Just like any other car battery, the Toyota Prius hybrid battery eventually runs out of juice and cannot be recharged. Sure, the adverts about how they recharge themselves when running are very compelling, but what happens when they die – as all car batteries do? This aspect of the Prius hybrid was not so well advertised!
This revolutionary hybrid car attracted the attention of many people, particularly those needing to be seen to be green. Just like anything new, unexpected problems can develop later, and with the Prius batteries this was their rechargeable lifetime.
The car is powered by a petrol engine and electric motor that interchange according to the demand. Without getting too technical, the Toyota Prius battery powers the motor in electric mode, and is being recharged when the car is running from the regular petrol engine. The car switches to petrol once the battery is exhausted, and reverts to electric mode when the battery is recharged.
Why Prius Batteries Fail
The reason for the Toyota Prius battery rebuild being needed is that the sealed nickel-metal hydride battery does not have an unlimited life – just as a normal car battery has to be replaced occasionally. It is not the power of the battery that starts to fail, but its ability to recharge, so a fully-charged battery becomes weaker with age.
You should see this in terms of your fuel consumption starting to rise as the petrol engine is forced to kick in more often. While a regular battery eventually dies when you continually overcharge it, Toyota Prius batteries lose their strength because it cannot be charged enough. Eventually, they will completely die out, and you have only two options: buy a new or rebuilt battery or rebuild it yourself.
Toyota Prius Battery Price
Toyota Prius battery replacements are priced at anything from $2,200 to $5,000 depending on where you are, what generation of Prius you are using and what your garage charges. This is a high price to pay for a replacement, but there is a much cheaper solution to your problem if you want to consider it: rebuild it.
You will find a fair bit of advice on the internet regarding this, but it can be very basic and not easy enough to understand to enable you to do it yourself – you only have to make one error and your battery will be ruined forever and you will be faced with an expensive replacement. There are also instructions available online in a commercial PDF eBook that explain to you how to rebuild generation I and II Prius batteries for under $350 – saving you up to $4,000 or more. The book also shows you how to replace your battery computer for $50!
In rebuilding your Toyota Prius hybrid battery using these instructions, you will find the most difficult part of the job is getting the battery out – man, that’s really heavy, although you should manage it fine with two of you. You also get free email help if you have a problem, but you shouldn’t need to use that.
Prius Hybrid Battery Rebuild Guide
This guide to a Toyota Prius Hybrid Battery Rebuild is more than just written instructions: it comes with photographs of the author’s last Prius battery rebuild, making it all look so simple. It also provides you with a list of genuine suppliers that can provide the parts you will need. The guide is very easy to understand, even for somebody like me that knew nothing about hybrid batteries until now.
You can save thousands of dollars using this guide and get your Toyota Prius back to running like a dream. There is another advantage: you also save on fuel, because in addition to saving on the price of a new Prius battery, you also resurrect your Prius fuel economy so save on the cost of the excess gas you would have had to buy.
Not only that, but don’t forget the income tax you might be able to reclaim for running a hybrid car. In the USA you can claim $2,000 from your gross income! So there you have three financial reasons for rebuilding a Toyota Prius battery that has permanently lost its charge.
If you are reasonably handy around the car or the house, then you can do this yourself. However, if tools confuse you, then you can likely get a friend or relative to do it for you, or even give your local mechanic a copy of the Prius Hybrid Battery Rebuild guide and pay him or her to do it for you – you still save thousands of dollars.
Advantages of Rebuilding Prius Hybrid Batteries
The advantages of running a Prius hybrid car are well worth you making the effort to get yours back into proper running order. Not only that, but this eBook can help you make money with your new-found skill: there are lots of Prius hybrid batteries in the scrap yards or being sold cheap that you could recondition and sell for cash.
Most people will simply dispose of their expended batteries and buy new ones because they believe that to be their only option. You could set up a blog or website to ask for them and then sell them on eBay after fixing them – that’s making the most of your investment in this eBook on how to carry out a Toyota Prius Hybrid battery rebuild! Some sites are reselling their rebuilt hybrid batteries for $1500 and more!
