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Traction Battery always dead

11K views 28 replies 15 participants last post by  razorpit 
#1 ·
I just got a new 2016 Rav4 Hybrid. One thing I noticed is that when I get in after a while the traction battery is dead and it was charged when I left it. It seems to drain completely after an hour. Is this normal or do I need to take it in to have the battery replaced? It seems odd that the charged battery would drain on its own like that. The car doesn't even have 100 miles on it yet.


Thanks,

Greg
 
#2 ·
You need to spend a great deal more than 100 miles getting to know the hybrid system.
For openers, its never "dead". Its not unusual for it to lose a bar or two after sitting. But you need to be aware that a bar does not represent a fixed amount of charge, but rather a range. With 2 red bars showing, your battery has a SOC of about 40%. With 8 bars showing its about a 80% SOC. So you're actually only operating in that 40% range of usage from 40-80%. Unless you're actually leaving the system on, there's nothing capable of draining energy from the battery.
 
#3 ·
I have to see what it shows in the morning. If it shows 0 bars, I would assume there is a problem then, but if it shows 2 it should be ok? I thought the battery should stay charged longer. The car had either 6 or 8 bars when I turned it off and when I got back after about an hour it was down to 2. It just seemed odd to me to loose a charge that quick.
 
#4 ·
I would call that strange personally. I've never paid much attention but even after a few days I can still get in and it's somewhere near where I shut it off. ie. If I park and there's 7 bars, after a few days it will likely be at 6-7 bars.

Very stupid question, and no offence intended, are you sure you are pushing the start/stop button to power down the car when you leave?
 
#7 ·
Disagree with you on this one. He is asking us because we have more experience with the car. I would certainly say that, assuming what he is saying is accurate, what he is experiencing is strange and abnormal behavior.

If the car is being parked and shut off with a full traction battery and then an hour later start it up and the battery is down to 2 bars(or even less if he is saying it's "dead") then that is clearly a problem in my opinion. Of course the traction battery swings from full to empty and everywhere in between during driving depending on the driving conditions, but that is not what the OP is talking about. A full traction battery should not fully discharge itself in an hour while the car is shut off. Now if the OP had inadvertently left the car "on" for that hour, that's a different story.
 
#6 ·
If the battery is used in the 40-80% of the full capacity, and 0 bars means 40% and 10 bars means 80%, then....

Ni-Cd typically lose 10% per month, or 0.33% per day. Each bar represents 4% of the full capacity. So if nothing is draining the battery while sitting it should go down 1 bar every 12 days. :D
 
#8 ·
I must have been mistaken in what I saw, or maybe it did happen, I don't know for sure. Anyway, this morning after several hours of it being off it showed actually more then when I left it. It was at 4 bars, and when I started it this morning it showed 6. I will keep an eye on it for any strange behavior. Otherwise it seems to be doing fine. I still have to learn how to maximize the fuel efficiency while driving :)
Thanks for the replies.
 
#9 ·
6 bars is the most common indication. 8 bars is the maximum and is only seen rarely. Like I said, its supposed to go up and down. Each bar represents roughly 6-7% of the total battery capacity (60% of which is never used.)

Bottom line is that ANY issue with the traction battery will always be indicated by lights going off, beepers sounding and a half dozen error codes. IOW if you have to ask, there's nothing wrong with it.
 
#10 ·
I actually get 9 bars from time to time, and 8 quite often. Another thing I noticed is that on a recent long hiway journey that it stays at 6 bars. Most of the journey was at 115 km/hr for 8 hours and it maintained 6 bars on the hiway but charged up to 8 once in city.
 
#13 ·
While technically true, it's good for one mile, that is assuming you've done no coasting or braking during that time which regenerates the battery. It's pretty easy to run on battery only up to about 65 km/hr. After that it gets harder to modulate well enough to keep the engine off. So it's good for more than just parking lot speeds. Most city driving can be accomplished with the battery.
 
#18 ·
I get that question often, "how long can it run on its batteries?", from people with regular cars. My usual answer is that it can't and explains that it has a "synergy" system that reuses some momentum to go up to 20% further on the petrol I put in.
 
#22 ·
I've had my RAV4 hybrid for 2 weeks or about 700 miles. My battery does almost the same thing as the OP reported. It's at 6 bars when I turn it off and then 5 hours later, it's at 2 bars when I start it back up. It gets really crummy mileage (about 10 mpg) for the first few miles too. The first couple of miles are 15-20 mph and after that it's 45-55 mph. The mileage gradually increases up to about 40 mpg after 20 minutes. Does no one else see the battery drain like that?
 
#23 ·
I've had my hybrid for about a week and see the same thing. I am guessing that there are several factors involved, and I'm not too worried about it. For starters, while the car should technically be able to start from cold on the battery, the energy it gains from movement is significant and therefore the system is likely to require a little bit of "recent" battery charge to power the engine. Not because it "needs" it, but rather it is more efficient.

I find that after 2-3 minutes of driving, the car is ready to coast on EV mode for quite a while. The battery meter might be purposefully deceptive at the start of the engine to gain some early momentum and therefore save engine power on later acceleration. Again, this is just me guessing, but if enough of us are finding the same thing, it doesn't strike me as a malfunction. Perhaps some Prius owners could share some of their decade+ knowledge on the subject if they happen to hang around here.
 
#24 ·
I have only had my rav4 hybrid a few weeks so I don't have a long history of being able to observe the battery discharge behaviour, but I have also seen the traction battery discharge after coming back to the car (especially overnight to morning). Typically my traction battery will discharge to 2 bars but never lower. That makes me think it is a programmed behaviour, perhaps the energy is being used to condition/cool the battery. From what I understand to maximise the life of a battery you want to maintain in a 20-80% range, which is largely what I see. Never seen less than 2 bars remaining and never seen a full charge, usually 2 bars short of max unless long downhill, then I have only seen 1 bar short of max but briefly. Anyhow, if anyone is seeing complete discharge of their battery, that is probably not a good thing and should get that checked out.
 
#25 ·
Reading this entire thread before posting might be helpful, or at least the first page.
Safe to say that Toyota knows more about battery management than pretty much anyone. There isn't anything can go wrong with the system that doesn't throw error codes, flashing lights and warnings all over the place. The traction battery itself never gets below a 40% SOC, ever.
 
#28 ·
I've done it while in traffic to test seeing how long it goes, but you only get a mile or so. After that the engine comes on the charge the battery and stays on for a while until the battery reaches a certain level before it turns off. I have not done that since because the mileage drops a little because the engine has to come on to charge up the battery and I'd prefer to keep the battery charged to help out while driving. For that reason I do not use EV mode at all because I get the best mileage by focusing on keeping the battery charged. My drive has lot of hills, so on the downhills I like to coast and charge up the battery a bit to help out later. Only problem with that for me so far is that the car likes to speed up fast and sometimes troopers like to wait at the bottom of hills to catch speeders.:surprise Otherswise all is good and I'm really enjoying the RAV4 Hybrid:D
 
#29 ·
I agree. It is fun going through the county park late it night in EV mode (~3 miles) and seeing numbers like 70MPG but you do pay for it later once you start driving normally for the battery pack to get back up to its proper levels.

I save EV mode now for leaving parking garages after sporting events, traffic jams, etc. Even then I'm finding myself leaving it more in normal mode than anything else. At only 2k miles, I'm still experimenting and learning.
 
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