Scotty, I think you need to rethink the value of the used Prius. I just bought an old Prius with 200k miles on the vehicle. Most of it's life in California so the car is in good shape. It has a new refurbished battery that has a lifetime warranty and new good year tires. Had the thing inspected at Toyota dealership and it passed with flying colors. > Here's the story, I am couped up in Wyoming out in the arctic tundra and it snowed over a foot with wind drifts of 3 feet. So I kind of panic because the Prius is down a long dirt driveway buried in a drift. I shovel the car out with a paddle board paddle to get some wiggle room. Then proceeded to use the Prius as a snowplow to clear the long driveway of about 200 feet just going back and forth creaming the snow out of the way. Then blasted through a plow stack of snow and over too main street. There are few cars out and the Prius was like some kind of little masher just tearing through the crud with good traction. Those cars are impressive and if you approach a used one logically considering - battery life / vs gas cost / longevity / and just relative toughness they are still good cars at a later age. The snow masher is a 2006 series 2 and it still has mojo! Thanks for all your great info on your site you are turning the tide of corruption in the car industry sharing your knowledge. Much appreciation amigo...
Glad it worked out for you, but when you buy an old Prius you're gambling with having to replace the battery pack for thousands of dollars and the generator for even more thousands. Then there's the complex, aging electronics. Even one of those things costs way more than I've spent on repairs for all my vehicles put together over the last 50+ years. So for myself, thanks but no thanks. I'd stick with something like an old-school Jeep or pickup to use for plowing.
The generation 2 Prius has the reputation of being a tank. Even as it ages. I’m not surprised you can use it as a snowplow. People have done some crazy things with the Gen 2 Prius.
