My wife's 2007 Prius Dash lights stop working in extreme cold weather. We have asked the dealer 3 times about it but to no avail! I don't even know where to start with this one?
View 2 RepliesOn some cold winter mornings, my dashboard stays dark. Later, sometimes hours later, it lights up normally.
View 4 RepliesDuring this week, most ppl at NA are experienced extremely cold weather, what I found is, the Prius can't do a great job to keep the front windshield clean under that kind of condition.
What I tried, front deforest bottom, or fan to front windshield and leg, both works fine for the middle area but not the top left side which is about 1/4 area of the windshield. It doesn't happen on my sienna. Usually I drive 5-10mins and the windshield are clean. What I guess is maybe the fan tunnel goes too straight to the windshield instead of blow to the rear area or maybe the outlet isn't wide enough to cover the side.
Occasionally my Prius 2nd gen has no dashlights when I start it up. No speedometer no gas mileage no gas gauge and also the car won't turn off by pressing the power button I would have to hold the power button for 5 seconds. To get the dashlights on I would have to pull out the aux battery out and push it back in. That fixes it sometimes but not all the time. Sometimes I would just drive it like that and eventually it would come back in on its own the next morning. It's pretty annoying.
View 3 RepliesIt's cold here, around 40 below zero F. The 2007 Prius resists turning off - you have to drive around and try a few times. The computer read out screen is blank - no mileage chart or anything. The back up light is not working. The RPMs go high - is it supposed to shift internally when in drive?
View 9 Replies"Vehicle with smart key system: The indicator light flashes after the "POWER" switch has been turned OFF to indicate that the system is operating." I have noticed that my immobilizer light will not blink when it has the no start issue. usually when the key is out the light blinks but when it won't blink.... it won't start.
View 19 RepliesIt has been cold recently (out of the past week, highs in 20's or lower). This hasn't been as much of an issue before, but in the past week I have had the red triangle of death, brake warning light, check engine light, and VSC light all come on at the same time, three separate times. Also, the display screen shows a red outline of a car with "!" through it. Each time this has happened, the lights didn't come on as soon as the car was "Ready" but only after the gas engine was running for a minute or two.
The first time the lights came on, I was driving back from class, but after I got back to my house I did some internet research and saw it may be a low oil indicator. Checked the oil, it was almost at the bottom mark on the dipstick, and it had been over 10,000 miles since the last one (oops! we don't normally do that). After reading some stories online, I took it in to get an oil change, and the lights went off for a couple days. Second time the lights came on, I checked the oil level, it was definitely over-filled, so I took it back to Walmart and had them redo the oil so that it was at the right level. I checked the oil level before leaving the parking lot that time and it was at the top mark on the dipstick. Again, all the lights were off for a couple days.
Today, I drove my car for about an hour in the morning (temperature was around upper teens, wind chill below 10) and had no problems. Then, this evening I turn the car on and start driving out of the parking lot when the car beeps at me and flashes all of the warning lights again. I drove back to my house and it is now sitting in the driveway. I am not planning on driving it until I can have a car mechanic friend take a look at it on Tuesday, but he doesn't know anything about the hybrid system/battery.
My wife and I have also noticed that since the weather has been colder, the hybrid battery (shown on the "Energy" screen when driving) seems to be charging and discharging much faster than normal. I haven't seen it at only 1 bar or full of green bars more than a couple times in the 2.5ish years we have owned the car, but in the past two weeks it has happened 5-10 times (estimated). I am not sure if this is due to the weather, or if it could indicate a problem with the (hybrid?) battery. For obvious reasons, this makes us nervous :/
As a side note, I changed the transmission fluid sometime in December, so I was wondering if possibly I didn't put enough fluid back in. I have checked the diagnostic screen and found some codes, but most of them seem to relate to the audio, which doesn't concern me as much as the code that seems to indicate the transmission, which is why I mention the change I did a while back. I just don't know why it wouldn't have shown up until now. I'll attach some pictures I took tonight of the codes and lights.
Also, the battery is a couple years old, but after sitting for a couple hours the battery was reading 12.1 V according to the diagnostic screen, so I don't think that is the issue. We haven't had any trouble getting the car to start, and once it is running it still seems to drive normally with the warning lights on. What these codes mean, and a possible cause for the warning lights?
I think this happened last year. Whenever it happened, I know it's happened before. It only happens when it's cold outside. Yesterday, it was 18ºF which, Priapus was happy to show me, equates to -6ºC.
View 14 RepliesI have an 05 Prius with 108k miles I bought about 2 months ago. My commute to work each morning is 1.5 miles with speeds of 25mph or less.
Usually the car has acted the same way each day. The ice spins consistently as I creep along to work. But last night the temps dropped to -10f and this morning when I left for work it was about 3 above. I turned on the car and instead of the few seconds after ready it takes for the ice to turn on it turned on right away today. I let it warm for about 3 minutes then set off. Right away I noticed the ice start to Rev up.
And as I slowly approached 25 MPH it was revving abnormally high. It was showing energy from the ice to the wheels and to the mg and charging the battery which was at the normal state of charge. All blue, right before green. When I stopped at a light about 1 mile in the ice turned off as normal, and started right away as normal. But it seemed the ice was still revving as if it was working very hard to pick up a slow increase in speed.
I pulled into my parking spot, battery showing green state of charge now, and the motor stopped as usual. I do not run the heat on this trip and it takes usually 5 minutes, so I just tough it out.
I've got a 2008 Prius which I bought used last summer. It works quite well except for one behavior: In cold weather, sometimes, the car either does not start at all, or starts without the dashboard gauges lighting up.
View 13 RepliesMy 2005 Prius shifts into Neutral, "N", when I put it either into Drive, "D", or Reverse, "R", during Cold weather, mid 20's and below. It will only stay in "B" to drive, and I have to hold the shifter in "R" to back up or "D" to drive. After the car warms up while driving 15-20 minutes in "B", I can shift it into "D" and it will stay there. I normally start the car and let it warm up in the morning for 10-15 minutes on cold days, below 25F but still I'm only able to drive it in "B" until it's ready. I just moved to Montana after driving this car in normal Southern California driving conditions. It happened while vacationing in Montana during the winter of 2007 a few times but it didn't bother me since I wasn't living there. I reported to Toyota but they couldn't do anything since the weather wouldn't co-operate. This car is still under 70,000 miles.
View 9 RepliesThis is the second year I've owned my 2007 Prius, and it seems to be getting worse.
In the summer, the hatch will open with ease! The handle recognizes my hand there and unlocks the hatch and whammo bammo we're in business. In the winter, especially the really really cold weather like we're having now (down to about 10 over night) the hatch refuses to open.
I have a 2000 Nissan Altima that works great except when the weather becomes cold in the winter. The brakes don't work when I turn on my car. The brake lever will not press down at all and once or twice (before I realized this was happening) my car went sliding down the road without an ability to stop. I can't tell if they start working after the car warms up or after I've pumped them for a while because they'll start working again at random times. Sometimes it takes a few seconds and sometimes it takes a few minutes.
View 15 RepliesFuel pump does not work in Cold Weather, but works fine in warm weather? Will replacing the pump solve this or is there a bad sensor somewhere else causing the problem?
View 14 RepliesWhen it is cold (below 30 degrees) and above about 30mph, there is a loud high pitched squeal (rather like the pitch of a squealing hearing aide)that seems to come form the front drivers side. The colder it is, the louder it is.
When I am able to take it in it is too warm to hear it. What might be causing the noise and will they be able to figure it out if it isn't making the sound?
My car usually is park in the garage. I was out of town this weekend and parked outside in 30 degrees weather, then my ML system's HDD won't start up. No GPS, no HDD audio and no voice command? It work again this morning after it sat in the garage overnight. I think this happened before last year also. Can I get the dealer to replace the HDD with my platinum extended warranty?
View 8 RepliesIn cold weather (10-15 deg.) the brakes in my 2009 Santa Fe are very soft/spongy. I had to depress the brake pedal nearly to the floor before it would stop on dry pavement. Once it's warmed up, the brakes seem fine. Pumping them seems to work but they are not back to their normal condition.
View 14 RepliesMy 2007 ES UL has started to peel at the edge of the glass of the rear roof panel. It was originally just at the rear corner and I assumed it must have been scratched and the due to dryness started to peel. Then I noticed it at the other rear corner. I asked them to look at it at the dealer and the service advisor told me it was from the UV rays which dried it out, and not to worry about it. I bought and applied einszett gummi pflege stift to those corners and all seemed well.
Now that it got colder here in NY the corners again began to pop up but today I see it's started to pop out very much in the middle of the panel which seemed fine before!! The SA had told me that this (gasket, molding) comes attached to the roof and to fix it I'd have to replace the panel! I'm scared my UL is sick of the panoramic roof just for show and wants to be able to open.
I was heading home last night from work and noticed something odd. It was the first pretty cold night that we have had around 20-25 deg. and I took off from the parking lot like normal.
When I got to the first stop light about a mile down the road I heard what sounded like the engine revving up right when I took my foot off the gas pedal. It did this as I coasted to the stop light. It also did it again at the next stop light just up the street. I thought maybe it was the heater blower, but It really sounded and felt like the engine revving. The car did not accelerate or anything, is this part of the warm up or normal? I also have the lower grill blocked but I don't see how that would make any difference.
2004 Passat 1.8t that is intermittently not starting. The problem only happens when the car is cold. When I turn the key, the car cranks just fine but will not start. All of the dash lights light up and I had the battery tested and it is fine. Tonight it took about 5 minutes of repeated cranking and waiting before the car started.
After a 15-minute trip home and it had a chance to warm up, the car starts just fine. I've taken it to my mechanic but they haven't been able to replicate the problem. I'm thinking about leaving it overnight just so they'll be able to replicate it.
Not sure if it could be related, but I just had a coil replaced a few weeks ago (the coil was <1 year old). The plugs are only 3 months old.
I got a new Prius Plug-in 2012 and when the cold weather came this winter, which isn't that cold at 40F, the 12v battery seems to get discharged very often. This week, I must have jumpstarted the car twice already. The 12v battery seems to get drained when I park outside in the (not so) cold, or when I park underground for hours. I also notice that the traction battery gets filled up; it's as if the 12v battery drains into the traction battery.
(I leased a Prius 2010, not plug-in, for 3 years and this never happened even if I parked it for days in even colder weather.)