6 Years in our Rav4 EV

[snoltor]

Our 2012 Toyota Rav4 EV is now six years old and still going strong. We've logged 81,500 miles so far. For the first 5 years the Rav was our primary car and we drove about 14-15,000 miles a year. One year ago we got a new EV and the Rav became our secondary family car so we drive it a bit less, 9,000 miles the last year.

My wife drives it more often than me on weekdays lately. Through the winter she was getting 100-102 miles on the GOM per standard charge (we have mild winters). One day the standard charge yielded 102 on the GOM, and after the standard charge finished I switched to extended charge and that gave us another 10 miles. I haven't done the Tony test in a long time so I'm not sure where we're at in terms of % degradation.

Major events:

May 2013: bought the car
Feb 2015: first drive unit replaced at 25k miles
Sept 2015: JdeMO installed
April 2016: Rav was rear ended. Rear door and bumper replaced, bill to the other guy's insurance was ~$5,000
April 2017: second drive unit placed at 57k miles
May 2019: 6 years, 81,500 miles, drive unit silent, all looking good.

We're still loving the car.

 

[geo]

I'm about 6 years in RAV4 EVs as well. Unfortunately, my 2013 was totaled 11 months after I got it, so I'm 5 years in on my second one (2014). It's also my daily driver, Jdemo installed at about 30K, drive unit replaced at about 40K. Still going strong.

I am starting to look fondly at the longer range electric SUVs that are starting to pop up. The Kia Niro looks interesting, but I might wait until the VW Crozz and Model Y hit the market before making the switch. A bigger battery would make trips to Mammoth and into the mountains more feasible.

 

[smkettner]

So glad to hear there are some that do fairly well. I won't list my issues but to say I was very happy to trade it off for an I-Pace. Loved the RAV while it ran.

 

[miimura]

I passed 6 years also. The only significant work has been the drive unit replacement for noise just before 5 years and the Powertrain Warranty expiration. It only took 2 weeks for diagnosis to replacement at Magnussen's Palo Alto. I had a couple Charge Interruption messages at about the 3 year point but they went away and never amounted to anything. The on-board charger was replaced when the car was new before I even bought it. It is in the vehicle history on the Toyota Owner's site.
The JdeMO makes this a great regional car for the Bay Area. Of course, the Model 3 is unmatched for inter-city travel like going to LA. The charge rate and efficiency are unbeatable, especially now that the LR pack can charge at >140kW. I keep trying to make an excuse to take a trip to try out the increased charge rate. Maybe I will take time to go see a SpaceX launch at Vandenburg.

 

[n3ckf]

ive had mine since May 13 2013 and now have about 86K miles on it.
Still use it as my "2nd" electric car and when i need to haul things within 30-40 miles of my house (I no longer live int he Bay Area where i used it to commute but it still gets used at least 3-4 days a week now just for shorter distances).

Drive unit replaced at 25K miles but nothing else "major" done to it. I got a couple of "check EV" symptoms but they went away...
It has JDEMO although i use it a lot less (mainly if i drive it over to Sacramento now)

Its still quite a useful vehicle to me (even though i also own a Model 3 Long Range Dual Motor (not Performance)) now.

 

[TonyWilliams]

My 2012 Toyota RAV4 EV now has 111,000 miles.

Nov 2012 - Purchased new (traded in 2012 Nissan LEAF)
Nov 2012 - melted vehicle J1772 inlet with a crappy Blink charge station
2013 - 11k miles - motor assembly replaced
2013 - trailer hitch receiver added
2014 - 40k miles - new Michelin Defender tires
2014 - new 12 volt battery
2014 - JdeMO
2015 - new 12 volt battery (Bosch AGM - 60ah - Group 24F)
2015 - purchased 7 year / 125,000 mile extended warranty
2017 - 90k miles - cabin heater, onboard vehicle charger, motor assembly replaced
2018 - recovered seats with black leather
2018 - 100k miles - new Michelin X-tour (Costco version of Defender II)
2019 - 110k miles - replaced main traction battery (20-40% degraded), new floor mats
Nov 2019 - extended warranty expires

 

[miimura]

The Bosch AGM battery is Group 24F, not 27F.

Was the traction battery replaced under warranty or did you swap it yourself from another car?

 

[TonyWilliams]

The Bosch AGM battery is Group 24F, not 27F.

Was the traction battery replaced under warranty or did you swap it yourself from another car?

I fixed the misprint of the 12 volt battery group.

There isn’t any main traction battery degradation warranty. We just replaced it in my shop.

 

[n3ckf]

did you have a new battery sitting around? i might someday want to replace the one in mine (although my degredation is only about 18-20% now). However now that i have the Tesla i dont do long trips in the Rav4EV anymore.

 

[eschatfische]

Facebook reminded me that today was my 6 year anniversary of owning the RAV, so I thought I'd check in. We've put ~70k on ours.

The RAV has overall been a pretty good experience. The only non-software issue we've had was with the propulsion unit noise, which became very severe in 2015, and we had it replaced in October of 2015. The new motor was silent, but now has developed a (different) whine, although not yet bad enough to get it replaced. We'll have to see how bad it gets over the next couple of years. We've only had around 10% degradation, and can still add substantial charge (what would be around 2 bars worth) with Extended Charge.

We've been a little surprised that the car has performed largely without trouble here in the frozen winters of Wisconsin. There have been a few times during temperatures below -10F that we've had to wait a minute or two for the battery to warm up, and obviously the range is impacted on those days, but it's still a daily driver for my wife and I. (The original heater still works, too!)

What I've been most surprised by is how the EV market has changed over this time; it's taken a radically different direction than I thought it would. While I was a huge fan of what Tesla was doing back in the early part of the decade, that was when they were focused on fast and reasonably affordable ways to avoid the problems of ICE cars. These days, they seem to be focused less on that core proposition and more on what I think is a hypothetical and problematic approach to autonomous driving; people seem to be buying Teslas more as an experimental technology platform than as a high-performance way to avoid gas. I increasingly distrust any announcements Musk makes as they become increasingly unlikely and impractical, and I have grave concerns about both their cost-cutting and their willingness to release self-driving features without what appears to be adequate testing. It feels genuinely strange to instinctively feel more worried about Tesla's future now than I was when I bought the RAV and they were barely on their feet. I'm not against self-driving cars, and I sure hope that I'm wrong about Tesla, but things look messier over there now than in 2013. (I've never owned any Tesla stock.)

At the same time, there's no question that BEVs have entered the public's imagination. When I told people 6 years ago that I bought a fully electric car, they looked at me like I had just told them I had bought a timeshare or joined Amway. These days, those same people are genuinely supportive and curious about EVs. Something really clicked in the public's imagination, and it feels like after this generation BEVs are here to stay.

So, that's the funny thing. While this has been without question the best car I've owned, and I'll certainly be getting another BEV, it's unlikely that my next car will be either a Toyota (given their abysmal support of both BEVs and this particular car) or Tesla (given my concerns about their current approach). It's genuinely surprising to me that there's still not another affordable mid-size SUV BEV. Perhaps my concerns about Tesla will be lessened by the Model Y, or the Bolt EUV will finally be out there. Fingers crossed.

 

[hbrav]

Usually these types of forums attract the problem vehicles looking for solutions. I'm not here much mostly since our '12 Rav EV at 62K miles has been completely problem free, everything original and works fine! Guess we might be in the minority but the car is a great vehicle love it and use it daily. We also own an original 2011 Leaf which got a new battery in 2016 and I just used to go into LA which for me is a 85 mile round trip. So either we are extremely lucky with EVs or maybe we just don't expect as much as others. Granted range is still an issue so we also own a 96 Diesel Suburban for those long trips where I don't expect to stop till I get into Utah or just need to tow something.
In the RAV we will use it to go to Palm Springs 129 miles or Big Bear 109 miles and 6k elevation gain. It does fine at both beyond that distance I'll take a diesel (burns biodiesel which is carbon neutral). My only RAV rant is radio missing analog knobs or some other way to control volume and a charge timer that is random and completes either too early or too late and yes the induction motor is way more whiny than the permanent magnet motors like a leafs. Our motor has not developed any grinding sounds or such guess our bearings have held up better than others. My DC/DC, heater and charger also work as well as day one and hopefully keep going! we'll see.

Steve
96 Suburban BioDiesel 6.5L
11 Leaf
12 Rav

 

[Spiffster]

2012 purchased in March of 2013. We are at 72k miles, no problems at all other than the 12v battery killing over after 3 years. Replaced with an Odyssey 35-PC1400T and solid ever since.
Motor makes a "Jetsons" car like noise so Im not sure if that is normal, but its been making that sound for as long as I have been paying attention to it. Have extended warranty until March 2020.
Wife's primary car. I have a Model 3.

Still nothing on the market that competes with this thing in terms of space and usability... sure the iPace, e-Tron, and Kona/Niro have more range but RAV4 EV has more cargo room than all of them and feels like a small SUV, not just a hatchback. Model X is nice but too expensive.

 

[geo]

Motor makes a "Jetsons" car like noise so Im not sure if that is normal, but its been making that sound for as long as I have been paying attention to it.

Good chance it is not normal. My car made a similar noise and needed a motor replacement. That warranty could come in handy, might want to take it into the dealer for a test.

 

[hbrav]

A lot of the motor makes noise are for two reasons IMHO

1. RAV EV is only Tesla Vehicle with large traction motor up front so much closer to driver with little in the way between our ears and the motor, we hear a lot more from the traction system than in a standard Tesla Model X or S which has the large traction motor in the rear where the sound is way more insulated and distant and moves behind the car not up to the driver.

2. The motor in a Tesla is an ACIM or AC induction motor. These are notoriously noise and make space age sounds do to the changing and reversing induction currents induced in the rotor. These induced currents can exit the rear bearing and induce current wear which becomes bearing noise but I'm not talking about that just the normal noises in and ACIM motor.

If you drive your car and not in regen mode but back off on the accelerator then the induction noises usually go away fast. If you have bearing wear induced noise then this won't help and the noise is not related to the accelerator pressure or lack thereof but just to the speed of motor rotation.

Steve
'12 RAV EV
'11 Leaf SL
'96 GMC Suburban 6.5l

 

[TonyWilliams]

did you have a new battery sitting around? i might someday want to replace the one in mine (although my degredation is only about 18-20% now). However now that i have the Tesla i dont do long trips in the Rav4EV anymore.

We have batteries for RAV4 EV.

 

[user 340]

The motor in a Tesla is an ACIM or AC induction motor. These are notoriously noise and make space age sounds do to the changing and reversing induction currents induced in the rotor. These induced currents can exit the rear bearing and induce current wear which becomes bearing noise but I'm not talking about that just the normal noises in and ACIM motor.

If you drive your car and not in regen mode but back off on the accelerator then the induction noises usually go away fast. If you have bearing wear induced noise then this won't help and the noise is not related to the accelerator pressure or lack thereof but just to the speed of motor rotation.

This fits the description of my car: no obvious motor bearing noise, but the audible component of the applied AC induction power has gotten louder in the past 1 - 2 years.

Have other forum members been able to get a motor replacement under warranty for similar conditions?

I made an appointment to take my car in for evaluation and would appreciate knowing what to expect. I will have to pay about $200 for the dealer to take the data (audio recording I believe) and send it to Toyota for analysis. This is waived if Toyota determines that a warranty repair is justified.

 

[miimura]

The motor in a Tesla is an ACIM or AC induction motor. These are notoriously noise and make space age sounds do to the changing and reversing induction currents induced in the rotor. These induced currents can exit the rear bearing and induce current wear which becomes bearing noise but I'm not talking about that just the normal noises in and ACIM motor.

If you drive your car and not in regen mode but back off on the accelerator then the induction noises usually go away fast. If you have bearing wear induced noise then this won't help and the noise is not related to the accelerator pressure or lack thereof but just to the speed of motor rotation.

This fits the description of my car: no obvious motor bearing noise, but the audible component of the applied AC induction power has gotten louder in the past 1 - 2 years.

Have other forum members been able to get a motor replacement under warranty for similar conditions?

I made an appointment to take my car in for evaluation and would appreciate knowing what to expect. I will have to pay about $200 for the dealer to take the data (audio recording I believe) and send it to Toyota for analysis. This is waived if Toyota determines that a warranty repair is justified.

I don't know where you're taking your car, but Magnussen's Palo Alto did not charge me anything for the drive unit noise evaluation.

 

[user 340]

The motor in a Tesla is an ACIM or AC induction motor. These are notoriously noise and make space age sounds do to the changing and reversing induction currents induced in the rotor. These induced currents can exit the rear bearing and induce current wear which becomes bearing noise but I'm not talking about that just the normal noises in and ACIM motor.

If you drive your car and not in regen mode but back off on the accelerator then the induction noises usually go away fast. If you have bearing wear induced noise then this won't help and the noise is not related to the accelerator pressure or lack thereof but just to the speed of motor rotation.

This fits the description of my car: no obvious motor bearing noise, but the audible component of the applied AC induction power has gotten louder in the past 1 - 2 years.

Have other forum members been able to get a motor replacement under warranty for similar conditions?

I made an appointment to take my car in for evaluation and would appreciate knowing what to expect. I will have to pay about $200 for the dealer to take the data (audio recording I believe) and send it to Toyota for analysis. This is waived if Toyota determines that a warranty repair is justified.

I don't know where you're taking your car, but Magnussen's Palo Alto did not charge me anything for the drive unit noise evaluation.

I'm also taking my car to Magnussen's Toyota in Palo Alto. They charged my work colleague $185 to record and diagnose his motor whine last year when Toyota declined to replace it under warranty. My understanding is that they will not charge this fee if Toyota deems to replace the motor under warranty.

 

[TonyWilliams]

When a dealer is charging you money upfront to diagnose a warranty repair, it’s merely padding their pockets. Why are you paying at all?

Of course, the easy answer is that many / most people will just pay. I would take the car elsewhere, and let another dealer who would prefer the warranty money from Toyota.

After many tens of thousands of dollars of warranty repair, I can assure you that I never paid a single dollar. If somebody’s asked, I’d take the car elsewhere.

 

[user 340]

I was hoping to get at least one reply germane to the question - has anybody here gotten their motor replaced under warranty for excessive low-speed (5 - 30 mph) noise that occurred only when the accelerator was applied? About how loud was it? I'd appreciate hearing people's experience with similar issues.