Prius (2010-12) :: Starter Battery Drain In Concrete Parking
Jul 20, 2015
I recently parked my 2013 Prius in a concrete parking structure near LAX for 8 days. When I returned, the battery was dead - car was completely nonresponsive. AAA had to "resync" the hybrid system along with jumper cables to get me going. The technician said it was because the concrete drained the battery. I have previously left the car in underground garages for longer periods of time with no problem. Is this an urban legend?
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I have a 2010 Prius that I really love. In two separate incidents, I parked the car in a NYC parking garage and when it was delivered to me about 6 hours later the battery indicator only had two bars. There was no problems since the car recharged in about 15 minutes. On both occasions, I believe, the parking attendant left the key fob in the car the whole time it was parked. Is the car being drained because the key fob is in the car, or are the parking attendants doing something wrong? I can leave the car in my driveway for a few days and the battery is not as drained a sit is in 6 hours in the parking lot.
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Is there some sort of battery drain when hatch is raised, even though the courtesy light has been manually turned off? Seems like I read something about this recently, and don't want to damage the 12v if it's true...
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Is the remote starter going to drain your battery faster? is it why a lot of CL members having a battery problem? My friend said his dealer told him so that he didn't get a remote starter for his car. Is it true?
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I have a 2007 LS460L. It hasn't been driven in three or four days. Today we found the car was completely dead. I had to get into the car with the manual key. The battery is one year old. The AAA person found that the light switch was set on parking lights rather than automatic. Could that have drained the battery. I thought that the lights turn off after you leave the car.
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2015 prius solar roof does it drain the battery when the sun is not out and the cooling fan is running, not AC?
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I just bought a 2010 prius (26k miles..prior collision.. so no warranty) for my wife. The battery drains in just 3 days if left unused. I had Toyota install a new battery. Again 3 days left parked and battery was dead.
I locked myself in and measured the consumption. It drains at the rate of 1.1Amps when parked. That looks very high consumption. I want to measure with SKS turned off, but that's going to be tricky. I believe SKS resets when battery is reconnected.
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I recently was stuck in a traffic jam in the middle of the Mojave desert. Outside temp was about 102 and we crept along for maybe 15 minutes going no more than 5-10 mph. I had the air conditioning on. I noticed the power bars were rapidly disappearing and got worried that I would lose the battery if I didn't get moving. Needless to say, I finally was able to speed up and the bars came back. (dropped to 2 bars).
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What is wrong with her car. It is an 05 subaru outback 3.0. She bought it 4 months ago. A week ago the battery died at red light. It tested bad and was replaced. Then yesterday it died at stop sign. Jumped it and died in 5 seconds. Before dying, car would not rev. Jumped it leaving cables on for 5 minutes since battery was almost drained. She made it half mile back to office and coasted into lot. Battery tested good but drained and was fully charged. Alternator tested 7 times to be certain. We bought a 10A multimeter (our town has no 20A).
Tested for parasitic drain. No results. We took Alternator off and tested a couple more times. We took out non essential fuses to be safe. Nothing was left running. There was a phone charger that has been plugged in for the whole four months. She took it out for good measure. Starter tested good. 3 people said battery cables are good. They appear to be non corroded and tight imo as well. They checked fuel pump. All was well.
She wants to go on vacation for the 4th but is scared to try. Mechanic friend said wait until it happens again, go to o reileys and demand them replace the battery as it has to be bad even if testing good. I'm not sure of this is the correct approach, but what else is there? One online mechanic said a voltage test on electrical system is next step but only a few select mechanics even know how to do it such as one that specializes in electrical wiring or something like that.
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I have a '10 with only 4k miles, driven very little. Car might sit for three weeks and sometimes, not always, car won't start, dead battery. I have checked starting voltage and battery. Both check good, (after i have recharged battery, of course). Is this normal? I certainly hope not.
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I'm still trying to decide whether to get a Prius. I'm looking at a 2014 new III. Question: My friend who has a 2001 Prius (whose original hybrid battery is still going strong, by the way) says that if she does not drive her Prius for 2-3 weeks, her starter battery will need a jump. Is that particular to Priuses, or do all newer cars with the keyless entry and/or theft deterrent do that?
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Driving down the highway I notice the car is fine on asphalt and any flat pavement but on grooved concrete highways I feel the car "wiggle" aka trammel. It has yokohama avids for tires on 15" rims and I am questioning if others have noticed this or if its my tires causing or should I look into suspension issues. This also happens on my Taurus which is heavier and bigger/wider tires and I know the suspension is tight on the taurus.
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2012 Prius Five- Had an annoying vibration coming from the trunk area at highway speeds- especially on concrete roadways. First thought was the problematic rear license plate/frame that I've read about- so I used some felt pads around the rear plate & frame but still had the annoying vibration ad highway speeds. Over the weekend I had some spare time so I started poking around in the trunk area by rapping in several areas with a heavy hand till I heard the same (or similar frequency) vibrating sound.
Eventually I was able to isolate it to somewhere under the rear deck. I removed the carpet, then plastic deck then even the spare, etc., Found it was actually coming from the sheet metal box that surrounds the connections coming from the car and relays to the hybrid battery box. Seems the metal edges of that small connections/relay enclosure were just touching the battery box metal enclosure just lightly enough to vibrate under certain conditions. But how to fix?
To make a long story short- I disconnected the 12v battery, removed the black exhaust duct over small metal cover, removed the battery cooling fan intake shroud, then two annoying orange lock rivets, then a few 10mm nuts and one 10mm bolt- and finally the metal connection/relay cover came off.
Once off- I used black electric tape to line every seam where that metal cover touched the battery box metal cover or car frame- I then lined the battery box metal cover the same way in the areas where the connection/relay cover mated on it. Reassembly was the reverse of disassembly. Upon ride to work this morning- vibration was 100% gone- fixed!
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I checked my rx350 battery health and it is good. Still I am having recurrent issues when battery dies. And needs a restart. It happened many times and last one just happened this morning and I have feeling that this is related to rear hatch door...let me explain what happened:
Yesterday evening I went for grocery shopping and opened the rear hatch door using my car key remote, kept the groceries and closed the rear hatch using the button on the bottom of rear hatch door. I drove back to home and parked the vehicle in the garage. This morning I opened the rear hatch again and closed it, drove it to a house one block away, returned home and parked the car.
When I tried to start 1 hour later, the battery had already died. So, I have a feeling that opening and closing the rear hatch door 3 times caused this battery drain.
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Just wondering if leaving the USB plugged in with the car is off drains the battery at all? Should I unplug it when I shut the car off or is it ok to just leave it plugged in?
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I started having a problem last week when my 2007 Prius was setting for two days while I was using my pickup truck. Found the 12 volt battery dead so I disconnected it and tested it with a battery load tester. And it showed it was bad. Well Ok, that figures, since it was an OEM battery and ~6-7 years old.
I have another 2007 Prius here for body repairs so I took the aftermarket (newer) battery out of it and topped the charge off in it. The battery load test indicated it was still a serviceable battery.
Put it in the car and cleared the red triangle, etc.. Everything was fine.
Since I was still going to be short one battery, I contacted Battery Systems, my shops battery dealer and ask them to drop off a new Yellow Top Optima that fits the Prius (FYI my shop price is $159.96). I would be a couple days til their deliver truck would be here and again I left the car sit for a couple days and drove my truck. On the day of the delivery, I had an appointment and drove the Prius, about 15 miles. No problem. Left it at in a street parking space for about 2 hours. Came out and all systems were dead. Nothing. Dome light was the only indication that the battery was so low that it was very dim. Head light were off and I hadn't used them while driving.
I called for road service and got a jump start and the systems came up and I was able to clear the Read Triangle when I got home by turning the car off and back on again.
The new Yellow Top Optima arrived shortly there after and I installed it. Drove the car for 6 days and this morning everything was fine when I drove to church and left it, head lites off (never had used them), came out 2 hours later and when I started the car, I got the Red Triangle and Ready but continued home. I turn it off and on again but this time I got no Ready but the Triangle and the whole sting of check light. Could only get it from park into neutral. Nothing else. Wouldn't clear.
Using my Torque Pro program, tried to read the ECU and it indicate no codes stored, Several tries, no codes or history. Called friend who has reader that will read the CAN Bus and he managed to find an odd P0503 code having to do with a speed sensor. Cleared that and the Triangle went out.
In the end I went and checked the voltage of the new battery and it was only 12.01 volts. I put the load tester on it and the condition is fine. Just the charge voltage is low.
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As the title states. It seems like the hatch release button is sticking due to the melting rubber. Would this cause a parasitic drain on the 12v battery?
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I've just returned from a late-night walk, where I discovered I'd left on the dome (interior ceiling) light in my 20-year-old car (soon to be replaced by a Prius c Two!) about a half-hour previously. I thought: if I hadn't noticed my mistake, tomorrow morning the battery would probably be dead!
Could this happen with a Prius c? Or is there a sensor that automatically douses any interior light(s) after, say, 15 minutes?
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One day, I drove my Prius with my key fob in pocket. Parked the car. Turned off the power. Opened the driver side door to get off. Heard the continuous beep of "key fob in the slot" warning. I had never heard of it so I did not what it was. Tried closing / opening the door several times. The warning kept coming when I opened it. Tried getting off the car, pushed the lock button. It locked with lock beep normally.
After a few hours, I found the battery was dead. Had it jump started and the problem had not come back for a few weeks.
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We have experience dead car, no start conditions with our 07 Prius at least 4 times. The nearest we can figure is that there is a drain when we place the car in ACC mode, close the power windows then turn it off. This kills the car in less than 3 hours. The last time the hybrid system complained about being in neutral when jumped...we NEVER use Neutral
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I accidentally left my daytime running lights on today for about 6 hours. My car is fairly new - only a month old. Will this drain my battery? I have driven it several times since I noticed it but am wondering if it will drain within the next few days. Had that happen on a non-hybrid vehicle when I left the interior light on all night - battery died a day or two after that. I know the batteries on the Prius C are different than in non-hybrid cars though I admit I don't really understand what's inside my Prius. I've read the owner's manual but in all honesty, it's pretty Greek to me. Seems like it has both an electric battery and a "regular" battery. Any major damage to it?
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