Prius Start Up Problems

has any one found the fix for this problem because I have change my 12 volt battery and the brake light switch and still have the same problem. 2007 prius Please Help

I just maybe resolved similar issue with 2007 prius. Dash lights strong, clock dim. Weird beeping when door open though. Smartkey worked but the car seemed to think it was in dash. Turned off smartkey (button under steering wheel), solved problem. Going to see if autozone can test my battery o/p. Haven't investigated whether alternator is testable. Hopefully I can get the smartkey back tho!

An interesting discussion is definitely worth comment. I believe that you should write more on this subject
matter, it may not be a taboo subject but usually people don't discuss such topics. To the next! Many thanks!!

I fixed my Prius Start Up Problem:

I had start problems in the beginning.
I learned that the prius has 8 computers.
So, I park the prius by pressing the park button and wait a few seconds for the prius to stop maiking noise.
Then I press the stop button to turn off the prius.

I do this every time. I have not had a start problem since then.

My thinking is that the car is a computer. You don't turn off your computer with the off button, you use the proper shutdown system.
I believe the prius is a computer and must be shut off in the proper order.

Otherwise, your prius will have some functions still active causing your START UP PROBLEM.

Good web site you have here.. It's difficult to find excellent writing like yours nowadays. I seriously appreciate people like you! Take care!!

Thank you a lot for sharing this with all folks you actually recognize what you're talking approximately! Bookmarked. Kindly also seek advice from my site =). We may have a link trade arrangement among us

[Scaramouche]

The solution you offered may have done the trick for me. THANKS!

I wasn\\'t getting a READY signal. Tried turning it on and off several times. Our 2007 Prius had initially probably run out of gas. We added enough gas to get it started. At the first addition, it would seemingly start, then stall. So, I added more than enough gas. This time we couldn\\'t even get the READY light to come on.

Lights and windows were working and many of the other lights on display were showing so I knew it wasn\\'t the 12V battery having been drained. Besides, the Prius doesn\\'t need much power to start.

I tried this poster\\'s idea of disconnecting the negative terminal then putting it back on in order to force a reboot. At first, it didn\\'t seem to help. Then, I pressed the power button to turn it off (no foot on brake pedal) and the READY light came on and the car was good to go. SPECULATION - the car running out of gas stressed the computer and it needed a fresh reboot to get back in the proper mode. END OF SPECULATION.

By the way, we have another 2007 Prius with lots of miles on it. I had to finally replace the 12V battery - so it was fairly new - when it began to not fully charge. The auto store said it was still a good battery. I began to think it was the Converter mentioned in this thread somewhere. I started to look for a good used one and found one but I wanted confirmation that was what it was. Took it into our local Toyota dealer. It turned out the wire that went from the negative terminal on the 12V to a connection of the body wasn\\'t fully tightened! They didn\\'t even charge me!!

I have a 2005 Prius, and used to have the no starting issue 2 or 3 times a year, even immediately after running the car. The last time was on a ferry after shopping in town (we live on an island) requiring a tow to the dealer, so I spent some time running this problem down. Toyota service techs were no help, they didn\\\\\\'t find a problem, just charged up the battery and said everything was fine. The service manager didn\\\\\\'t seem very familiar with the Prius.

I am a computer technologist, and thinking the problem was a control problem, rather than a hardware problem, I handled it like a computer problem. The first thing you try with a erratic computer is a reboot, so I rebooted the car. There may be a better way, but what I did was unhook the negative battery terminal on the 12 volt battery near the right rear wheel for 30 seconds, then reconnected.

My theory is that the car computer is running 24/7 (it starts in seconds when you power up, I believe it goes into sleep mode when you shut the car off). Low power situations, power spikes, possible programming errors can all lead to an unstable computer over months or years of operation. Rebooting the computer starts it fresh.

Since that last failure on the ferry, I have been rebooting the car every 3 months, and then topping up the battery with a charger. Only once did it take a charge - the battery was down 20%. I have never had a problem in the last 2 years.

Note - after rebooting, the 2005 Prius needs a power-up (foot on brake), power off, then power-up again to get going the first time. The gas guage requires a day or 2 to reinitialize.

Now I have an OBDII reader installed, giving continuous battery voltage readings. Voltage is steady at 14.2 when the car is powered up. The OBDII has never flagged an error. The 12 Volt Prius battery gets it\\\\\\'s charge from the 200+v NiMH battery through a power converter so it can charge even if the gas engine is stopped.

My 12v battery at 5 years old was still passing the load test during servicing at the Toyota dealer, but I replaced it anyway with an Optoma deep cycle, 2 Amp hours more and $40 cheaper than Toyota\\\\\\'s battery. I ran the old Toyota battery down to 11 volts, then charged it up again at 5A in 80 minutes, about 7 Amp Hours compared to the 32 it was rated at new, and it was still passing the dealers load test!

I also put a PriorityStart low voltage battery disconnect switch on the 12V battery to guard against a light being left on and draining the battery. Draining a lead-acid battery can reduce it\\\\\\'s life by up to 50%. It disconnects at 11.5V if the car is not running. So far it is working fine.

I really like the Prius - it is a fun car to drive. For the last 2 years it has been reliable too.

[pimpingprius]

I had the same problem and fixed it myself. My problem was when starting with my foot on the break, only the electricity would turn on. Pressing the start button again turned on the accessories, but not the motor. I could only put the gear shifter into neutral and no where else.

How I fixed it: behind the plastic dash of where you pop the latch to the hood there is a fuse box. The brake fuse was blown. I changed the 7.5 amp brake fuse and it started up and fixed this disaster. Wooohoooo!!! Let me know if I saved you hundreds from those lying mechanics send me a couple bucks on paypal thanks

[sergeantstevens]

09 to 14 Pruis cars had a recall on the brake peddle. I was one of the users who had mine replaced. The problem caused the car to shut down while driving; however, I started seeing my problem after the change out. Starting the car became a chore. Long story short, here is my \"work-arounds\" for when you go to start it and all lights come on with no juice:

Hold down the Park button until everything powers down; pull the key and wait 5 seconds; insert the key and press the brake; hit power.

If that fails a few times, try pressing the power and park button together.

In my opinion, there is a switch attached to the brake that will starts to go bad after a period of time because my last resort is to jump start the car which always works, instantly. Having the extra juice pump through is really all the car needs to bypass a bad switch.