No dash panel

Hello and welcome to PriusChat!

What you describe sounds like a fairly common fault on a Gen2 (2004-2009) Prius. The Combination Meter (CM or speedometer- dashboard cluster) can fail to turn on.

What happens is a capacitor on the CM circuit board is just bad enough to sometimes prevent the processor from booting up. Playing games with 12V battery can get things to work- until it doesn't.

Repair is to take apart the dashboard to remove the CM assembly. If you (or someone you know) is good at soldering surface mount electronics, then get new capacitors from DigiKey or Mouser and replace them.

Or you can send the CM to a place like TexasHybridBatteries.com for repair (they also sell exchange units with the odometer programmed- you ship back your old one after swapping).

Last is to get a replacement CM - new ones are very $$$. Used ones will have the odometer reading of the donor car and could have the same capacitor failure at a later time.

The odometer is stored on a chip in the CM.

Here is a long thread about this problem.
https://priuschat.com/index.php?threads/161268/

Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.

 

You only have to unplug the 12 volt and do that dance to try and make the display come back In reality when you see the check engine light your car is ready I've been driving mine like this for 3 or 4 years I've even changed the speedometer assembly or the heads up display or whatever you want to call it two or three times to extremely low mileage vehicles like little old ladies cars with 90,000 mi every display I have put in this car that I own which is an '09 generation 2 the displays all do the same thing they work very well then they start not coming on sometimes etc etc I just push the button see the check engine light No other lights on the dash or lit including the speedometer or gas I just throw it and drive and go when I get up to the store and stop and pick up my drink and whatever usually I come back out to the car push the button and the display comes back on and works for a month maybe longer. So I just keep driving it after a few months or a year I'll get tired of that and I'll see a car at the junkyard or wherever in near perfect condition look like it's almost not hardly been sat in and I'll strip that car I'll take its dash which looks very nice put it in my car it will fire right up and work about a month of that and then this display that I just installed I'll come out to the car in the morning push the button no display but yet if I put the car in reverse I can back up out the driveway and go to work go wherever this all repeats the same again. Don't really know why Don't really give a hoot. I just chalk it up to Way too much electronics.

 

Where did you read about the fob trick? More information (or context) required.

 

I personally don't but I imagine they know a little bit about what's going on they're wasting their time to offer the repair I mean You look at what the parts cost and the time it takes to solder them on any person proficient in board work and electronics. This is a pretty quick easy thing drop back in an envelope and off it goes. But personally I don't know the people