Hi,
I really like the RAV4 Hybrid but it does have it's caveats. It's delivered excellent performance and MPG for family Summer road trips and hauling my r/c airplane, jets, and helicopter gear ro my club's airfield. There's only one shortcoming. The poor design of the Auxiliary Battery. The vehicle has too many overhead head tasks that run while it's shutoff and parked. I am an engineer and I work from home most of the time. If my RAV4 sits parked under the carport for two weeks the aux battery will just about fully discharge. If it's cold, -5F like it is right now the battery will discharge in a week. Yesterday my area got hit with a snowstorm. I went to move my RAV4 from the carport to the driveway and the aux battery was dead. I had to walk through the snow to my shed, get the 12v charger, set it up, charge for 10 minutes, Put the RAV4 in Ready mode and let it sit for 2hrs, and put my 12v charger back in the shed. There should be a gauge on the RAV4 dash with the status of the 12v battery, but it was left out. I purchased a bluetooth 12v battery monitor, the specs rate the current draw at 1.5 mah. When it warms up I will install it. I plan on pulling the DCM fuse as well. The DCM is far too chatty. Telematics should not occur when the vehicle is parked and shutdown. The last status when the vehicle was put in Park should be enough. It's almost as if the lead programmer on the Toyota DCM had OCD. I'm looking for a trickle charge solution that installs under the hood and the harness plug that connects to the trickle charger terminates in the grill in one of the screen/mesh holes on the lower bottom driver's side. That way I can plug it into the AC Outlet that lines up with the front driver's side grill
Ford has a solution for their Hybrid Pickup Trucks. A coworker told me the Ford App is free and he can program it to automatically put the vehicle in Ready mode on a schedule and set the duration for as long as he wants. If the vehicle is in use the connection is ignored.
Toyota can actually learn a lesson from Ford here. The Aux Battery is a PITA during the winter.
I really like the RAV4 Hybrid but it does have it's caveats. It's delivered excellent performance and MPG for family Summer road trips and hauling my r/c airplane, jets, and helicopter gear ro my club's airfield. There's only one shortcoming. The poor design of the Auxiliary Battery. The vehicle has too many overhead head tasks that run while it's shutoff and parked. I am an engineer and I work from home most of the time. If my RAV4 sits parked under the carport for two weeks the aux battery will just about fully discharge. If it's cold, -5F like it is right now the battery will discharge in a week. Yesterday my area got hit with a snowstorm. I went to move my RAV4 from the carport to the driveway and the aux battery was dead. I had to walk through the snow to my shed, get the 12v charger, set it up, charge for 10 minutes, Put the RAV4 in Ready mode and let it sit for 2hrs, and put my 12v charger back in the shed. There should be a gauge on the RAV4 dash with the status of the 12v battery, but it was left out. I purchased a bluetooth 12v battery monitor, the specs rate the current draw at 1.5 mah. When it warms up I will install it. I plan on pulling the DCM fuse as well. The DCM is far too chatty. Telematics should not occur when the vehicle is parked and shutdown. The last status when the vehicle was put in Park should be enough. It's almost as if the lead programmer on the Toyota DCM had OCD. I'm looking for a trickle charge solution that installs under the hood and the harness plug that connects to the trickle charger terminates in the grill in one of the screen/mesh holes on the lower bottom driver's side. That way I can plug it into the AC Outlet that lines up with the front driver's side grill
Ford has a solution for their Hybrid Pickup Trucks. A coworker told me the Ford App is free and he can program it to automatically put the vehicle in Ready mode on a schedule and set the duration for as long as he wants. If the vehicle is in use the connection is ignored.
Toyota can actually learn a lesson from Ford here. The Aux Battery is a PITA during the winter.
