Does mileage or age have the greatest effect on battery pack life?

irishkisco

I am in the market for a GEN 3 PRIUS to replace my 2005 PRIUS whose battery Pack just died. The PRIUS had just turned over 200,000 miles. I want to purchase a pre-owned PRIUS and our dealer has a 2013 with only 28,000 miles. I would think that would be great for a non-hybrid car. However, my concern is that the battery pack will die due to age long before I put ample miles on the car. Since I keep cars for a long time, I'm thinking I'd be better of with a newer vehicle even if had more miles. Thoughts? Opinions?

stever

Great question, wish I knew. You may want to look at the date of manufacturer on the door jamb too - it's possible the 2013 was built in summer of 2012.

Hm, the other question is why isn't a 3 year old Prius eligible to be certified? Seems like that would raise the price a bit but may extend the warranty significantly.

Did your current Prius's traction battery die because it was ten years old or do you think it was because it was miled up?

Mr_Shiftright

I think the only significant threat to batter life in a hybrid would be a) extreme heat and b) overcharging due to a fault system. Otherwise, the batteries should last the life of the vehicle. So heat and loading are the main factors.

To put it into numbers and predictions is difficult, but from what I've read as stated by battery engineers, at tempeartures above 86F, the battery is vulnerable to losing power. Over time, say in desert coutries with extreme heat, I bet those owners will see shorter battery life.

Also, interestingly enough, a battery with a high state of charge and exposed to high heat is more likely to lose power.

I'd say that if your hybrid starts using more and more gasoline power and less battery, that's a sure sign of impending failure.

abbe722

If you got 200K from your battery, that's impressive. Any battery has a cycle life. We just replaced our battery after 185k. From an economic view; if the rest of your car is in good shape, replace the battery. It only costs 1.5 cents/ mile and gets you 10-15 more MPG.
The thing that degrades a battery faster is jack rabbit starts where the battery is called upon to give up more energy than it's optimum design. As ultra capacitors are developed, they will replace batteries in hybrids because they are designed to take and provide high energy in short spans of time.