Hey, group..... I have a question that is nagging away at me innards !!! Since the TCH has no starter motor and uses the battery to "start" the ICE, what happens when the battery fails/dies/goes to battery heaven? Are we just stranded until a tow truck comes along, even if the ICE works normally and the tank is full of gas (last at $1.79 - woohoo!)???????

Just curious. Just as an FYI, I love my TCH, average about 40-42 mpg in summer and 35-37 in winter (live in NH), and had ALL the factory "customizations" done when I bought the car 18 months and 20000 miles ago (you know - touch handle to unlock all doors; touch trunk to unlock it; disable stupid seat belt ding-ding-ding alarm, etc. etc. etc.) and it runs bee-yoo-tee-foolly!!!!

Any thoughts?

 

If your battery dies on the TCH, hope that your cell phone battery is OK (to call for help) because the car is not going to move unless you push it.....

 

Failures do happen in complex machines, even if they are not a hybrid car.

Note that the number of Hybrid battery failures with the current Panasonic battery technology can be counted on your fingers. The reliability numbers includes about 1 million Prius (2004+) plus a smattering of Camry, Highlander, and Lexus hybrid models. Some of the older Prii have more than 100,000 miles with no problems (including my 2004 at 135,000 miles) so the possibility of your HV battery failing is so low that you should enjoy your TCH and not worry about it.

Nothing lasts forever. Your HV battery will also die at some point, but your TCH is likely to die for other reasons before that occurs. A new HV battery installed is about $3,000 (which is what a rebuilt transmission costs in a non-hybrid car). You can also find salvaged batteries (from a totaled TCH, I don't know if the readily available Prius HV battery would fit) for much less ($500-$750, plus installation) if you need to save money. A possible need to tow a stranded car is one more reason join AAA for their services after the Toyota road service coverage runs out.

JeffD

 

I guess I look at it another way. If the ICE fails, the battery will still get me a mile or two down the road to a safe place to park and wait for a tow. I doubt that either one will fail during the time I tend to keep my cars (200,000 miles or so) but you never can tell when I might get stupid (or senile at my age) and run out of gas....

 

Even if the ICE is running when the hybrid battery "fails" you still will have no "GO".

The e/CVT will effectively "slip" into neutral.

Not sure what the electronics (ECU firmware) would do with an ICE failure "underway", you may also be dead in your tracks in that case.

 

I am far from a battery expert, but I believe the battery is a series of individual cells. I can't say for sure, (....and making a wild guess here....) but if one (or more) of the cells fails, there might still be enough power from the other cells to power the car to a certain extent.
I'll go further out on a limb that the "check engine" light should fire up to alert driver of this situation.
My point being, I don't think you'd get a complete 100% power failure without any warning...although since this is all guesswork, I wouldn't bet on any of this being correct.

 

If my traction battery ever goes bad, I would prefer the toyota tech replace the defective 7 volt battery pack that cost about $100. It's a plug in device. I don't know how much labor is involved. I doubt it's that difficult to do.

If the traction battery fails I would think the ECU (electronic control unit) is smart enough to allow the car to run entirely on the engine.

The deep cycle 12 volt battery in the trunk is used for power to the instruments and readouts. It also powers the ECU even in the sleep mode.

If this very dependable battery don't work the car's ECU will not boot up. This 12 volt battery can be jumped like a standard or smaller 12 volt battery. The information is in the car manual in the glove box.

 

Jimmy,

The only thing that propels the car is mg2, no battery, no movement. The ICE can be dead and the car will move but not the other way around. The upside is that is would take a MAJOR problem for all of the cells in the traction battery to fail or a system short (or the ECU thinking there was one) to stop the car.

 

The following is meant as reassurance, not a snide comment:

Other questions that might nag at you would be what happens if the transmission on your [insert name of car other than TCH] fails? Or what happens if the computer controls on your [insert name of any car]? Of what if a wheel falls off?

Any major failure will disable any car -- nothing special about the traction battery in a TCH. While the battery introduces a point of failure not present on non-hybrids, the CVT removes a point of failure present on most other cars, the transmission. And, as pointed out in a couple of responses above, the failure rate of traction batteries is both theoretically unlikely and -- based on experience -- almost unheard of in practice. Personally, I would worry more about the wheel falls off scenario!

By the way, Consumer Reports lists the TCH as among the most reliable cars out there. So the chances of being stuck on the highway are way lower than average to begin with.

Bill

 

...of course these cars are still relatively new. The Prius is more 'battle tested' but the Camry Hybrid is only a few years old. No one can say for sure what will happen when the Camry turns 6 or 7 years of age...or older.