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Can i still drive to dealer withRed triangle, vsc light, check engine light, icon on screen

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Care, Maintenance and Troubleshooting' started by McNuilty, Nov 18, 2017.

  1. Patrick Wong

    Patrick Wong DIY Enthusiast

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    That is fine, and the battery module replacement task may become a new hobby for you.
     
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  2. McNuilty

    McNuilty Junior Member

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    Took the battery out, checked the voltage of every cell and found out the cells are between 7.89v and 8.05v, mostly around 8.00v, except for 2 cells, one reading 6.96v and one reading 7.79v. The ones reading lower are next to each other so i am going to change both. Going to receive the new cells on Monday. The new cells will be between 7.4 and 8.0volts, hope they will be closer to 8.0v than 7.4v...

    So far it was quite easy to do, just a lot of work, took me around 4 hours to take the battery out and check the voltage.

    Wanted to swap the 12v battery too, but the old one is reading 12.4 volts so I might as well just send the new one I bought back.
     

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  3. McNuilty

    McNuilty Junior Member

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    Placed the new cells in the battery today and the car is running great again! no christmas lights or other problems. The cells were around 8v so perfect. :)
    Most difficult part was putting the white backplate back on the battery after installing the new cells, but with lifting all cells a bit everything will fall in place. Total costs of the repair: 90 euro and 7 hrs work, but i enjoyed it so didnt see that as a problem. Next time i would do this job would take me around 3 hours with 2 coffee breaks included (y)
     
  4. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    That's great news! You might want to do your battery a favor and look into getting a grid charger to get all those out of balance cells back in balance. It won't guarantee a longer life, but it will keep a cell from failing due to having too high or low of a charge relative to the other cells. There are a zillion threads here about grid charging if you want to read up. Right after replacing a cell is the perfect time to rebalance the battery. Well, actually, before you need to replace a cell is even better. :)
     
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  5. Kevin_Denver

    Kevin_Denver Active Member

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    Jerry's advice is great. You'll want to re-balance the pack.

    Additionally, be aware that other cells are likely to fail soon as well - Without doing a Amp-hour and load test on each module, it's not possible to know if the other modules are good. This is why the best way to rebuild a pack includes a 3x charge-discharge of every module, recording the Ah capacity on each discharge. Not doing this test is referred to on PC as playing "whack a mole." (In reference to the 80's arcade game). Many people see additional modules failing within a short time period after (less than 20k miles or 30k kilometers)

    I personally wouldn't plan any road trips to distant places, until you know that all the modules in your pack are solid.

    Also worth getting a mini-VCI cable with Techstream to be able to directly monitor your HV battery modules (reports 14 voltages, one for every 2 modules) and to diagnose problems on your car that now has more than a decade of use.
     
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  6. jerrymildred

    jerrymildred Senior Member

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    Thanks for the additional explanation, Kevin. I was in a bit of a hurry and, in fact, have to get back to the real world now. (y)