Ran across an interesting phenomenon yesterday and wanted to share. I had my Pri in ON mode (not ready) and was programming voice tags for my phonebook entries. I was about 45-55 minutes into the process when the car shut down completely. When this happened I wondered if I drained the 12V battery down since I had the map light on the entire time, so I tried to power it up again (pressed POWER button without holding foot on brake = what I call ON mode) and it came back up again. I didn't wait another 45-55 minutes to see if it does it again. Any comments? Thanks
My Truck cuts off the dome light and everything after 30 mins to keep from draining battery, you can close and reopen the door and the cycle starts over. I think the same here?
EZW1, Haven't seen mention of this before. Is it a feature of the '09? I wonder, if a door is left ajar, does it completely shut down, including interior lights left on? It would be worth a test just to prove/disprove.
If the car is left ACC-ON for an hour, then it will turn off automatically. This is a design feature. (ACC-ON is defined as the state where the MFD is on but the instrument panel lights are off. You can play the stereo in this mode; you cannot adjust the power windows or use the ventilation fan.) If a door is left ajar, the interior lights will remain on indefinitely - and this is why some hapless owners have had to purchase a new 12V auxiliary battery sooner vs. later.
Pat, Patrick, I forgot that current/past models have the timed shut down feature. I keep thinking that at some point Toyota will relent and put a total shut down feature in. It would lessen one of the more frequent complaints; a dead 12V battery. Well, the '09 is really a carry-over model to bridge to the '10s. Maybe next year in the Gen IIIs, Toyota will get it right.
You hit the nail on the head. I was in ACC mode, the doors were shut, I had the map light on to help me read the manual better, and it shut down about 45-50 minutes later. Nice to know of this feature... Helps preserve the 12V battery, which many have run dead.
EZW1, You didn't say what happened to the map light when the car turned itself off. Did the map light turn off too? If the answer is yes, then there has been changes to the control algorithms. In this event, you couldn't run the 12 V battery down as now the lights are turned off, even though the map light switch is in the on position. This would be real advancement. If the light didn't go out, it doesn't tell us much without further probing. The light might be kept burning because the pressure sensors in the drivers seat sense that it is occupied. To test if this is the case, you'd have to repeat what you've done, but exit the car, close the door, and wait until the car shuts down. Now if the light stays on, nothing has changed in the algorithms. If the light goes out, Eureka! there has been a change in the control algorithm and it would be much harder to deplete the 12 V battery. I'm being a little dogged about this because I believe that Toyota makes small changes to how the car works without saying anything about it. As an example, when I disconnect the 12V battery in my '08, I don't loose the radio presets and others settings. This is not true for earlier year models. By doing the second test above, you could determine if Toyota has made another sneaky little change. No big deal, but it would be nice for '09 owners to know.
