GS450H hybrid issue

NickySB · August 16, 2018

Hi All,

My first post here so please be gentle 😊

Just returning to Lexus and have bought a GS450H 2007 plate. Bought privately so no recourse, but the car has almost instantly developed a hybrid fault - not sure what I’ve done to upset Karma but hey hoe, I shall attempt to describe the issue.

I’ve done a fair bit of research regarding this issue, and I’ve found lots of similar cases but I wanted to check exactly what was going on in our instance in case it is something different.

So, here’s what we’re getting:

When power button is depressed, with foot on the brake, the engine starts.
Error messages are received - Check Hybrid System, Check VSC, Check ECB
We can drive the car for around 5 minutes, engine only, then the car appears to die. Power steering, dash lights, brakes etc all stay available. (Try putting foot on accelerator and nothing happens so it isn’t still running at that point)
We have to then pull over and restart it. Each time it repeats the same.
Hybrid system on the central display screen is not showing any energy flow between engine/drive system/hybrid system (apologies if the terminology is wrong I have not got my head around the hybrid system in good detail yet). - the manual describes this situation as No Energy Flow.
An OBD reader shows codes P0A80 - replace Battery pack & P3016 - Manufacturers control - I believe this code is due to either a faulty HV Battery assy or a faulty Battery ECU.
Initially hybrid batteries showed as empty, following a drive (repeating this stop/start procedure) they eventually went up to green, and since sitting for a few hours and testing it again they are back to empty.
The hybrid Battery vent at the rear can be heard running as soon as the car is running so I assume the fan is not the issue.

I believe the car had to be jumped before collection, which in ‘normal’ car world (ie not a hybrid) would suggest the 12v Battery was in poor shape. I have checked the 12v Battery, and it looks to be the Panasonic, which I believe is original, and the voltage on a brief check was measuring around 12.6v.

I appreciate that all this points to a damaged hybrid Battery pack - but before I go spending some serious cash trying to fix it, I just wanted to check with those in the know whether all these signs are completely symptomatic of a failing HV hybrid Battery pack, or could this be more than 1 issue, or am I suspecting the wrong piece of equipment?

Thank you in advance

Nicky

ColinBarber · August 16, 2018

Hi Nicky

It does sound like an issue with the Battery pack, probably one or more cells having gone bad.

Might be worth speaking to Richard:

http://www.hybridbatterysolutions.co.uk

Herbie · August 16, 2018

Never had to use him myself but I'd give a '+1' for Richard, or maybe there's someone else closer to you.

Anyway, here's a short video from Richard himself:

Matrixxxx · August 17, 2018

for £50 Lexus will do a Battery diagnostic, they should be able to do a diagnosis for a fixed price?

I would check your Battery in the boot first, if you are getting multiple errors it could be a duff Battery or bad connection get it tested or replaced.

NickySB · August 17, 2018

Thank you all for your helpful responses - i shall do a bit more research and give the 12v Battery a good check before continuing with the most expensive option

Farqui · August 17, 2018

Welcome to the forum Nicky and I hope you manage to figure out the underlying cause without too much hassle or cost. I have my fingers crossed for you.

Herbie · August 17, 2018

12 hours ago, NickySB said:

I have checked the 12v battery, and it looks to be the Panasonic, which I believe is original, and the voltage on a brief check was measuring around 12.6v.

To do a proper check you need a heavy discharge tester really. A starter motor in a 'normal' non-hybrid car draws about 300A so the heavy discharge tester checks to see if the Battery can provide that for about 20 to 30 seconds without the voltage dropping below 10V.

As it's been a very long time since I did anything like this I would take those figures with a pinch of salt but you'll get the gist of it - have the Battery properly tested by an auto-electrician.

Zotto · August 17, 2018

In Hybrids there is NO starter motor and start of thermal engine is made with the intervention of one of the 2 electric motors that works with HV Battery, 12 V does not have big currents to distribute, it mainly has to make services work.

NickySB · August 18, 2018

Thank you for the background- remarkably the 12v Battery checks out fine- which I’m gobsmacked about given it appears to be date stamped 11/01/07. However I guess we have our answer - the hybrid Battery !

Mike Hartland · August 20, 2018

I remember mention a while back that Hybrids should not be jump started as it can cause electrical issues soon afterwards. Could that have been the cause in this case?

Matrixxxx · August 20, 2018

I would be sceptical that a Battery 11 years old will be in good condition, normally once the warranty has run out i.e. 3- 5 years , replace as a matter of course.

the Battery in the boot powers the controls on the car , if it is failing the whole system will malfunction. did you do a full discharge test?

Another quirk of the car is that you cannot raise the revs with the accelerator in park.

I would have thought piggy backing a 12 volt Battery on the control Battery shouldn't cause problems, but jumping with a plugin type could well cause damage.

NickySB · August 22, 2018

Unfortunately I don’t know how it was jumped but I would imagine it could have well contributed to the issue- we had the issue regarding not being able to rev the car as well- I have a new 12v Battery for the car once the hybrid issue has been investigated - probably possible both have been fried at the same time

i don’t know if a full discharge test was done as it was conducted by a garage - probably not

Britprius · August 22, 2018

The engine revs are control by wire system. So if your in neutral or park the throttle does not respond in a normal manor. In park if you push the throttle far enough the engine will start if it was not running, and the revs will rise with force charging of the HV Battery takes place. The engine cannot start in neutral, but it can continue to run if it was running when put into neutral.

John

Leigh2000 · August 24, 2018

I’ve had a similar issue. I took my car into Lexus for a full diagnostic (£99) and a quote for getting the work done today. The diagnostic revealed that there are three blocks (3,4,6) which give the fault codes P3013, P3014 and P3016. I think that this means that I need at least three and perhaps 6 cells replacing. Lexus has quoted me just under £2550 to replace the Battery pack, but given the age and mileage of my car this isn’t economical. I’m therefore going to be contacting Richard to see about a refurb.

The fan running all the time is symptomatic of the Battery pack failing. Mine is also working over time. This will be dealt with when the Battery is either repaired or replaced. On the way back from Lexus today, the car also went into limp mode 3 times. I therefore stopped for 30 minutes for lunch and let it cool down. I got home (last 20 miles) with no problems. The fact that the OP seems to have a more serious issue with the car cutting out suggests to me that the hybrid battery is very depleted which (in the worst case) means it may have already been refurbed and may need replacing. If you email Richard he will tell you,if he’s seen the car before. If he hasn’t, then he may be able to do something with it. Richard quoted me £2000 for a standard replacement with a 2 year warranty. However, you can pick up a used hybrid Battery pack from Lithuania off eBay for £850 plus £60 delivery-

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LEXUS-GS-450H-06-11-HYBRID-BATTERY-PACK-ASSY-G9510-30030-2010/253792368143?hash=item3b1734360f:g:c7MAAOSw3vFbYv7i

There’s another one from a domestic seller for £1399 which is well overpriced IMO. You could get the one from Lithuania and pay someone to fit it? I emailed the seller and asked about mileage. It’s done 78000km (I think he meant miles but you’d need to check- either way it should be good for a couple of years unless you’re very unlucky).

Unfortunately it looks as though the seller isn’t a nice guy. He/she knew what they were doing. (B*****d!) I’d be interested to know what you paid if you’re willing to share? I paid £2.5k for mine. However, depending on mileage/year/condition etc, if you paid under £3k then you could still come away breaking even.

Anyway, best wishes on getting it sorted! I know what it’s like to be sold a lemon. I certainly wouldn’t do that to anyone and wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

ColinBarber · August 25, 2018

I'd be wary of purchasing a used Battery pack to just replace a faulty one. Given the very small number of GS450h vehicles sold, and the high number of people with Battery issues, you are likely to just have a similar problem at some point down the road. Better to get your existing one repaired, or purchase a used one to use for parts or get repaired itself.

cachaciero · August 26, 2018

As far as I can see the GS450H is in terms of drive train / HV Battery is little different to any other Toyota / Lexus Hybrid and overall HV Battery failure is very low so what is different about the GS450H? what is "a high number of people with Battery issues" ?.

I suspect that at a Battery module level the modules are identical over the whole Hybrid spectrum, the only thing that appears to change is the number of modules in a Battery pack and hence the final voltage.

When I purchased my first Hybrid a Prius 2 Battery and ability to repair / replace was a concern and I did a fair amount of research on this and came to the conclusion that it was no big deal to repair a HV Battery pack,

I believe pretty well any second hand HV Battery should be a source of usable individual modules, Toyota seems to like to keep things standard across models and generations as far as possible and I believe that this will apply to batteries as anything else, however this is unproven and I would be interested if anybody knows for fact that this is not so.

The only problem I can see with building / refurbing an HV Battery pack is charging it on the bench and ensuring that all the modules are at a similar charge state before use this is improtant.

In the event until now I have had no reason to explore this scenario further both the Prius and Lexus just work and the occasional check with an analyser would indicate that there is little deterioration from new in the individual Battery modules on either car.

NiCad batteries providing that the charge / discharge regime is controlled within limits are virtually indestructible, in this respect the Toyota setup does control the Battery charge / discharge regime very conservatively, actually too conservatively IMHO.

12 V Battery is another story :-)

Malachy · August 28, 2018

Any luck since Nicky?

Britprius · August 28, 2018

On 8/26/2018 at 9:46 AM, cachaciero said:

As far as I can see the GS450H is in terms of drive train / HV battery is little different to any other Toyota / Lexus Hybrid and overall HV battery failure is very low so what is different about the GS450H? what is "a high number of people with battery issues" ?.

I suspect that at a battery module level the modules are identical over the whole Hybrid spectrum, the only thing that appears to change is the number of modules in a battery pack and hence the final voltage.

When I purchased my first Hybrid a Prius 2 battery and ability to repair / replace was a concern and I did a fair amount of research on this and came to the conclusion that it was no big deal to repair a HV battery pack,

I believe pretty well any second hand HV battery should be a source of usable individual modules, Toyota seems to like to keep things standard across models and generations as far as possible and I believe that this will apply to batteries as anything else, however this is unproven and I would be interested if anybody knows for fact that this is not so.

The only problem I can see with building / refurbing an HV battery pack is charging it on the bench and ensuring that all the modules are at a similar charge state before use this is improtant.

In the event until now I have had no reason to explore this scenario further both the Prius and Lexus just work and the occasional check with an analyser would indicate that there is little deterioration from new in the individual battery modules on either car.

NiCad batteries providing that the charge / discharge regime is controlled within limits are virtually indestructible, in this respect the Toyota setup does control the battery charge / discharge regime very conservatively, actually too conservatively IMHO.

12 V battery is another story 🙂

Friday at 09:44 AM

19 replies

It is perhaps a little ironic that the hybrid Battery in the RX is very different to the rest of the Toyota range. The RX Battery is arranged as 3 packs with 3 cooling fans, and the modules are steel cased instead of plastic having 8 cells per module at 9.6 volts against 6 cells 7.2 volts for the plastic variety . This will mean unfortunately that the RX modules will be much harder to obtain than there plastic counterparts.
Picture below.

John.

ColinBarber · August 28, 2018

On 8/26/2018 at 9:46 AM, cachaciero said:

As far as I can see the GS450H is in terms of drive train / HV battery is little different to any other Toyota / Lexus Hybrid and overall HV battery failure is very low so what is different about the GS450H? what is "a high number of people with battery issues" ?.

There is something specific about the GS series III, especially in hybrid form. There is a complicated transmission compared to other hybrids which has caused a few problems, but easily fixed. The Battery implementation has resulted in a higher number of failures compared to other Toyota hybrids. On these forums the number of reported failures is easily into double figures, when I can only recall a couple of 400h hybrid Battery issues - that in itself may not mean too much but given that the 400h outsold the GS450h 5 to 1 there is a big discrepancy. I see less Gen2 Prius hybrid Battery issues reported on TOC than GS450h issues reported here on LOC, and they outsold the GS around 15 to 1.

XT5 · August 29, 2018

You might like to consider this as a possible solution to your problem, NickySB:-

https://www.lexusownersclub.co.uk/forum/topic/104412-2007-gs450h-hybrid-battery-cell-replacement-for-50/?tab=comments#comment-932696

NickySB · October 5, 2018

Hi everyone,

thank you for all the inputs to the thread it’s all very useful information.

sorry I’ve not updated recently, however I fell ill and then surgery so the Lexus update has been at the back of the queue. However there is nothing worse than an unfinished thread, I find.

We removed the hybrid Battery ourselves and tested it. Found cell 30 was below par. Took it out and replaced it. I also cleaned up all the copper washers as most were covered in the green corrosion to some degree. Put the Battery back in, replaced the 12v Battery just for good measure, and the car is working wonderfully.

With the symptoms we had, the car would not run for any more than 5 minutes so we had to fix it quickly and on site.

Thank you to everyone who contributed - my first experience of this forum has been a very positive one.