man0fsteel

I had the hybrid light come on a while ago and the dealer told me the starter battery was going bad. That sucker was expensive as I recall (thankfully covered under the power train warranty) but I did notice a lot better acceleration after it was replaced.

AQuach

took a while but Lexus finally agreed to replace the battery. Quoted me $8000 initially.

12V battery is costing me $550 to replace.

mr. tetsuo

iTrader: (3)

is this the only way to tell if your battery is headed to the grave? my 07 is at 93k miles and dont have any issues thus far *knock on wood* but am curious what watch out for that will lead up to the repair. or did other owners just have the message pop up without warning? any insight is greatly appreciated.

Coolpop

This happened to me last November. I got the dreaded "CHECK HYBRID SYSTEM" light on the dash. No other symptoms or issues, no prior warnings, car still running as well as ever.

Brought the car in, they diagnosed it the next day and called me. Advisor said it was the hybrid battery and that it would cost $7,000. I was already watching my **** Michigan team give the game to Iowa in the 4th quarter so I was already laughing at how comical it was. When I got this call and she told me the price, I laughed even more and said alright, well, it's under warranty so go ahead and replace it.

My car had 110,000 miles at the time and the advisor told me no, it wasn't under warranty. I explained to her that the previous GM was a good friend of mine and he extended the warranty for me to July 2014 and/or 150,000 miles and I had the email to prove it. After a few minutes of her hitting a keyboard, she says yeah, i see the extension but it doesn't apply to anything over 100,000 miles. She then tells me that Lexus will probably show some goodwill and pay half. I said I'm not paying $3500. I then thought, why am I talking to her?

Called the new GM, explained everything, basically got the same response. They had given me a 2014 RX as a loaner so I was perfectly happy to drive that until we came to some kind of understanding here. Towards the end of the conversation that really wasn't going anywhere, I just planted a little seed and told the GM look, nobody wants this to get ugly, I really don't want to have to sue Lexus over this issue, let's just work this out so everybody is happy. This was a Saturday. He said he'd get back to me on Monday.

Monday afternoon, the GM calls and says Lexus is covering the battery but that I need new spark plugs and the cost is $432. I knew I could probably get it done for half that price elsewhere, but since they were covering the battery I said fine.

SO...moral of the story to fellow hybrid owners - if your battery goes out, be persistent (but nice) in getting Lexus to cover it, bc in all likelihood, they will.

SoCal_450h

iTrader: (14)

Which one is the starter battery? is it the one by it self on left hand side (behind the tail light)?

pinkmaro

Anyone knows where can buy new Lexus GS450h hybrid battery's single cell? =D

Hale

My Hybrid battery failed on Christmas Day. I only bought the car in October 2014. Records indicated it had been in the DC area for its entire history. Had to drive home with the dreaded "check hybrid system" plus check ECB and check VSC warnings. Lexus confirmed Hybrid Battery was out of tolerance and changed it under the 8 year - 100K mile warranty. (just 8 months left on that one, phew!) Lexus of Rockville were excellent, gave me very a nice ES loaner to drive while my GS was with them for a few days.

gsssss

I also got the "Check Hybrid System" and ECB/VSC warnings last week. My 07 GS450H is 8.5 years old at 75K. Dealership wants $7,000 to replace the battery...lol smh

Hale

Double check that "8.5 years old" because that could save you $7K. That would mean that your 07 car was sold in August of 2006(?). Also talk to Lexus customer care. This is too close to the warranty period, and several posts in this forum indicate that Lexus might take care of the battery replacement.

gsssss

Yea my car was sold in July of 2006. I contacted Lexus shortly after taking my car to the dealership. They called me back telling me that they're looking into it. Still waiting to see how it goes.

Hale

Good luck. Please let us know whether Lexus resolves this in your favor.

gsssss

Lexus offered to cover half of the damage and I settled for that. Wished the new battery had a better warranty than 1 year though.

GSLA

I had mine replaced at 73137

TJLB

Add me to the list. My '07 GS450H hybrid battery has also died. It's 5 months out of warranty. Lexus have quoted me just over $5k to get it replaced. They won't give me any help as its out of warranty. I am wondering if anyone had had success with replacing just one cell of the battery as it seems there is only one that's damaged. I just don't know where I can source just one cell. Any help will be appreciated?

kenne01l

The place I bought my 06 GS430 from also had a GS450h that they wanted me to buy but I really wanted the V8. While my car was in their shop getting the timing belt replaced they had the 450h in the shop with bad cells in the battery, They didn't want to invest that much money in a used car and managed to source just the cells and replace them and the 450h was revived. I talked to the tech a bit about it when I was picking up my car but he replaced the cells and the car is working at a much more reasonable price. I don't know where he got the parts but I know he got them and replaced them. I wish I had more answers but hopefully knowing that the cells are replaceable will help you a tad.