I read in my owner's manual that leaving my car for 2 weeks+ without driving it will discharge the battery and require a trip to the dealer. How can TCH owners take long vacations with their families then? Do you think a dealer will babysit the car and drive it in your absence?

 

That's ridiculous. I never heard of such a thing and wouldn't give it a second thought.

 

What a crock of bull puckies! Left mine sit for 2 months while overseas and fired rite up. ROTFFLMAO

 

I was going to test drive a TCH at the dealer and the first one we went to was dead.. dealer said that it was sitting on the lot too long without being driven. The car was only about 2 weeks old according to the date on the sticker.

 

Its the small battery in front that feeds the computer. Just put a trickle charger on it and you should be fine for about 2 months

 

Except that battery is really in the trunk. Unless you leave a reading light on the car will put Smart Entry into sleep mode after a week and you'll be fine. Worst case is you put a trickle charger on the battery in the trunk if it's really dead. You'll need to use the physical key to open the trunk with a dead battery.
A two week vacation is a non issue. A two month vacation might be a different story.

 

I think the dealer was just covering up a lemon with some mechanical and electrical issues with a lame excuse...

 

The issue at hand here is the traction battery self-discharging.

I don't know what the final consensus was, but check out PriusChat for more info on how long people have been able to leave their car "in storage". If the traction battery runs low the car will not start. There is no traditional starter in this car. Your dealer will have to charge this one. (Unless you feel comfortable charging a 244 volt battery)

The traction battery is a NiMH battery. When the car is shut off, this battery is completely disconnected by relays. But all batteries will self-discharge over time. Your best bet is to have the battery as near full as possible before leaving it in storage.


The other battery in the car is a deep cycle AGM lead acid battery. This is the "12v" battery. It is in the right side of the trunk. If this battery runs down the car will not start either, but a normal jump start will fix this.

As far as the Camry on the lot that didn't start, someone probably left the dome light on. The self-discharge rate on a lead acid is pretty low. The car is not a lemon.

 

Typical NIMH will take about 3-6 months to self discharge from full, so the trick here is to make some effort to have the traction battery at high charge state before leaving, but 2 weeks should be fine even if the battery is low. As far as 12 V battery goes, I would just be prepared with some trickle charger, just in case when I come back, but again 2 weeks should not be enough to run it down. You can always disconnect 12 v battery if going for more than 2 weeks. I would not leave trickle charger on for 2 weeks if everybody was away. There could be flooding, rodents could chew on the cables and if there was a short the battery could provide enough amps to start good fire even if charger itself was 100% fool proof and they're not.

 

You don't really want to put a trickle charger on any car that is left unattended, can cause damage. There is a product out there called Battery Tender that is made just for these situations. It charges the battery and shuts off when fully charged as the battery starts to discharge it senses it and starts to recharge automatically. My brother-in-law has a 2nd home down here in Fl and his ES300 constantly had to be started every few weeks or jump started until we bought the Battery Tender. He now uses it on his Highlander and has never had a problem even after not starting for 4 or more months. My next door neighbor tried the trickle charger bit on his Mercedes and wound up with a ruined battery and damage to the electric system.

http://www.batterytender.com/