Is There a Low Coolant Warning Light?

I bought one gallon two years ago and still have about 80% left after topping off both cooling tanks earlier this year. I think it is a good investment if you do your own maintenance.

Steering pump, not sure about that.

 

There is a warning light for the electronic power steering, and for high coolant temperature. Additionally, since there are two coolant reservoirs, one for the engine and one for the power control unit, the MFD will display "Hybrid System Overheat" if the power control unit overheats (the coolant temperature warning light is for the engine coolant only). Those are probably likely to come on in the event of low fluids, though not guaranteed until they're extraordinarily low.

That said, there's no power steering fluid, it's all electric.

And the coolant should be sealed in. Maybe when you have 300,000 miles on your car and a few dings in the radiator, you'll need to carry a bottle with you to mitigate a slow leak. Until then, no need. A good practice is to peek under the hood when you're waiting for your gas tank to fill and make sure everything (oil level, coolant levels, etc.) looks normal. But in general, you shouldn't have any problems with a brand new car losing any fluids.

 

There is only a High Coolant Temperature light and a Hybrid System Overheat light. No low coolant level warning. Perhaps there should be: http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii...49-inverter-radiator-leaking-replacement.html

There is a requirement for changing coolants in the maintenance schedule, first change at 100K miles and 50K miles after that. There are procedures for changing both (engine and hybrid) coolants in the maintenance manual. If I keep the car I intend to change mine at 100K miles.

I have 46K miles, two years, and my coolant levels are right where they were when the car was new, so the system does indeed seem tight, at least so far. I check the levels in the overflow bottles every time I check the oil.

 

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As per the linked thread you will get "CHECK HYBRID SYSTEM" on screen if you have no inverter coolant left. Interestingly i was still able to drive to the dealer in this condition with no overheat of the inverter, but the drive was not very smooth as it seemed to be trying to completelyignore the battery and supply all power as required just from the engine.