EGR Valve replacement Prius v (lowercase v for the Prius v wagon, not an uppercase)

Welcome to Prius Chat .

I replaced the egr on our 2010 Prius II last year at 120 k miles. It will be difficult to do the valve outside of removing the valve and cooler assembly. But to do that, you'll need to drain the engine coolant and removed the windshield wiper cowling.

If you were going to take the cap off of the egr valve to manually actuate it, I would use an impact screwdriver as a regular screwdriver could lead to rounding the threads.

Best thing to do IMO would be to;

1. Pull the Egr pipe that leads to the intake manifold.
2. Inspect the pipe and determine the deposit level.
3. Remove the black cap off of the egr valve and manually actuate the valve.
4. Reassemble what you have taken apart.

What symptoms are you experiencing? Did you get the P0401 code?

Good luck and keep us posted .

 

Since the build up was in the pipe, it has probably also gotten into the intake manifold ports where the Egr enters. If you are not getting the P0401, the egr valve maybe functioning properly. But there is a lot of cleaning to do.

What services have you done recently? How long has this problem been there? Spark plugs changed? What did they look like? Any oil consumption, if so, how much? Ever use any fuel injector cleaner?

I was getting poor engine and motor transition, so I bought a cooler and egr valve from the salvage yard and pulled the original cooler and valve out. I would plan ahead and do the following if it were me:

1. Buy a spare EGR cooler and valve (both can be had for ~$100 total before shipping from a salvage yard)
2. Clean the cooler and valve prior to installation
3. Remove and clean the intake manifold
4. Get a PCV valve and replace it while the intake manifold is off as this makes the PCV valve job take 5 miutes and a lot easier than from below the car
5. Clean throttle body
6. Clean MAF sensor with specific MAF sensor cleaner
7. Purchase all gaskets so you have spares just in case
8. Replace all parts disassembled

The intake manifold removal and cleaning took me about 2 hours but I made sure to thoroughly clean the egr passages and flush the manifold before reinstalling, which led to the manifold sitting in the sun to make sure it was dry.

If you swapped parts and still get the misfire in the same spot, I agree that flow and what the system is expecting are different.

Keep us posted.

 

Is your engine coolant level stable? How was the intake manifold cleaned?

By this do you mean that the connector was connected, but the cap was off of the valve? And when you revved the engine and the computer wanted to move the valve it couldn't? Do you have techstream?

 

Sounds like you have the next step. When you clean the intake manifold, I would do a before and after flow test with compressed air. This way you can see what volume of air is allowed to pass through before and after. Not quantitative, but will help.

How many miles have you put on your Prius since the issues have cropped up? When you cleaned the throttle body, did you spray down onto the butterfly valve and housing, or spray on a rag to clean it?

 

The shaking occurs at all speeds or only at startup? Was there a check engine light that came on the dash? Did the dealership tell you the code? Was it P0401? If so, there is a TSB out on the egr valve that they should replace it for free. But they will do nothing else.

To do a flow test using compressed air, remove the intake manifold from the engine. Then use a hose to see how much flow you get out of each inlet. Then clean it and compare the difference. It sounds like there is a restriction on the air flow, so this would give you an idea of the severity in a qualitative sense.

I asked about the throttle body cleaning as some will spray the cleaner into the valve and it will not clear, causing knocking on startup until the solvent clears.

Keep us posted .

 

@Raytheeagle Of the EGR valve and EGR cooler, is it mainly the cooler that needs replacement, ie: the valve is relatively easy to clean and reuse? I'm just browsing on Toyota Online Parts and see either the cooler or the valve, new, is a bit over $200.

I appreciate you can get the pair, used, in EBay for a bit over $100, but am thinking that could be a bit of a gamble, and new cooler is going to be completely clean.

Toyota Online Parts | toyotaonlineparts.com | Toyota Parts Online

 

Glad I could help and provide you with some insights.

If you are ever in the Bay Area of California, maybe we could share a beer or a glass of wine.

Keep using the forum as you have questions. There are a lot of great people on here.

What did the plunger on the cooler side of the egr look like? Did you shine a light into the cooler to see what the fins look like?

Keep us posted on your intake when you get around to it.

Great question.

IMO, the salvage part can be easily cleaned and returned to "like new" status. The great thing about the valve and cooler is you can take them apart and look at them.

But what you asked is a value question. Would the valve and cooler be worth $400 or can I make the $100 be just a valuable? The valve is the easiest to clean as you need to remove the black cap to allow for activation of the plunger, which is best done by having an impact screwdriver to avoid marring the screw head.

For me, the $100 saved me $300 (or $135 if I bought the used valve and new cooler) and I could make the salvage part close to like new with a little elbow grease and some brushes and compressed air. I also inspected the part when the parts guy brought it out so I could gauge the cleanliness of the part prior to purchasing . I also figured that the replacement will get soiled in service, so having it be spotless would not be time well spent.

Knowing I have a spare and that the problem will not get any better, I can clean and prepare for the next rotation. I went 120 k miles before doing the first replacement. Next round will be at 200 k miles, or 80 k miles after the last one.

I have changed several parameters in the equation (fuel injector cleaner, top tier gas, oil consumption, etc), so it won't be apples to apples but in this case I'll be a bad scientist in the interest of saving $$$ in repairs .

Just depends what your perception of value is. I feel a used cooler can be cleaned to "serviceable" condition and the valve can be cleaned to "close to new" condition and that's plenty good for the application.

 

I can relate to having spare parts, the convenience to take your time cleaning, at your leisure cleaning. How did you clean the cooler, soak in solvent?

 

I just used compressed air. The carbon deposits here were not caked on line in the intake manifold, so 100 psi did the trick.

The only problem is I have a small compressor (3 gallon tank), so I have only short bursts of high pressure available. Maybe @Rebound had a larger tank and I'll bring the valve and cooler to clean it faster at the end of the month. But you could solvent soak it as you will see if the fins got junked up.

I did not do a solvent soak as I tried compressed air first and it seemed to work. My fear with liquids in normal gas service is plugging given the fins are small and I didn't want to make the problem worse, or have to buy another cooler.

But I am an experimenter, so if the compressed air didn't work, I would have tried something.

 

Cleaning the manifold should get the P0219a. You could also clean the MAF sensor if you have not done that in the past.

For the P0403, I believe that is for the egr and pcm not being kosher with expectations. Might be worth checking the electrical connection to ensure it is tight. If it is, try pulling the black cap off of the egr valve and pushing on the plunger to ensure it is free and operational and everything is seated correctly.

Hope that helps. Keep us posted.

 

Sorry, all I have is a little pancake compressor, and my friend "borrowed" it about two years ago.

 

That's unfortunate .

That still won't deter my attendance though.