Why would someone steal the battery from a Toyota Prius
We’re sure by now you’ve heard a number of precautions to take from having things stolen from your vehicle, but we bet you haven’t heard of this one recently: people are now stealing batteries from the Toyota Prius.
What?!
Why would someone steal the battery from a Toyota Prius, you ask? Well, for one as electric vehicles become more and more popular, the parts for electric vehicles are becoming more in demand. Especially in the San Francisco/Palo Alto area.
Many of the people who have reported having their batteries stolen from their Prius said their back window was smashed in and then just stealing the battery from the trunk. It only takes an experienced battery thief about 20 minutes to do some damage, and these batteries are selling anywhere upwards of $1,000.
Even that is a steal though (no pun intended!), because a replacement Toyota Prius battery can cost as much as $3,000! Police aren’t sure what has sparked the outbreak of Toyota Prius battery thefts, but it could be because the first-generation model batteries are slowly nearing the end of their life
How to protect your Toyota Prius battery from being stolen
The interesting thing about people stealing the batteries from the Priuses is that they are stealing from the older generation models, which are not directly interchangeable
with the most recent Prius generation models.
However, if you are looking for ways to protect your Prius battery from being stolen, there are a few tricks you can take note of. For example, anything you can do to make your battery inaccessible will likely deter any criminal if they have to work harder than normal. Another thing you could do, and this might take some time or finagling, but you could also somehow attach some bolts to or some sort of bar above the battery to deter any thief from taking the few minutes to steal your battery.
Have any of your had your battery targeted? Have you taken any precautions? We’d love to hear more!
