i work late, go down to the car, and it's just...dead. has enough juice to weakly beep at me, the dome lights come on at about half power, and there's a great big triangle-! light on that i've never seen before. the car had been left on all day after a valet moved it. every time its battery got low, it turned on the ICE until it ran out of gas, which was actually pretty amazing to me. the roadside service's 3 free tanks of gas have apparently resurrected the car, though. two things: 1. anything else i should watch out for now that this has happened? 2. make sure you tell valets to turn your car OFF after they park it!
This is the kind of stuff that I'm afraid of. The other night I went to dinner at a restaurant. The valet insisted to park my car because there was a party going on and they need to arrange the cars(I think they want my tip more than anything else). I told them that the car will need to match my finger prints to open the door (I can easily fake this with SKS ), they were like oh , and pointed me to a spot where I can park. Garsen, I think the Prius should be smart enough to shut itself down when it runs low. Hopefully nothing is damaged. Or you can ask the dealer to do a diagnostic check and document it. If anything's damaged, have the valet pay the bills.
They should come with the option of shutting down just like laptops :-p After an hour of idle (again as an option on the MFD)
Yeah, I am really super reluctant of letting others park my car for just that reason and a handfull of others. Sorry to hear about your problems, Garsen. It's a shame it was late and the guy wasn't there for you to rip into.
While I don't yet have a Prius (I've been waiting since December), one thing I know is that running a battery until it is that low is very hard on it. For the 12 volt battery it will build up sulfates and prematurely shorten the life of the battery. I think this is also one case where the Prius will also run down the NIMH battery far below where it normally will, which is also very hard on that battery. For the 12v battery some of the new car battery chargers have a special mode to help get rid of the sulfate crystals to rejuvenate batteries (and I've seen this work). Hopefully you can have this billed to the valet parking for any damage caused.
I feel for you. I rolled up to a hotel this past week and the valet came running up to my car to park it. I politely pointed out that it was a Prius, one of those newfangled hybrids, it was less than a month old, and I did not want anyone else driving it--"...it's very complicated and a high learning curb is required." No problems when I asked where I could park it myself.
A great suggestion I read on this board a while ago is to turn off the SKS if you're having a valet park your car. This means that they have to put the FOB in the slot to drive it. Valets are used to taking the "key" out of the car when they're done with it, so it shouldn't be too much to expect that they'll pull the FOB out of the slot, which will shut down the car.
I just looked at the valet card and the instructions on that is to put the FOB in the slot to power up and to remove the FOB (after pressing Park and Power) when done, so they should know what to do. I do like the idea of turning the SKS off beforehand. If fact, when I had to go to a tire place to fix a leak last weekend, I planned to do that (I ended up taking it to the dealer and I figured they'd know what to do).
There are also spanish versions of the valet instructions also- I laminated the spanish version.. But when I take it to the the closest dealer to service, it ALWAYS comes back almost empty of battery......grrrrrrrrr. Idiots......
at least it wasn't stolen. my sister had a brand new bmw M3, 3 days old, they went to a eat at a fancy italian place she handed the guy the keys like normal next thing you know they are doen dinner, they come out and the car is gone and the valet has a blank stare on his face. the WORST! telling them it's complicated may be the simplest solution...
"I think this is also one case where the Prius will also run down the NIMH battery far below where it normally will, which is also very hard on that battery." Not true.
I can, but that's because I hacked the solenoid wiring so it can't grab the fob. Once the car's powered up, the fob doesn't need to stay in. . _H*
Oh, really? OK. You can tell I never put the KeyFob in the slot (although I'm going to try it out on my ride home). I thought I remembered pulling the key out of the slot and having the car shut down, but I definately could be mistaken. Anyway, I think turning off SKS is still a good idea. Part of parking any car is taking the key out; they know that they should get the key out of the car, and eventually they might read the valet card.
I have SKS, so I never know that till last week when I go for the insurance inspection. The guy ask me to put the key in the slot and show him now it works. The guy who inspected the car was impressed by the Prius. He said he worked on a Honda hybrid before, but not as cool as the Prius! At the end, he said he wanted to get one too.
I NEVER let any car jocky touch my Prius or any other car I own -- Period. I offer them a tip, but will not let them touch the car. If they claim they have to move cars and there is no place for me to park I just tell them to move them and I will park it all the way in the back where it will never have to be moved. There is no way I am letting some kid that treats a car like crap touch anything I own.
