I just swapped the 12V battery today with a new oem battery. I know the 12V is far past it's typical, useable life. It's been begging for a change for the last year. I'm pretty sure I killed it early on when I first installed the stereo equipment. Before I changed the battery, I took a reading of the old one. 10.3V!! 10.3V and the Prius is still able to boot. How awesome is that? I wonder, what's the minimal amount of current needed to power up the computers and relays? Would an 8-Cell alkaline pack made with AAs be enough?
The peak current required is ~30A. I doubt that AA batteries could deliver that amount of current flow.
