, AM2, DOME, THRO, M-HTR, CIG, WASHER and STOP, but no the IGN you mentioned. Where is it located?
     
  12. Trombone

    Trombone Member

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    Did you look at the attached pictures? You can't miss it---circled, yet!
     
  13. dolj

    dolj Senior Member

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    Do you mean the pictures in post #10?

    They appear to reference the EFI fuse. :whistle:
     
  14. Trombone

    Trombone Member

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    Right you are, dolj. Brain fart---sorry about that!
     
  15. Marcelo J Aliberti

    Marcelo J Aliberti New Member

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    I'm not refering to your post. Did you mentioned the IGN fuse? I guess not....
     
  16. Marcelo J Aliberti

    Marcelo J Aliberti New Member

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    I was driving on a neighborhood street, a normal day, without cold, heat, rain or snow, and the vehicle stopped. First time something like this has happened to me. There was a slight smell of burning. Tried to start it again and nothing. No ready, no gear position indication, intermittent fuel gauge (I knew positively that the tank was almost full), no red triangle, no alarm, nothing.

    I disconnected the 12 V battery and reconnected it after 5 minutes, I even disconnected the main battery, and nothing, everything was the same.

    I tried looking for information here and it was the most frustrating thing that has ever happened to me.

    The next day I started checking the fuses one by one until I found the AM2 15 Amp fuse blown. This fuse, in addition to powering the inverter's coolant pump, powers a good part of the computers when the car starts up.

    Luckily for me, the replacement fuse I had was 20A, so I put it in and it allowed me to see smoke coming out of the area where the inverter coolant pump is. So far I did not know if it was the pump or some wiring. The 20A fuse held without blowing.

    I began to disassemble everything necessary to be able to extract the pump and when I was able to get to it I saw that there were ashes in its lower part. Here is the culprit. I electrically disconnected the pump, put the vehicle on and everything went back to normal. I even started it for a few seconds to check that no other fault appeared and the car started without problems and without indicating any fault.

    Before that, I used Techstream to try to identify the problem, but without any luck, because most of the computers were out.

    Now I'm waiting for the pump to arrive, to change it and solve my problem.
     
  17. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    At some effort to keep a thread from becoming about two different things, what you've just described is a somewhat common situation in Gen 2, where the inverter cooling pump fails and takes the AM2 fuse with it, but this might be the first time I've seen it reported for Gen 1. More about that can be found here in the other thread where you posted about it. That includes pictures locating the AM2 fuse. (Gen 2 has a connector you can easily disconnect to avoid blowing it again while your replacement pump ships, but no such luck in Gen 1.)

    This thread was about problems following the theft of a catalytic converter. Thieves cut or rip apart the wires to the heated oxygen sensor, and if the heater supply wire shorts, it blows a different fuse, the EFI fuse. (Not the IGN fuse; that was a bit of a red herring. There is an ECU-IG fuse, but it's in the fuse box inside the cabin, and mostly supplies power to ECUs.)

    [Edited: the pump-blows-AM2 issue is so common in Gen 2 that I totally missed the post was about a Gen 1. Might be the first time that problem's been reported in a Gen 1!]
     
    #17 ChapmanF, Feb 20, 2023
    Last edited: Feb 20, 2023
  18. Marcelo J Aliberti

    Marcelo J Aliberti New Member

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    Who is "you" in your post ? And why are you posting about the Gen 2 when the post is about the Gen 1 Prius? Pics wont never match.
     
  19. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    Oh, good catch, sorry. The pump-eats-AM2 issue is so well-known in Gen 2 that as soon as I saw it, I was just sure that was what car you had. Maybe you've been the lucky first person to have the same issue in a Gen 1.

    I've edited the post.
     
  20. Marcelo J Aliberti

    Marcelo J Aliberti New Member

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    I dont think so, because there's a bunch of people (on other thread), that described the same problem, BUT NO ONE POSTED THE SOLUTION.