I am looking at buying a 2023 rva4 xle and am hearing about problems with the batteries going dead after sitting for a while. I was wondering if any of the members here have that vehicle and if so are you having problems with the 12v battery, not the hybrid battery. I hate to think of spending that kind of money on a car that I would have to babysit the battery or worry about it. what are your thoughts on this?
dead batteries in 2023 rav 4 hybrid
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REWahoo
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I don't have a Rav4 hybrid, but I do have a very similar vehicle, a Highlander hybrid (2021). No issues with the 12v battery even though it often sits in the garage for up to two weeks without being started/driven.
latexman
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Is the battery covered by Mnfr's warranty in a hybrid (or EV)? It seems it should be.
Our first Prius had the 12v battery die within the first 3 years and it was replaced under warranty although I had to pay a large fraction of the cost (3/5ths?) since it failed part way through its expected life.
frayne
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I have a 2020 Rav4 XLE, not a hybrid. Still using the same 12V battery that came with the vehicle. I've let the car sit a week or longer and have not had any issues. To give you an idea of how much it has sat, it only has 16K miles on it.
REWahoo
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frank, maybe ask the RAV4 owners group: https://www.rav4world.com/forums/
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Opposite experience here. I have owned 2 Prius cars. The first had the 12v battery fail after 3 years, and last year the 2nd Prius 12v battery failed after 5 years and 3 months.
Koolau
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MY Rav4 is a '12. I bought it used in '17 and the battery - probably new - lasted 5 years. I always kinda worried about it as it sat for 4 months each year. One year the battery went dead BUT it charged up and ran another 2 years. I suspect the "theft detection system" but do not know for certain.
YMMV
youbet
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With an ICE vehicle, a hint that the battery is failing is that the starter begins to crank slowly. But what is the hint with my Prius? The car starts via the main battery so no weak/slow starter to possibly give you a hint that the end is near.
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ERD50
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Don't know about a hybrid, but seems to me that modern ICE cars start so easily (computer control, good spark, fuel injection) that they barely turn over at all before they start. I'm not sure you get much warning anymore, no whirrr-whirrr-whirr, putt, whirr, putt,putt, VROOOMM!!!. Just click, whirr-hummmmmmmm.
I'll make a point to listen next time, but IIRC, even in cold weather, they barely turn over before they start. So good one day, then the next, they just can't get it to turn hardly at all.
-ERD50
You get a message on the info screen saying the 12v battery is low.
RetiredAndLovingIt
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I'm in roasting hot Southern California and I've never needed to replace the battery in any of my cars until they were at least 7 years old and yet others say theirs last just a couple of years. When I was working I drove 140 miles round trip daily for 24 years so did that usage help to extend their life, I would have thought that would have shortened it.
Koolau
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The "end" of many batteries is a dead cell. IIRC the crud that sloughs off the battery during its life builds up and eventually shorts out one cell. The internal resistance of a dead cell means the end of the battery. Virtually nothing in and nothing out at that point. That's what happened to my RAV4. One day it was great the next day, it was so dead I couldn't jump it with any (or all 3
) of my jumper batteries. Dead as a door nail. I agree that cars are just amazing now - now that we no longer have carburetors and mechanical distributors. I never worry about any of my cars - heh, heh, until that one day when they won't turn over the engine.
meierlde
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A simple way to handle this is if the car sits in a garage, by a trickle charger and connect it to the 12 battery thru the jump clamps. This keeps the battery charged, I used this on a riding lawn mower that would sit 6 months over the winter and the battery laster longer.
KB
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I have a 2020 RAV4 Hybrid and have not have any battery problems. I bought the car just before the pandemic began in Dec 2019, and only have 7000 miles on it. So it sits a lot. No problems with the battery so far.
audreyh1
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Our experience with batteries is that they last just past their warranty date. Buy an inexpensive one - 1 year warranty- and that’s about how long it will last. Buy a better quality one it likely has a multi-year warranty.
We disconnect the battery in DF’s old truck when it is going to be sitting for more than a month.
We disconnect the battery in DF’s old truck when it is going to be sitting for more than a month.
Northforker
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THIS!!!!
We are gone months at a time, the 1.25 Amp battery maintainers on the jeep, the boat, the car, and the lawnmower are fully charged at all times.
NW-Bound
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+1
Hence, I have seen jump starters that are just very large capacitors. Hooked to a weak battery, they accumulate the charge from the battery, then when you turn the starter key, provide a quick burst of power to turn the engine over, which quickly catches.
And you can tell when that happens if you measure the battery voltage, and it falls short of the usual 12 V nominal voltage by a multiple of 2V even after being given a charge. It's because each cell voltage is 2V.
When the above happens, I wonder if the capacitive jumper would work. Instead of 12V, it would slowly charge to 10V or 8V, and I wonder if a burst of power at the lower voltages would be enough to turn the engine over.
Koolau
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I can only tell you what happened to me. When the RAV4 wouldn't start, I tried both my capacitor jumpers and they didn't w*rk. It just wasn't enough to over come a (likely) dead cell. YMMV
NW-Bound
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OK. I believe you.
One cannot get [-]squeeze blood from a turnip[/-] jumpstart off a dead battery. A merely weak one, maybe.
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NW-Bound
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The 12V battery of an EV is charged off a DC-DC converter feeding off the big propulsion battery, which has a capacity 100x that of the 12V.
A hybrid car still has an ICE engine driving a generator/motor. But a hybrid car also has a large propulsion battery. I wonder if some makers do use the larger battery to keep the little battery alive for long idle periods when the ICE is not running.
Of course, they would be sure not to drain the large battery too far, the same way they have to do it on EVs. At some point, they have to cut off the 12V and let it die instead of killing the propulsion battery along with it.
A hybrid car still has an ICE engine driving a generator/motor. But a hybrid car also has a large propulsion battery. I wonder if some makers do use the larger battery to keep the little battery alive for long idle periods when the ICE is not running.
Of course, they would be sure not to drain the large battery too far, the same way they have to do it on EVs. At some point, they have to cut off the 12V and let it die instead of killing the propulsion battery along with it.
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