2004 Prius engine died

I'm helping a friend with their Prius. It is a 2004. They were driving it home and had the engine die out on them and ran for a little while on battery power before the battery power gave out as well. When the engine fail I'm told there were lots of lights coming on the dash.

I've checked it with my OBD!! reader and get the following codes: P0335 and P0341.

Also per some searching online we checked battery voltage without car running it was a 7.5 volts. (Which I know is quite low)

We tryed jumping the vehicle to see if the battery low is the issue. However we hooked it up and got it to start buy then the motor died within about 3 seconds of starting. This leads me to think that while the battery is too low it may not be the engine failing issue. From online it sees suggested that I replace the crank sensor which we are looking at options to do.

I'm wondering if you have any ideas? something I should check?

Can I put a normal 12volt: 10A/30A/200A/ charger on the battery?

Thanks,

 

Thanks for the info everyone, I'll give an update:

We went ahead and started with dealing with low voltage battery. I did not have a charger on hand to charge at low amps so we went ahead and had it tested and as I expected they told it was bad. So went with a new battery.

So new battery in the car last night and that in turn reset all my codes. Hit the start button and motor started right up but sounded a bit rough. In the first seconds it started to rev then just died like it was doing the night before. Probably only ran about 3 secs then check engine light come on and orange triangle and car stalled. I've not ever worked on a hybrid before so forgive me as I'm learning how that part interacts with the standard systems of a car. All my work has been on standard engines so that's why I'm asking you guys for help so I don't miss something related to the hybrid systems.

After the first attempt to start with a new battery and stall the following codes were show on my reader: P0A90, and P0341.

After a second attempt to start with the same 3 second try and stall it added the following code to the first two: P0335.

With my little understanding of hybrids I'm thinking I need to work initially towards getting the engine to at least stay running so that I can then start checking charging systems and such. right now I can't even get a reading on if the 12v battery is charging correctly because the engine won't stay running long enough.

I'll be down in town Friday and thinking about dropping by a pick n pull and grab these two sensors (Camshaft/Crankshaft) off a car since they are only $12 each and see if one of these is my problem.

I'd be open to any ideas on trouble shooting these sensors. I know electrical well and use a meter almost daily for work so I've got tools to trace stuff down if I knew what I was looking for.

Thank you all and if these codes can be symptoms of something totally different please point that out.

 

I re-read reply's and want to respond to a couple comments:

-I don't know much about car history. I know my friend has had the car for a number of years. Told me they just take it to a shop when the oil change light comes on for that service. They can't remember if the shop has done much outside maintenance on it.

-has almost 150,000 miles

-I know it was said earlier to pull the hybrid battery and charge that. I don't have a charger that would do that I think. I was kinda hopping getting the engine running would do that charging for me?

-I have not had time to do much checking over the engine for health like was suggested. I have a long weekend with a wedding I'm involved in coming up but I have the car over Christmas time so I'm planning to spend some time on it middle of next week on my time off.

-Other than this issue they tell me it seems to have been running fine.

 

Wanted to update my experience with this car. New(used) crankshaft sensor went in yesterday. Car started right up after that. Once I got the sensor in hand I saw how easy it was to test it. (electrical meter made it very easy being that the sensor was magnetic) Old sensor was bad. Replacing it allowed the engine to run. Hybrid battery started charging right away. Everything seemed to be running well at that point. Checked everything over and the car is getting all new brakes and filters. Basic maintenance items...

Me not ever driving one of these cars before did not notice the big issue with the car right away. Apparently sometime between replacing the battery a week ago and running the car yesterday the combination meter went out. At first I thought there was some button somewhere I had to push to turn it on (my never having driven a Prius) However, I quickly learned on the forum that these CM's go out often on these cars. I a connection who works at a local shop they pulled the Toyota bulletin on these and tested the CM as bad. I do not have the time now to experiment replacing parts on the board to try and get it working so I'm looking at ordering a replacement from: Texas Hybrid Batteries com . They seemed to have a decent reputation on the forum. Wish I was quick enough to get it ordered today but will hopefully have it in the mail from these guys Monday and get this finished right after new years. I'm supposed to have the car all ready to go for my friend come the end of next week. Hopefully this will be the last surprise I find working on the car.

Thanks for the advice along the way guys and let me know if you think I'm missing something.

 

Thanks for the thought, I am Northern CA. A couple hours from Sac. I hadn't looked on Craigslist before for this. I did already get it ordered through the other company earlier though and should see it Monday or Tuesday and hoping to get it in over the new year. Benefit I have is it's not the car I need to drive every day and owner isn't flying back into town till the end of the week so I've got the week to get it all wrapped up hopefully.