[WisPrius]

HELP!!!
Wife was at the grocery store, came out, started '02 prius and all exclamated warning lights came on! Drove it home at 29 mph and called me. I called the dealer- Kolosso of Appleton, WI and they said to drive it in. We have AAA so I had it flat bedded in to them.
Six weeks ago we had the same condition and dealer replaced the ECU. That cost us $ 100 plus a rental car for 5 days! Now they want to replace the fuel tank at a cost of $ 625.00 to me!!!!!
Am I getting screwed?????

 

[KTPhil]

I would guess they suspect the fuel pump, which might require tank replacement. They better be sure of their diagnosis before they lay that bill on you!

What else can cause the code? Id this the "fails to start quickly" code?

 

[flynz4]

I have a question. Do you ever run your gas tank low? I never realized that some cars (I think the Prius is one of them)... has the fuel pump inside the gas tank. The fuel actually provides the cooling for the high pressure pump, and if it is not submerged... then it can very easily overheat.

On another vehicle (not a Prius)... I just paid $650 for a fuel pump repair. My mechanic told my daughter to never let the tank go below 1/4 tank again. His advice... at 1/2 tank, you should be thinking about a full-up and absolutely fill by 1/4 tank.

What is even worse... the fuel pumps on some cars have plastic impellers... and if they overheat... they start shedding tiny pieces of plastic. Since the fuel filter is before the fuel pump... these plastic slivers can destroy fuel injectors.

Never again will I let a tank on any vehicle go low again.

/Jim

 

[JDavies]

How many miles on your car..?

 

[TechGuy]

Gas Tank / Fuel Tank Issue...

Hey Jim,

With all due respect, I suggest your daughter get another mechanic... Many cars these days either have a fuel pump in the fuel tank or use the fuel to cool the pump internally as it is pumping fuel. If your fuel pump is not capable of pumping fuel (and thus cooling itself) it is not able to maintain adequate fuel pressure which will, in most cases, stop the engine from running (or cause it to run very rough). And if your engine is not running, the computer controlling the engine will shut off the fuel pump. (This is a safety feature. In nearly all modern vehicles if you have an accident and the engine stops running, you definitely want the fuel pump to stop pumping fuel.)

Some fuel pumps do indeed have plastic impellers. I have never seen one (or heard of one) melting the impeller due to over heating. Keep in mind that fuel is constantly flowing over the impeller and cooling it if it is running. (See previous paragraph). The next time you see an electronic fuel injector, examine it very closely. You might be surprised to find a very fine mesh filter screen within the injector.

Sorry about your $650 fuel pump repair bill. They sometimes do fail...

 

[tochatihu]

P3191

Sorry about this WisPrius. You should read the technical service bulletin EG011-03 posted in the files section of the Yahoo toyota-prius-sat1 group. It describes the diagnosis of replacing the ECU and the fuel pump relay and the fuel tank assembly, that your mechanics should have followed. If in fact either of the latter are at fault, they are only free for 36k miles.

Me, I would want to confirm that the techs are really good at Prius, and that the hybrid vehicle ECU they replace had at least the part number 89661-47054. The last two digits being higher would be even better.

If it is certain that the fuel tank assy is required, you might look for one from an 02 or 03 that suffered a front end crash. The salvage car parts market is very computerized. Start with LKQ.

DAS

 

[WisPrius]

Code P3191 Again!

Not having the pleasure of excessive time to read all of the various postings about this problem, we sucked it up and had the tank assembly replaced at our local dealer. Cost of the tank sub assembly was $ 299 and the labor was almost $ 300. Coincidentally, our gas mileage was beginning to suffer, too.
Today, my wife called Toyota Customer Service and let them have it verbally citing our love for Toyota and their quality vehicles. She said she knew it was way out of warranty but that Toyota's level of quality was at question and she was only interested in having them meet us halfway on the costs. The CSR was pretty snotty but agreed to look into it and gave her a case number.
A person who has had a bad experience with a vehicle can destroy a lot of good will for a company if they squeak loud enough.

 

[DanMan32]

Loss of gas mileage may indicate the battery is losing its capacity. That was the experience of a lady's boyfriend who had 250K on it. Other symptom was poor acceleration, since the ICE had to do nearly all the work without battery reserves.

 

[Seven7]

HELP!!!

You could search on the site for P3191 or Engine Warning Light and see that a lot of people have been given different answers by service depts as to how to fix this error code.

With me, they went from new fuel pump to new fuel tank assembly to new ECU and relay to new fuel injectors... all at my cost. Though that was just explaining the problem. When they ahd they car they could not get the code to reappear. After about 7 or 8 months of off-and-on warning lights, they ended up doing the repairs at no cost as it was under the 100,000 warranty and also a released TSB.

Good luck.

 

[tochatihu]

You could search on the site for P3191 or Engine Warning Light and see that a lot of people have been given different answers by service depts as to how to fix this error code....

I'm not so sure it's varying advice - within the TSB EG011-03, one set of symptoms lead to a new engine control module (ECM; one of the computers), and others lead to the fuel pump relay and/or the replacement tank assembly. The latter primarily because of the fuel pump and/or fuel filter contained therein I guess.

TSB EG006-02 leads to fuel injectors and/or valve adjustments and/or ECM. The dtc codes are different there.

In many cases fuel line cleaners or similar may be helpful, or just appropriate maint. There may be (for Toyota techs) a proper diagnostic flow chart based on real world driving experience, but I would never see it. Just trying to look for common themes in postings here and elsewhere.

ECM replacement has been the only thing needed in most cases so far, but as the Prius odometers creep upwards things will probably become more complex.

DAS