Mine did something weird today

After five days of ownership I can tell you that I have read some of the manuals, the short forms and I am working my way through the full owners manual.

There are instructions there about holding buttons down firmly for a second or so if I recall correctly.

I do find that the deliberate effort to power up the car and shift to reverse is becoming quicker as I make these motions routine. It is possible that you are being a bit too quick. Maybe too quick for those temps.

Could be an early indication of problems to come.

The manual states that if something corrects itself in warning lights below 60 seconds or temporary flashing that quits quick, do not worry about it.

Bill Gates products are not as reliable as the systems on a Prius and this is the most technology laden car in the world.

 

I would have thought you were experiencing the IG-On lockup problem, but more careful reading of your post, you were already driving therefore already in READY mode.
Maybe you didn't pull the shifter left before pushing down for drive? Pushing down without going left is B, and you can't go from R to B, it will go to N instead.
i have moved quickly from R to D, even with a slow creep backwards, so it can be done.

It was suggested in another thread about the Ig-On lockup that maybe we are pressing the power button too fast, and to hold it down for 1/2 a second. I have yet to see it lock up when I do that.

 

seems to me that if it does this, you need to hold the power button down for like 3 seconds to shut down in a reset situation. what you describe sounds like a computer lockup situation when all the controls stop working.

well just like your home computer that locks up, sometimes a hard reset (power cycle) is neccessary, however some computer models dont come with a reset button so you need to hold the power button down for 3 secs or so to power down

 

resetting the Prius means to power cycle it. many have reported strange goings on with their car (computer) that was fixed by a reboot (power cycle or power off, power on)

i use the computer as an analogy because from what ive heard from others who have related issues with their Prius that apparently required no other action other than a power cycle, that the car, rightly so, is a computer on wheels.

in the OP's case when a momentary touch of the power button didnt immediately produce the desired results, my suggestion to hold the button down, i believe, is one that has been suggested before.

 

Hate to say it, but as the technology becomes more complicated, you can expect a large proportion of the problems to be software in nature.

I spend a large part of my time troubleshooting odd software problems in industrial process control, and it can really be vexing at times. Although there are many automated test tools to reliably uncover the obvious issues, you can still encounter an odd problem from a different permutation of errors.

Say you have an explicit exception throw or catch to reliably recover from an exception resulting from "A." Say you build additional error-detection to deal with "B" and "C." You also deal with permutations like ABC, BAC, and CAB, since your logic testing has uncovered these permutations to be the most common.

What happens if CBA comes along? Or BCA? Rather than an explicit exception, it could be a general exception, and this could ripple until your stack locks right up. This is a very simple example, imagine a complex control algorithm with many variables.

I've had to deal with those evil +400 MB stack dumps too, and they truly suck. Although they are essential to uncover problems, as usually you will unearth a pattern. I get very p***** off when a field service person casually erases the dump "But it's working fine now!"

I've noticed some forum members claim to ignore the MIL or other error indications. I think it's really important that even if the problem "cures" itself, to still swing by your dealer and have the tech pull the codes before they become erased.

My local Prius tech mentioned that if the MIL or any other error light came on, to stop by ASAP so he could download the codes and send them off to Toyota. According to my local Prius tech, Toyota strongly desires to receive these MIL codes and dumps from the field, so they can perform additional testing in their labs.

 

Prius has an emergency off. While in motion, you can press power for 3 seconds and it will either turn off, or ig-on with neutral. Probably latter to maintain neutral, powering off would put it in park.

One person has tried it.

 

red warning light surprise....

i had a strange Prius Event tonight, too! some bozo came up behind me really quick when i was stopped at a light, so i did what i usually do... mash the gas, pull forward about two or three feet, and stop. (yes, i always leave room in front of me at lights, sometimes for that purpose... there's lots of bozos around here.)

well, the red !!! light came on on the dashboard and a kind of pink ! square showed up on the display screen, though it wasn't a "pushable" button: it just sat there: no information, just a button. :cussing: the car seemed to lose power, so i nursed it to the side of the road and restarted it. it seemed to restart fine, with good power from both the MG2 and ICE, so i stopped at a store, did some shopping, and restarted it, and the light was back on.

so i went to the dealer and asked for an appointment to see if they could do a "hard reset" or whatever.... two service guys looked at the light and scratched their heads; one saying that the technician might need to re-flash the computer storage.... (ugh!). sure, bring it in tomorrow at 8am (ugh^3) and leave it for most of the day, since their service guys are backed up.... oh, well.... ok.

got home, logged on here, read these posts, went out to the car to try the "three-second reset" ( :? ) and...... when i powered it up, there was no warning light!!! so, here i am, reporting the fun.... i just called the dealer and canceled the appointment.

:roll: 8)

 

wow would be interesting to find out what the red button was for anyway though...

 

In the year that I've had my Prius, I have had maybe three times that instead of starting, the car went into a weird "neutral" mode. the car seems to be in acc-on but the gear selector is in neutral and cant be shifted any other way nor will it turn off if you press the power button. After much reflection, I'm pretty sure that in every case I had tried to quickly start the car and immediately put it in reverse before it had "booted." In each cae I pressed and held the power button for a few seconds and the car shut down. I put my foot firmly o the brake and pressed the power button and the car started normally. I'm pretty sure the problem was me and to be fair to the Prius, there have been many times in my youth that I was in a hurry and trid to start a normal car and put it into gear before the starter had finished. At least the Prius doesn't make that horrendous noise!!

 

If you are talking about the Ig-On lockup issue, car doesn't go to ready, but shows an amber indicator on the power button, hit the power button without pressing the brake. It will turn off, and can then be turned on normally. Works for me every time.

it is speculated that we may be hitting the power button too briefly. Hold it down for 1/2 a second.