Hi All, I'd love your thoughts: I recently inherited from my mom, who no longer drives, a 2006 Prius with only 70,000 miles. I realize how fortunate I am! The hybrid battery needs to be replaced, however (clear with codes and subcodes confirming). The original battery lasted 12 years, and then she and my dad replaced that with a Dorman, which lasted another 8. I was leaning toward going with a new battery from Exclusively Hybrid, which would ship from Florida to where I am in Md, and then I'd have an independent dealer install it here. EH's warranty states 4 years/unlimited miles. The total cost for the battery and installation would be about $2,500. The problem is I'm not seeing in the reviews anyone talking about whether the company upheld the warranty if problems occurred, though most of the reviews were positive. An independent installer told me to be really careful about battery warranties, that he'd seen some that were not honored based on technicalities. Also, some customers of EH are saying the battery got banged up in the shipping process. I also found out I could get a Toyota OECM battery for about $1,800 from a dealer's parts department and take it to the independent installer, so that would cost me about $2,400, but the warranty would only be for 1 year. Considering it's a brand new battery, and the ones installed in new cars are warrantied for 8 years, this is concerning. The dealer told me they could install the same battery for $3,400. And then, there's Green Bean, which will do the installation in my driveway for about $1,600, but it's a refurbished battery. On the other hand, their reviews seem to indicate they're good about honoring their 4 year warranties. So I'd probably need another after 4 years. I understand that with such low mileage on the car, it should last a long time, so if I knew the brand new Toyota battery was solid, I'd probably go with that and have an independent mechanic install it. But these warranty issues! Sorry for the lengthy explanation. Does anyone have any suggestions or experience that might help me get clarity here? Thank you so much.
Dealer or Panasonic new with papers .. I have a friend who is a Toyoda parts dept head . So I know a lil bit about it . Also been with Toyota 50 years. 50 years of Toyoda shop pictures on my walls of shop. All the way back to 2000GT.
For $2400 installed, definitely go with the OEM battery. You said the original OEM battery lasted 12 years, so you should expect the same from a new OEM battery. There is no better battery that you can buy for your Gen 2 Prius than the OEM battery.
welcome! in your situation, I would go with oem. there's a lot of life left in your car, and while you may need a brake actuator at some point, the rest is likely very solid if you're not burning any oil. Dorman once had a very good rebuilding process, but they ditched it to keep the price down. no one else will have the quality of new toyota oem, and warranty length is not a concern. all the best!
