Civic stolen - What next? - Plug in Prius

[Xist]

I have only ever seen one Yugo in a junkyard, so they must last forever! However, I have never seen one on the road, so I must be unlucky.

I have not ever owned a Toyota, although most data indicates they are more reliable than Hondas.
Mom complains every day about her "Shabby" 2006 Camry with 190,000 miles. The exterior of her car is perfect, except scratches in the back bumper from the garage door.

She also complained every day that her house was shabby, but I painted most of it this week.

The only maintenance Mom has had is two sets of shocks and one alternator. $2,000 in repairs over twelve years sounds good to me ($166.67 a year, $13.89 a month). Since it has a timing chain, the actual maintenance has basically been zero.

It always seems like hybrids make more sense for people who drive excessively. Do hybrid batteries die of old age as well as mileage? You could trickle-charge it, but that strikes me as a bit silly.

Honestly, I think you should ask Jalopnik. It might not be useful at all, but it should be entertaining. Meanwhile, I have two recommendations. You're welcome!

Drop a Willeys Jeep body on a Prius chassis or an Anachromoto!

Honestly, I think part of the Prius popularity is people convincing themselves they are better by having a car everyone knows is a Prius. I have shared a post from elsewhere of someone that owned an HCH, but traded it in for a Prius so that people knew he drove a hybrid.

Then there are those that have an irrational hatred of them. You should drive a real car that belches smoke and makes puppies cry!

[RedDevil]

A Prius is a very good all round car, no need to drop another body on one unless for giving that body a better drive train.
Maybe it isn't much of a drivers car, but passengers have little to complain about.

I read of a guy who travels around the world on a daily basis, often to rich places like the Middle East oil states and such.
He had Bentleys and Maybachs for taxis but prefers 3rd gen Prius cabs above anything: surprisingly roomy, comfy rear bench, smooth ride and super smooth power delivery.

[Ecky]

1st Gen Insights and 1st Gen HCH have battery balance issues, but Prii do not. You don't need a grid charger for a Prius. They only have battery issues when a cell physically fails, there's no regular maintenance.

The 2nd Gen HCH has terrible battery problems for multiple reasons, mostly from expecting higher currents from a smaller battery, along with inadequate cooling. This, along with not being able to keep the cells in balance, tends to kill batteries very quickly. Some cells get out of balance and are effectively cooked to death.

I don't think the 2nd Gen Insight has been around long enough to prove whether the battery management has improved lifespan. Most HCH1 and G1 Insight batteries lasted at least a decade, it's only the HCH2 which had earlier failures. Insight and HCH1 batteries can last as long as those in a Prius if they're manually balanced occasionally from the beginning, but imbalance degrades and eventually kills the cells that are outliers, so it's generally not the case that you can simply grid charge a 12 year old battery and bring it back to prefect health. Some do, many don't.

[Frank Lee]

If you don't get another '99 Civic you'll have to change your i.d.

[Ecky]

Worth looking at this:

http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...ery-36316.html

[j12piprius]

68k miles - 2012 Plug in Prius - owner purchased salvage title and repaired front 5yrs and 45k miles ago - speaks in detail about car - driven by wife around town - now they have newer cars - 13 miles on charge - lifetime ~63mpg - $9.8k is slightly below kbb - I'm interested but concerned - need suggestions.

118k miles - 2010 Civic LX automatic - nice looking car - $7.5k is $1.5k above kbb - CVT, might last awhile? - only 35 mpg - not that exciting but I hope to see today - possibility.

206k miles - 2006 Prius - beautiful car - asking $4k kbb - battery pack reconditioned recently - I could replace battery pack with new one for $1.6k - but that's more expense and miles are way too high - pass.

The first 2 are the only cars I'm interested in currently that don't have high miles. Comments and suggestions are much appreciated, especially regarding the 2012 Plug in Prius.

[Ecky]

I wouldn't be too concerned about miles on a Prius. I understand there are plenty of outliers, but:

Toyota Prius Taxi Running Strong With 600,000 Miles And Original Battery

Toyota Prius Taxi Running Strong With 600,000 Miles And Original Battery

For those questioning the lifespan of a Toyota Prius battery, one taxi driver has 621,000 reasons why there’s no cause for concern.

That’s approximately how many miles one man has logged in his Prius taxi. Manfred Dvorak, a cab driver in Austria, tells the story of his 621,000-mile (one-million kilometer) Prius in a series of videos posted by Toyota Austria.

“The figure of one million kilometers itself speaks to its excellence,” Dvorak said of his Prius. “Even if the engine survives [in other cars], the other parts will break down. But this is not the case with this vehicle. It still continues to run well, even now.”

He paused for a moment to try to recall if the Prius has ever broken down before stating, “Nope, never.”

In a second video, Dvorak talked about how much fun the high-mileage Prius is to drive, with the car still maintaining its ability to quickly accelerate and handle the mountain curves with ease.

“The acceleration is very good,” explained Dvorak. “I’m sure the drivers I have overtaken feel the same way.”

Of course, these are promotional videos created and released by Toyota. It doesn’t appear that Dvorak has given an interview to any other news source (at least within the U.S.), so it’s difficult to verify his story.

But his claims of 621,000 miles on an original Prius battery aren’t implausible.

Taxis in general see far more wear and tear than most other cars on the road. In the U.S., the average taxi logs 70,000 miles each year (according to the NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission). Compare that to the 13,000 miles most household vehicles travel annually. These aren’t easy miles, either, with taxicabs spending a significant portion of time navigating stop-and-go traffic, which wears heavily on a vehicle’s powertrain.

Even looking beyond the realm of service vehicles, it still doesn’t appear that Dvorak’s taxi is a singular exception of a long-running Prius battery pack.

In the San Jose Mercury News, Gary Richards listed more than half a dozen examples of Prius owners reporting mileage in the neighborhood of 200,000 miles on the original battery. Only one had ever needed to replace the battery, and that was after seven and a half years of use. One owner even rolled over 530,000 miles before a collision took the Prius off the road permanently.

“The only problem that I had regarding the battery was a cooling issue that occurred due to dog hair sucked into and clogging the battery cooling fan located below the rear seat,” remarked the 530,000-mile Prius owner. “Toyota did not design an air filter for this rear seat vent. It is probably the only design flaw I would mention about the car.”

Consumer Reports has also tested to see if Prius batteries lost effectiveness after a long time.

“We hooked up a 2002 Toyota Prius with nearly 208,000 miles on the clock to our testing instruments and compared the results to the nearly identical 2001 Prius we tested 10 years ago,” said Consumer Reports editors in 2011.

“We found very little difference in performance when we tested fuel economy and acceleration,” they concluded. “Our testers were also amazed how much the car drove like the new one we tested 10 years ago. We were also surprised to learn that the engine, transmission, and even shocks were all original.”

“So is an old Prius a still a good value?” asked the editors. “We think so.”

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by j99civic

68k miles - 2012 Plug in Prius - owner purchased salvage title and repaired front 5yrs and 45k miles ago - speaks in detail about car - driven by wife around town - now they have newer cars - 13 miles on charge - lifetime ~63mpg - $9.8k is slightly below kbb - I'm interested but concerned - need suggestions.

What was the damage that caused it to be totaled? How was it repaired? If it's a salvage title the price should be considerably below KBB. I tend to stay away from salvage title cars due to you having no idea how well the repairs were done.

Originally Posted by j99civic

118k miles - 2010 Civic LX automatic - nice looking car - $7.5k is $1.5k above kbb - CVT, might last awhile? - only 35 mpg - not that exciting but I hope to see today - possibility.

Per Fuelly the 8th gen Civics got slightly worse mileage than the 7th gen civics (the 9th gen was where the MPGs seemed to climb, and even better for the current 10th gen). However it's superior aerodynamics seem to make it an equally good if not better car for ecomodders.

Hondas CVTs have a bad reputation...newer ones are better though. Not sure when the "cutoff" year is though. A CVT will also limit your max MPG since it isn't a manual, although I've been getting well over 40 mpg and close to 50 mpg with my 4 speed since modding.

Never go above KBB...a Civic like that should be $5K-$6K, unless you can really talk the seller into going down by $2k or so.

Originally Posted by j99civic

206k miles - 2006 Prius - beautiful car - asking $4k kbb - battery pack reconditioned recently - I could replace battery pack with new one for $1.6k - but that's more expense and miles are way too high - pass.

206K isn't that high for a Toyota or Honda.

[j12piprius]

Thanks much for the feedback! My main concern with the 2006 Prius is the age of the battery, and the miles due to other concerns like compression, power on hills, oil leaks and consumption. Your comments have helped me to reconsider.

I thought once the battery pack went out that the car wouldn't drive at all and would have to be towed, but according to this video at 1:07, the car can still be driven at slower speeds. Is that correct? Also, this video shows how to test, balance and change the bad cells.

As long as these things are correct, the 2006 Prius is my #1 choice.

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by j99civic

68k miles - 2012 Plug in Prius - owner purchased salvage title and repaired front 5yrs and 45k miles ago - speaks in detail about car - driven by wife around town - now they have newer cars - 13 miles on charge - lifetime ~63mpg - $9.8k is slightly below kbb - I'm interested but concerned - need suggestions.

I bought a rebuilt title 2012 PiP in 2014 for $13k. Check the wear on the tires to see if alignment issues exist due to the prior damage. My tires wore very unevenly. I've since gotten an alignment, so that should solve my tire wear problem.

The other issue I had began when someone backed into the front of the car, which when combined with the previous repaired damage, introduced water into the cabin (leaked down the passenger side foot / firewall). I was able to locate the leak by pulling up the carpeting and testing with a hose. Then I sealed the leak with silicone. If the windows are fogging up unnaturally, the car likely has a leak.

The traction battery is probably fine as it's Li-ion. You can connect an ELM237 reader and download the Torque app to see the health of the various batteries. It's a bit of work to install the app and configure for the PiP, but not too bad.

Check that the EVSE is included, along with both key fobs. Everything else is what you'd normally check on a car. The fact that it's been driven for years since the repair speaks to the likelihood of having future problems.

I normally value a rebuilt titled vehicle at 70% of the clean title price.

Originally Posted by j99civic

I thought once the battery pack went out that the car wouldn't drive at all and would have to be towed...

That is correct. The car will not drive on a failed traction battery. I'm hesitant to consider module replacement as a repair, as the other modules are likely similarly worn and close to needing replacement as well. Some people swear by grid charging.

You can view the health of the NiMh modules with the Torque app too. If you're set on owning a Prius, you might as well configure the app and buy an ELM237 device.