I'm just looking into what service items I need to buy to give my Prius its first service - I just bought it on Tuesday and have already driven about 400 miles in it. In looking for oil, I've found that Tesco has a fully synthetic oil 0W20 which is only £20 for 4 litres. Has anyone used this oil? It seems to meet the Prius specs in the manual but it's about half the price of the next cheapest oil.
excellent. i can't vouch for the oil, but at 120k, you pretty much need everything. do you have owners manual with maintenance schedule, and know what services the previous owner performed?
Try and research who make the oil for Tescos. It probably is one of the big name brands, so will be as good as most others.
Ooh, exciting! Is it mostly DIY-able? I've had plenty of experience servicing an old Citroen on my driveway so I'm hoping I can just about manage the Prius too. Where can I find a service schedule?
in the o/m. if you don't have one, they are on line. if you are diy, it is helpful to have tech stream, toyota's service software for a couple things, but most can be done easily. there's a great series on youtube by member @NutzAboutBolts
An Oil change? It is no different to oil change on any other petrol car. Two Prius specific things: The repair manual calls for replacing the crush washer on the oil filler plug. These are inexpensive to buy in packets of 10. I find that it can be reused for several changes, but your call. The torque spec for the drain plug is 38 Nm (387 kgf.cm; 28 ft.lbs) These are Gen III videos, not everything is transferable to Gen II
Prius is pretty average (or even easier) for DIY maintenance. As long as you don’t just assume that it’s a traditional car. You do need Techstream software (Mini-VCI is cheap, but requires XP laptop) for brake fluid change/bleed. Disabling the brake system when doing brake work, and double checking that the Prius is not on, when doing some work are couple of difference compared to traditional car.
Why 0w20? I think 5w30 would be a safer bet in a second hand Gen2 with 120000 miles and (at this stage) a still somewhat unknown engine condition. Taking a quick look as at what Tesco has to offer the following one would be my pick. With industry specs like ACEA C3, BMW LL04, Dexos 2 and MB229.31/.51 you really cant go wrong. That is going to be a very good oil! My pick: Buy Tesco 5W30 F. Synthetic Oil BMW/VX/MB 4L from our Car Oil & Lubricants range - Tesco
Because of the colder weather, it is ok to use the lighter oil. Toyota UK have retrospectively approved 0W-20 for the Gen II for the UK.
Yes I know. But he has just bought it secondhand with 120000k miles on it. Unless it is an exceptionally cold part of the UK then I'd play it safe and use 5w30, at least until the oil consumption has been monitored and verified for a while. Also, that Tesco 5W30 that I linked seems like a very good oil for the price. I couldn't find any information at all about 0w20 on their site.
Are you able to get Toyota Genuine Motor Oil. Here the 0W20 is $5.91 per liter through dealership parts department, or $4.50 in bulk. I'd second the recommendation to stay with the spec'd 2nd gen oil weight 5W30. I'm considering switching to that myself.
I'm afraid I've just spotted 1 litre of genuine Toyota Engine Oil (5W 30) on eBay in the UK, retailing for £16.80 - that's about $21.68.....!! It's cheaper to buy engine oil from an independent vehicle parts store
THAT'S what I was afraid of. Strange, we seem to have the "golden goose" deal here. Oh, what about directly from a dealership? Or don't ask? Here, I go in with my container, a mechanic fills it from a metered bulk dispenser, works a charm, $4.50 per liter. No empties going into a recycle stream either.
I used to do that when I had an ordinary ICE car (Skoda Estelle......Google it and be amazed ), at an independent garage where the mechanics were good friends. Those were the days of cheap budget motoring in a vehicle built in Czechoslovakia, out of solid 1960s technology, but produced in the 1980s. It was what it was. Cheap reliable seat of the pants motoring. Petrol and oil was oh so cheap! iPhone ?
