Early failure on Hybrid battery!

Hi all, new to the forums; I have looked around, but have not seen reference to this. My 2007 hybrid battery died after only 77,000 miles. As I recall, and I may not be right, this battery was warranteed for 90K or 7 years. Toyota has offered to pay for only 25% of the new battery, and not the installation. So, 3500 bucks out the door including tax. I am pretty... put out.. by this, but it is what it is. The 12volt battery died at the same time (third one), and they say they will replace that and (gosh how generous) the labor to replace it. As it was explained to my by the dealership, it takes a day and a half to replace the battery, with insane safety precautions. She said (repeated) that the battery was radioactive, and the tech had to cone off a section of the shop, and wear a set of protective gear to even work on the thing. As a 25 year controls electrician, I find this dubious, but I didn't say so. Is there any truth to this?
As the next step, who have you folks used to purchase rebuilt batteries? I intend to sell this lemon after I replace the batteries and clean up the interior from two catastrophic bear attacks inside the car. I live in Alaska, so stuff happens. I will have to barge the battery up here, and install it myself. What have been your experiences with self installation?

 

I thought so, but its a small one-dealer town, can't put up too much fuss. I don't see any real physical reason I couldn't replace these cells myself.. Can't be any harder than replacing a halon system in a Coast Guard ship....but I'm not too proud to listen to the experts here about what is involved, and whether I should attempt it or not.

 

1. As previously stated, the traction battery warranty is for 8 years/100K miles. So how far out of warranty is the car?

I bought it in late April of 2007, so its about 6 months out of warrantee.

2. Contact the Toyota Customer Experience Center to see if you can get help with the battery replacement. That is much better than the idea of replacing individual modules - especiallyI if you can get a big discount on the repair price.

I'll look into that; the rep stated she advocated for me, got them to come up to 25% of the part. But this is the same person that said the battery was radioactive (I said "don't you mean high voltage" she replied "no, radioactive"), had to cordon off the shop, and required a day and a half to replace, and expensive HazMat shipping. So there's that.

3. I would avoid "rebuilt" batteries. You would be better off buying a used 3G battery from a salvage yard - as long as the battery really came from a car that was operational prior to getting into an accident and the battery had not been messed with prior to its resale. There have been recent posts about how to inspect battery module serial numbers to confirm they all came from a similar production run vs. some modules being swapped into the battery case.

4. Regarding the frequent 12V battery replacement - how long have you owned the car and how many miles do you log monthly? If the car is used infrequently, consider using a battery charger or battery tender to improve 12V service life.

Why is this different than any other car? I stated that any drain at all, overnight would kill the car, such as the trunk light (a frequent offender with kids), she stated "Oh yes, that would easily do it".. Well, I left the headlights on with my Ford truck overnight, it turned over fine. I know the battery is smaller, but geez. This problem has stranded my wife or kids uncountable times.

5. If you take reasonable precautions to deal with the high voltage DC (201.6V nominal voltage) then there is no problem working on the system if you need to.
Thanks, I appreciate that. I do feel more confident after seeing what instruction is out there. I have the gear. I will be testing the cells and replacing whats bad, then selling this pig. I was an early adopter and got bit.

6. We need to hear more about what prompted the bear attacks.

I don't know what about Priii specifically attracts bears, but Mcdonald's fries under the seat would be a start. My neighbor down the road had her interior completely powdered after the bear got locked in overnight. Suffice to say it must have scared the s*** out of that bear.. A lot of it. My bear just ate my heated leather seats and punctured the trim in several places. The momma trained the cubs to turn their paws over and lift up the door handle, now we always lock our cars in the summer. After the second claim, the insurance company demanded receipts that the work was actually done. I have a paid-off Pruis, thanks Yogi.