Prius Prime--Expected Longevity

Probably was not a regular scheduled maintenance item for Honda either. Spark plugs/valve adjustment is just like water pump/timing belt for my other Toyota. They like to tack on additional items.

 

I just bought a 2018 prius Prime. Hopefully if you charge you battery each and evey night you can do most of your driving on electric only. No engine wear in electric only. I have a 2010 Prius level 5 trim that just popped it's headgasket on its second engine at 431,000 miles. Rather than installing another JDM engine in a car with that many miles I replaced it with a Gen 4 Prius Prime. The EGR was redesigned in the Gen 4 and the EGR gas enters the intake manifold behind the throttle body instead of a tube with 4 rather tiny passages on each cylinder which tend to clog up and overheat cylinder 1 especially and lead to headgasket failure. I say hopefully it will last longer than the infamous headgasket blowing Gen 3. Other improvements in gen 4 1.8 liter are higher tension piston rings which reduces blow by which clogs up the intake manifold and blowby causes oil burning so hopefully your Prius Prime will longer than the Gen 3 Prius which is now not recommended to buy because known headgasket issues by several mechanics

 

congrats! how many miles on her?

 

4th gen should last 400k miles unless u damage it somehow

 

Any sense of how long the Prime traction battery may last even if overall driving miles remain low? Can a PHEV last 20 or 25 years without replacing traction battery? Or is it more likely to last only 15 years or so even if miles are low? If so, this would seem a significant downside to the vehicle, in my view.

 

Only 32500 miles on my 2018 Gen 4 Prius Prime. I am a Pharmacist and I get paid to drive. It's been just under 1 month since I bought my car and it had 29600 miles when I bought it. I only have about 7 more years before I plan to retire and my 2010 Gen 3 Prius had 130,000 miles on it when I bought it in November of 2017 and last month I noticed it started idling a bit rough at times (Death rattle) then it smooths out. I removed and cleaned the intake manifold and cleaned the EGR valve and EGR cooler at first and it didn't seem to help so I brought it in and it was diagnosis with a head gasket failure and Techstream detected a historic sporadic missfire on cylinder 1. They didn't do a bore-scope camera inspection and since the car had 431,000 miles on it and it was already on it's second engine ( replaced original engine in 2021 with JDM engine) so I decided to retire it. The coolant level reservoir was also a bit low too so it was diagnosis as failed head gasket cylinder 1. Ironically the engine was still at full on oil and since the engine swap I never needed to add oil between oil changes. I was hoping it would make 500,000 miles but Gen 3 Prius tend to blow headgaskets after 200,000 thousand + miles

 

The 8.8 KWhr battery is only good for a maximum of 25 miles of EV driving. I heard that some high mileage Gen 4 Prius Primes still are still functional albeit with a few miles less driving range in EV mode. I plug in every day so first 20+ miles are electric. Electricity is cheaper than gasoline plus hopefully the 175 miles max per week of EV driving will help the gasoline engine last longer. I live in North central Minnesota and I average 35,000 miles per yer so EV mode could take at most 9000 miles off the engine running could buy a few extra years of engine life. 15 years if well maintained should not be a problem

 

I’m still getting 40 miles (64kms) as my estimated EV range when fully charged in my ‘22 Prime, so no significant degradation yet. I wonder how degraded the traction battery must become before the car is inoperable and requires a new battery.

 

Unfortunately I recently replaced my 2010 Prius Traction battery this January. at the time it was running great. I spoke to the woman interested in buying my old car. Her mechanic is a real prick and says she should only pay me $200 and I put in a new 12 volts battery and a $850 reconditioned traction battery from MN Hybrids so $500 is actually a really good price. Plus the body on the car is straight and there is no rust through at all on the body. Her car has front end damage plus a bad hybrid system which would cost way more than $500 to fix. Plus my car is a level 5 trim with the 17 inch alloy wheels which I will sell on Facebook marketplace to minimize my loss of replacing the traction battery

 

Ummm; you've got 430K miles on it with a blown head gasket and it's a 16 year old car. While I agree with you that $200 is a low-ball offer, the new owner is going to have to replace the head gasket on a 430K mile car with a "rebuilt traction battery". If that lady doesn't wrench, she's just going to pay for that mechanic's kids college tuition. I mean that's why your retiring that car, RIGHT?????? At this point in it's life cycle, it's going to nickle and dime you to death - and it's going to be unreliable.

Reality Bites....... A car isn't an appreciating asset, it's a tool. Unless it's a rare collectable; which you'll need to find a buyer. In most cases, a house would be an appreciating asset; but that requires basic maintenance too.

 

the original plug in prius is 14 years old and most are still going strong and the prime is much better. I suspect 20-25 years is not going to be a problem for most.