Lower Rear Window Lines

the connections are not there This car has a whole new hatch and upper glass wasn't changed (not broken in the accident) but the wiring isn't there for the lower glass. I was there when the body man was putting it back together as at the time March last year we (PC users) were interested if the wiring was there for the backup camera so I went and looked at the harness. That's when I discouvered that the lower glass on her car wasn't heated. Found out a lot about the Prius at that time. The car was down for about 3 1/2 months being repaired properly.

 

8) Frank,

I agree with Tideland Prius, you should contact your local Toyota Dealership. You also mention that your car has a whole new hatch. Did the hatch come from Toyota or some other after market repair part store?

Ben

 

My car has the original hatch, and my lower lines don't do anything either, so you're definetly not alone here.

 

No it was all Toyota parts as there was nothing available in the early days. It was also repaired at a Toyota dealership bodyshop. I know the parts manager there and the insurance we have only allows new genuine parts.

 

have a look at this thread, I caused a bit of server load with it.
http://www.priuschat.com/forums/imo-dont-b...ghlight=imo+buy

 

8) Frank,

Sorry to read about you being hit from behind. I also am perplexed, by the fact that your lower rear window defroster is not wired up and/or functional.

It is a mystery that Toyota would put defroster elements in your vehicles lower rear window and not have them connected to anything.

But alas, as long as you were not injured, and sheet medal can be repaired life go on.

Ben

 

yup a mystery for sure but it's a Toyota and not all things are straight foward. We get DRL's and you don't you get heated mirrors we don't. This was an early production car also so maybe that's the difference. Oh I still stand by my comments in that post about the trunk floor plate. She took it out the instant she got the car back from the shop. On the repairs the main wait was for the data on pull points and dimensions. The car was pulled to within 2MM of spec. No rattles no squeeks drives straight and true, and exelent repair. Just take out your trunk plate. Use the cargo bin below. Your battery will like you.

 

I bought mine in January of 04 and had not seen the lower window defroster work until yesterday morning. I had not noticed the lines before reading this thread.

 

well i can also confirm that they are defoggers. yesterday it was 26º when i went out to the car. and there was a ½" of ice all over the car.

glad i have remote unlocks as my neighbors locks froze and she couldnt get into her car.

 

Mine works too. Last evening when I went to the car it was coverd in frost and the defogger worked. Very strange that some do and some don't.

 

8) It's just a big Prius conspiracy to leave some defrostless........

Ben

 

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Oh My God.... could this be connected to Kennedy and Elvis?? I would like to find out what is going on is this isolated or related to some reproducible and understandable model?

 

the Kennedy and Elvis things are not conspiracies!!

my martian friends told me so just the other day

 

I've got an IR that has a LED spot indicator for aiming it. They are really handy for checking rad's to see if you have plugged tubes and also use it for checking tranny cooler lines to see if the temp control valve in the tranny is working properly. Also good for checking stuck calipers on brakes even took it home and checked the seal on the fridge door. I paid way to much for it but it's handy to have.

 

I've got a Fluke contact temperature thermometer -- I could easily attach the thermocouples to the lower rear window lines and check it out, and would be happy to check. (I like the ease of IR thermometers, but there are some places (like food preparation) where you need the accuracy of thermocouple measurement.)

But it sounds like we've pretty much confirmed that most people (except maybe the earliest pioneers) have defogging down there. Sounds like it's more of a question of how to get Frank's working.

 

Frank, have you checked in with your dealer to see if there is anything that they can do to get it working for you (under warranty coverage of course)?

 

here on the coast you seldom need it so is it worth the hassels? I'm not sure. If I have the covers of the hatch for any reason I'll look and see what's involved. A couple of feet of wire and a bit of soldering I'd say was about it. But there are two inline noise filters on that circuit to reduce interference for the SKS system and if both aren't in there I doubt I'd do it. In a colder climate I'd be in there and figure it out, as for now, she's not complaining so I'm ignoring it.

 

From the wiring diagram, and my own observation after taking the hatch covers off, the noise filter(s) are shared. It really did look like the bottom glass defogger was an afterthought, since 3 wires are tied together with a sealed wire nut: one to the upper glass, one to the lower, and one to the noise filter. The ground points for the defroster on both windows looked more natural. They had separate wires going to the same ground point used by some other things.

Should be easy to add in. The connectors to the glass would be the the most involved thing.