Loud noise followed by yellow triangle

If you're lucky you didn't make it worse by driving it further... If you're lucky your cooling fan just sucked in something that's clogging it and you can clean it and fix yourself at no cost. If you're currently too broke to spend $125 on diagnosis, you don't want to know about repair costs if you aren't lucky. If you have basic automotive repair skill you may be able to fix it inexpensively... There's lots of info on this site. Don't drive your car until this is figured out!

 

^ What he said. Don't be penny wise and pound foolish (Brit currency adage). Try checking/cleaning the hybrid battery fan and associated ducting, before driving it any further. @NutzAboutBolts has a good video on it here:

Nutz About Bolts Prius Maintenance Videos | PriusChat

My only comment on the video: you can avoid pulling off the rear seat bottom; just push a space between rear seat and back, at the hybrid fan intake grill, and reach in there with a 12 mm socket on an extension, remove the single hold-down bolt. Take care not to drop it.

You can check/clean the fan without complete removal. Also, when reinstalling the hatch floor, leave most of the fasteners off, the ones that push into the top of the hybrid battery. This'll make it a lot easier to pull off next time.

 

welcome!

pretty unusual, how many miles on her?

your last two sentences, yes and yes.

all the best!

 

Now that I've cleaned a few fans with and without complete removal I'm thinking it'd be a way more efficient and more thorough clean up job if I popped off the clip holding the plastic squirrel cage fan part and scrubbed it in in hot soapy water. Is that the way you do it? Is that clip / plastic relatively east to remove?

 

Complete removal of the fan is another level of difficulty, and not really necessary, my 2 cents.

I cleaned the fan in place, with a Q-tip, which fits between the blades just snug. I ran one of those duster boas through the (removed) duct, work then just blew out the whole area with my wet-dry vacuum on blow.

 

Thanks... I'll try the q-tip idea next time... Probably have to go thru alot of q-tips though. but I bet it fits in between each blade better than the rag I was using, which only made it 95% clean. Sure wish it was faster to just pop the squirre cage off and wash it with the force of hot water and soap. But like you said, it seems like another level of difficulty.

 

That's yours right? Yikes!

There's air exhausts under the hatch floor, both rear corners. There's flaps over them: maybe the rodents are coming in through there.

They do call the fan a "squirrel cage"...

 

wow.... Just wow... Maybe previous owners had some clever kids? Or maybe there's some plastic barriers that have been chewed thru by critters? If you have the right vacuum cleaner attachments you might be able to do it without pulling the hybrid battery but who knows... Please post more pictures... I'd love to know more details about how/what happened?

 

That is scary.
Eat, Spit, Be Happy?
What type of advertising slogan is that?

I have a question.
Are the seeds you are finding complete? That is not just the shells but the entire seed?
My fear obviously would be some type of rodent infestation and rodent damage.
But if that is the case, I'd also expect you'd be finding more unpleasant evidence of rodent existence. Starting with, a lot of 1/2 eaten sunflower seeds.
What do you do? I'd continue to clean, inspect and hope for the best.

 

I've got rodent mesh on the engine air intake, the cabin air intake, but not the hybrid battery air exhausts. Thinking maybe I should get on that...

Not sure if this is 2nd or 3rd gen, anyway they are similar. There's an exit air flap like this on both sides:

 

I'm glad they were eating sunflower seeds and not your wiring!!

 

Too bad. I was trying to be optimistic.
Guess they like take out.

 

Yea... What's so weird is that their weren't any already eaten hulls in the pics... How long was the package in there for? In my experience they work on getting into cars in the Winter when its cold out and have no interest in such spaces in warmer months.

 

Yes, that's why I was trying to be optimistic. NOT seeing any empty shells or 1/2 eaten seeds. I was hoping that perhaps it wasn't a rodent infestation symptom.
Good god, how stale do those seeds have to be to be turned down by hungry rodents? They disliked them so much, they were throwing them in the rodent equivalent of a mulcher.

 

Yep... What I enjoyed most about this post is it gave me something to ponder while gardening today!

This is yet more proof that cars will last way longer and will have way fewer problems if you keep them super clean and free of clutter... Don't be messy or you'll attract an even bigger mess!