Faults & Fixes
PART ONE: Though hybrid technology is generally durable. It’s now been around for long enough for significant issues to develop, though things like a failing traction battery don’t always write a car off. Peter Simpson begins a two-part series by explaining what it is, and how it works.
Hybrid cars have now been around for… well, believe it or not, 2023 is the 20th anniversary of the second-generation Toyota Prius’s introduction. That wasn’t the first hybrid to go on sale in Europe. It was, though, the first to sell in sufficient numbers to make petrol-electric hybrid motoring available to the masses.
The 2003-2009 Prius is also an astonishingly reliable and durable piece of kit – just ask any minicab driver! It seems to me that Toyota knew their reputation rested on reliability, and if the hybrid technology was found in any way wanting, it would cause massive damage to the brand as a whole! Consequently, many aspects of the car were, arguably, over-engineered. Anecdotal evidence is that while the hybrid side of 2009-on Priuses is still as good, some other parts aren’t quite as long-lasting. To be fair though, that’s a bit like saying Snowdon isn’t quite as high as Ben Nevis. In other words, both mountains are very big.
The Prius isn’t, of course, the only hybrid around at the time – Toyota’s ‘other’ brand Lexus started using broadly the same technology from 2006, and Honda’s Insight was a direct Prius rival with a similar method of operation but no parts commonality. Honda’s offering never, however, sold in the same numbers as the Prius – though it, too, has an excellent reliability record.
The part of hybrid and electric cars most people worry about is battery life and replacement cost. Until recently, it was almost unheard of for a Prius’s
Traction Battery to need renewal. When I bought mine in 2015, out of curiosity, I asked the dealer to price a new battery. They couldn’t tell me, because neither they, nor any other dealerships in their group, had ever been asked for one. That’s no longer the case – these days they’re about £1200 including fitting. That, clearly, isn’t an expense many would welcome. But on the other hand it probably isn’t going to write off an otherwise good car. Or, looked at another way, it’s not that much more than a clutch/DMF and timing belt change would cost, which most conventional cars will need before a hybrid battery requires changing. A Prius, however, has neither clutch nor tim
