My Prius Is Dead

[ashpole]

The boot light does seem to be the achilles heel. I personally turn the light off to be on the safe side, but if the boot light is important to you, why not swap the bulb for an LED one? That way if the boot doesn't quite shut properly one time you should be less likely to run the battery down as quickly.

Just an idea and yes you could argue "why should I?" but it's a cheap fix.

Does that mean the boot light and car alarm use different sensors on the rear hatch? My thinking was if the hatch was open and the light on, the car alarm would be upset if you tried to set it.

[Chris Dance]

Hi Jon,

I have not had any experience of buying a Prius from the Toyota Aylesbury sales team, as I said bought mine from a different Toyota dealer.

With regard to service and assistance I cannot fault the Aylesbury dealer.

Hope you enjoy your Prius and the good service I have experienced.

Chris.

[Doesn'tExist]

Actually the dealer got back to me and the vehicle is fixed. It was not the boot or anything like that. It was an broken earth to the auxiliary Battery. I asked them about the other problems and they didn't know ;-)

They offered to return it to me today, but I have had enough so I told them to keep it. Nobody senior around either, although 15 minutes later I was called by the principle. I'm rejecting it, they can keep it.

But damn need to arrange another car for Tuesdays school run now :eek

[johalareewi]

The boot light does seem to be the achilles heel. I personally turn the light off to be on the safe side, but if the boot light is important to you, why not swap the bulb for an LED one? That way if the boot doesn't quite shut properly one time you should be less likely to run the battery down as quickly.

Just an idea and yes you could argue "why should I?" but it's a cheap fix.

I have screwed one of those Osram DOT-IT LED lights to the rear hatch of my Prius. Not only does mean I don't have to worry about leaving the boot light on and flattening the 12v Battery, but it illuminates the cargo area from above instead of the side. Much better for loading stuff in and out in the dark.

[Doesn'tExist]

And another week later and still no car or acceptence of rejection, just a telephone message last night they've tried 4 out of the 6 amps in the last two days and can't get any of them to work properly. They haven't even started on the rest of the issues yet.

7 more working days until I can start getting legal on them, I hoped it wouldn't have to come that far. And in the mean time I got a rubbish Zafari 1.8 as a hire car where I am racking up the expenses. My wife is vocally hoping they cannot rectify it as she doesn't trust it anymore.

I must admit that I am disappointed as I thought of Toyota as the boring but reliable brand, but between the dealer, Toyota UK and Toyota Europe they don't seem to be able to get their act together and deliver a quality product.

[atraindriver]

I think I am particularly unlucky and perhaps have added some rarer options which my main beef is with. Those problems accentuate my feeling towards the common rattles. But being stranded is something I hate, especially with two young children. That should just not happen on a 60 reg car leaving it alone for 4 nights. I would never trust it to leave at the airport now.

And if you do, find a piece of flat ground and leave the parking brake off...mucho hassle moving my Mk2 T4 after leaving it on a slope in sub-zero for five days..... But at least the Battery was OK...

A Train Driver

[Doesn'tExist]

Cheers, good tip!

[Doesn'tExist]

Although the Prius is alive again I've agreed to test for a week to ensure all it ok. Power seems to be restored. Swap out of the iPod connector kit and the associated ECU has made it such that my iPhone's and USB sticks can be read, although there is still a fault which I immediately identified as the system is not ignoring other filenames as in resource forks. So basically incompatible with a Mac ;-) I've written and educated Toyota on how to properly read filesystems, unbelievable beginner mistake for such a major manufacturer. But there is still the problem of it not switching on a Nano following parking up. And a new defect has been introduced where there is a crackle on songs so it seems insulation somewhere in the installation was not correct.

I've got to say the squeels from the back and the rattles have all been rectified.

Then there is the sound, the feedback when switching on/off and sources has been rectified. As has the static feedback in the rear Speakers. But now we are back to the volume levels in the rear are totally hopeless and unacceptable. Makes me wonder whether they just removed the second amp.

So all in all still not happy with the vehicle and the very expensive options that we had on it. So not looking good when I hand it back at the end of the week, better book myself another rental vehicle.

[jont-uk]

Arrgghh ... was going to drop you a message JP to see what the latest was and if they'd sorted everything out ? ... but didn't want to tempt fate !!

Apparently mines due in the country at the end of the month - getting nervous now that it's all OK :-/

Sounds like they'd be better off pulling all your audio out and starting again, again !! ... I think that's a dealer/ local fit rather than factory so it shouldn't be so hard ...

Jon

[Doesn'tExist]

The dealer fits the upgrades by Toyota provided and don't have engineering mode access. They even said they have no tools for that firewire port ;-)

The ecu for ipod has definitely got a defective firmware as it can't deal with resource forks. I have no problem writing a little script to remove those but it is annoying, not.something for my wife, and Toyota documentation is not accurate as in that it doesn't work with a MAC.

I also think the.firmware of the head unit needs an update. In the weekend I sat in the back and it was really annoying. Rear Speakers just don't join in, so all.you hear is sound somewhere 8 foot in front and a rumble from the sub in the back. Whilst in the front you can hear/feel low frequencies at all, it is very very bright with no real adjustment.