Happy car again

We've had our car for a bit over a year now and we love it. When we were shopping for one we looked mostly at bigger SUV's so how did we end up with a Prius? I don't know how the magicians at Toyota do it but but there is more head room, leg room and rear seat space than any of the big vehicles we sat in, and countless other little things that have keep us happy with the purchase.

Well, this morning I noticed that the dome light was on because one of the kid's doors wasn't closed through the night. Once before we had left the map light on which is another funny story that I'll save for a different post. I figured a quick jump-start would take care of the problem. Unfortunately we had no luck at all. I figured the battery had a bad cell so we took it in to be tested.

The first place took the battery then came back and said they couldn't test it. Apparently the Prius auxiliary battery is kind of 'special'. Now we're not talking about the hybrid system batteries here this is just the normal looking battery that runs the standard electrical system for the car. So I call the next place, where we usually take our cars for work, and explain what we were told at the first place. He was up front with me and said they had never had a Prius in for a battery issue but their computer shows a compatible part that they could order and get in about an hour. I take his offer... but it turns out that the 'compatible' part is not quite compatible enough. So we're left with going to the dealer. Good news! their battery is only a few bucks more than what we would have paid elsewhere and it's an in-stock part. Bad news is it's an 'upgrade' battery, or in other words they no longer make the battery that fits our car and the next closest model is bigger and doesn't fit in the same bat tray as the original so we have to also get the conversion kit to accept the bigger battery. Well, 15 hours after finding the car wouldn't start this morning, the battery is purchased, the conversion installed, we're up and running, and the car is happy again.

The service guy at the dealer mentioned that even with the conversion kit the fit isn't perfect and some plastic trim needs to be cut from the car to make the thing sit properly. Everything else was too much fun for one day so I saved that bit for tomorrow!

happy driving