2012 Engine Failure - warranty claim rejected

[kickinback]

I know of a local servo that has just been refurbed with new tanks etc. Within 3 days of opening many customers were making claims on them for water in their fuel. A friend from the footy club was one of them, and he was stopping every 10 or so k's to drain the fuel filter (2010 d4d Hilux). 2 days later, 5 days after opening the servo was having the new tanks removed.

I am very particular where I get my fuel from and am happy to pay a higher price for it, rather than save some bucks with a shopper docket.

Could you please inform us as to where you bought your diesel from please, as this sort of info benefits everyone.

Oh by the way, ever wonder why the color of diesel fuel was changed from blue/brown to yellow? bit of a story there!

Good luck with your warranty claim bloke, let us know how you go.

[Skog07]

I know of a local servo that has just been refurbed with new tanks etc. Within 3 days of opening many customers were making claims on them for water in their fuel. A friend from the footy club was one of them, and he was stopping every 10 or so k's to drain the fuel filter (2010 d4d Hilux). 2 days later, 5 days after opening the servo was having the new tanks removed.

Yeah stay away from new servos for a few months after they instal the tanks. The tanks are filled with water to stop them from floating before the concrete is poured on top. Once poured they pump out the tanks and there is about 1inch of water left on the bottom and generally filled up with fuel afterward. The proper way is to wet vac and hand dry the tanks with rags through the turret before filling. We recoved 400L of water and silt out of a tank that was supposedly drained properly...

[kickinback]

Yeah stay away from new servos for a few months after they instal the tanks. The tanks are filled with water to stop them from floating before the concrete is poured on top. Once poured they pump out the tanks and there is about 1inch of water left on the bottom and generally filled up with fuel afterward. The proper way is to wet vac and hand dry the tanks with rags through the turret before filling. We recoved 400L of water and silt out of a tank that was supposedly drained properly...

What hope do we have?

[smithy01]

We also got to think how many more hiluxs are out there compared to other models. My younger brother has a 2006 sr single cab. Got it with 220000 on the clock. Now done just over 350,000 and he floggs it. Towing tandems full of wood, smashes it off road. All he had to get done so far was replace te slave cylinder on the clutch. $300 not bad for a car that's meant to be so sensitive. I'd still trust mine and his over any other model

[kickinback]

Very true Smithy.

[jackolux]

[quote="Alby"].
All brands have issues, if you talk to independent mechanics or diesel specialists we are not having any more issues than any other manufacturer [quote]

Yeah that is right , but we all drive Toyota's , our/my , issue is with Toyota ,
I know several Toyota owners , Hilux , Prado's and 200 series Cruisers that have had problems with the fuel system and in every case bloody Toyota has straight out said " Dirty Fuel " and they have all had to jump through hoops to try and get a fair deal , thats dealers here in West Gippsland where I live , friends in Canberra and as far away as Darwin ,
in one case with a 200 LC , it was the fuel the bloody dealer had put in after the first time thay had a go a fixing it ,
it bloody sux ,

If its Contaminated fuel ( water , dirt , what ever ) we have no hope , its Australia wide
I have just returned from a 14K Kimberley Trip , I have to buy Diesel where and when I need it .

[Hellbound]

Another reason to install a pre-filter and water seperator. I know we shouldnt have to and the car should be setup with a better filter to begin with, but come on fellas its been a widely known problem with crd vehicles not just the hilux so just bite the bullet and get one installed before the oem one, then theres really nothing to stress over.

Ive had a very good one installed since the car being 20,000km old and it has saved me twice after filling up hours away from a major city. Buzzer went off and i emptied it out BEFORE it even gets to the stock filter - sure it cost couple of hundred to set it up but a shitload cheaper than rebuilding injectors/pumps etc.

[CHS002]

Thanks everyone for your feedback.
I didn’t mean to come across as “throwing a grenade” but if you put yourself in my shoes you can probably understand my frustration, especially as this is my main work vehicle which has been off the road 4 weeks now . I am exploring a few different avenues at the moment and I will keep you all posted as I hear anymore. Thanks again for the advice and feedback.

[Qwerty]

Buddy in your shoes I'd be throwing grenades ... Into Toyota offices! Ha ha

[Lancair]

Please do tell why the fuel colour was changed ? Ive noticed it.

Just on Toyota Hilux popularity, I drove from Coonabarbran to Tamworth late yesterday afternoon.
AGQUIP, one of, if not the biggest AG shows is on right now in Gunnedah. Anyway, from Coona to Gun, I swear, out of every 10 vehicles we passed heading the other way, at LEAST 7 were Toyotas. Land Cruisers, Prados and Hilux's and the odd Kluger. By far the MOST common make of UTE was the Hilux, esp dual cab drop side. Probably closely followed by the Colorado or Navara. I dont recall seeing a single Mahindra or Great Wall.

Just on a brag point, from Gunnedah to Tamworth, I was following a new Dual cab Colorado, with all the Holden advertising all over it and he was going for every overtaking opputunity he had. I was able to easily keep up with him, in fact having to back off WOT often when following him around traffic. ( I have got a Chip-It on tune 5 )

[MarkYounger]

Oh by the way, ever wonder why the color of diesel fuel was changed from blue/brown to yellow? bit of a story there!

Good luck with your warranty claim bloke, let us know how you go.

Yeah I'd like to know as well. Our fuel is blue here still.

[Gawry]

Some Preventatives:
**Only ever fill up at BP, searching this forum tells me the best fuel quality (cetane level). I keep all the receipts.
**If installing an extra fuel filter/water separator ensure doesn't affect the fuel flow, apparently
Hilux still requires fast fuel flow. Ensure hose size stays the same.
**Be specific to Toyota when servicing that you want Fuel Filter to be replaced.

Australia has bad fuel quality standards (see cetane level):
http://www.environment.gov.au/atmospher ... index.html
What is recommended for the Hilux (see page 28 recommended fuel grade):
http://www.toyota.com.mk/content/pdfs/h ... oshura.pdf
Specifications from Australian Toyota website do not show recommended cetane levels.

[10K]

As a bloke who has spent a small fortune rebuilding my D4D twice I think I can speak here with some authority...


Lets get some things straight and cut through a lot of rubbish floating around on this thread at the moment.


FACT: More D4D's present with injector issues and bad fuel motor failures than other new diesel motors.
That said they also sell in much greater volumes than any other diesel.
The vast majority of the new sales though are fleet.


FACT: D4D's a very susceptible to damage from bad fuel. Much more so than Navara's, Triton's and other diesel utes.
How Toyota is still running with the whole line of the fuel filter NEVER needing changing is beyond my realm of reasonable explanation.
These D4D's have now been on the road for over 7 years and it's still not been addressed.
STUPIDITY at it's most flagrant. WTF is wrong with the people who review these types of things at Toyota.
If someone has a reasonable argument as to why they tell you NOT to change the fuel filter EVER, or why after 7 years they still run with this I'm all ears.


FACT: Toyota is very aware of these issues A LOT of drivers are having with both faulty injectors, and also the damage bad fuel will cause to the motor and still do nothing about it.
I'm not here as a Toyota hater... I love them, Always have and always will... I'm a proud Toyota Man, but as a bloke who has owned 5 Hilux's I'm very disappointed that over 5 years after I had to rebuild a motor at a cost of about $8'000 a lot of people are still having the same problems. Why?

Toyota makes no change in the fuel filter policy, and does not upgrade the fuel filter system, or recommend secondary fuel filtering, let alone offer it as an option... as it would imply fault or a problem with their set up and cost them a lot in warranty claims.


My first rebuild was put down to water and a high kerosene level in my fuel. Handy.
Good luck fighting the fuel company for the costs... I walked down that path and soon realised they have a whole floor of lawyers waiting to take this to court and bury you. Not an option.
Second rebuild was bad luck and bad management... The motor cooked after blowing the head gasket... probably caused by the accident I had a few months before and also driving the truck very hard with all the hot rod bits you can throw at a diesel motor (Chips, exhaust, LPG injection etc)

I got nowhere with Toyota in terms of warranty in spite of a good few weeks of kicking, screaming, moderate yet polite threats and every other trick in the book. I'm a belligerent bastard when I want to be, and also know there is more than one way to skin a cat so to speak. I pulled every trick I had, took advice form a lot of smart well informed people and still got nowhere.
I spoke with very senior people at Toyota and they just don't want to know about it.
Bad fuel. Out of warranty scope. PERIOD.

I was one of the first people in the country to have this issue.
Toyota couldn't even fix the motor and sent it to West End Diesel, as they had no techs in Sydney who'd been trained at the time who could even work out what was actually wrong with it.
They wouldn't even give me parts at cost or discount.
They didn't have the parts in the country either.
So I bought new injectors, common rail pump, common rail, fuel lines and chemical clean of my tank.

And it's still going on today... WTF.
Why? Aren't we supposed to learn from issues that are continuously happening and put measures in place to stop it happening again?

This isn't the type of service and product quality Toyota built their reputation on and I feel that in the past few years Toyota has really dropped the ball in terms of the aftermarket care offered to D4D owners with motor issues.

Injectors should be available at cost price and fixed fee installation through Toyota.
Parts for motor rebuilds due to bad fuel should also be at cost.

How many other older Toyota diesel motors needed new injectors just within warranty or just out of it?
1KZ's? 1HZ's? 1HD-FTE's? 1KD's? 14BT's?
Not many I would suggest.
Toyota built a reputation on bullet proof reliability with their diesels as long as they were serviced religiously and you used genuine parts and good oil etc.
What has happened to that? The V8 diesels in the LandCruisers are also very prone to reliability issues, burn oil and break down all over the place.

So why so many D4D's suffering injector and motor failure... and don't say because they sell so many and it's just a numbers game.
BULLSHIT.
Consider how long the 1HZ and 1KZ and the rest the motors I listed above were around in new cars of the ay, and how many of them sold over their life spans and I would suggest the numbers are there to confidentially say that the parts like injectors were of merchantable quality, the D4D items are not in a lot of cases and therefore any reputable company should look after those effected with new injectors at a fair price if they fail.
Especially a company like Toyota... I didn't buy a f@#$ing Daewoo or Great Wall.

Why should Toyota profiteer of the misfortune of loyal customers who have a product that I honestly consider to be not of merchantable quality?
I paid $3500 for 4 injectors back in late 2006. I paid $44'000 for the entire truck 18 month earlier.
Add the common rail and fuel lines and I spent just over 15% of the total purchase price on parts to repair the motor. Just the parts, not towing or labour.

There are a lot more customers with D4D's who are not on this forum who have had issues... a hell of a lot.
I know the guys at West End Diesel very well and they fix a lot of D4D's, and I'd suggest that any other reputable diesel workshop across the country would have the same tale to tell.
Any wrecker will also tell you how many calls they get for motors and injectors as well. A lot.

It's really simple... Toyota is turning a blind eye to this problem and managing to do it quite well.
There hasn't been a big story about it in the media so while it's not a big PR issue for them they will continue to ignore it and say it's isolated cases and due to bad fuel etc etc.
None of the 4WD magazines would run a proper story on it as Toyota spend big money to advertise with them so you do the math.


For all you blokes out there who have not had to spend thousands of dollars rebuilding a D4D for no good reason I suggest you have good think about how you would feel if it happened to you before you throw statements around regarding how people should act or what they should or shouldn't say on a public forum about Toyota... I'll say some stuff right now
Consider what this is doing to your re-sale value... a major reason why Toyota has such a good reputation, and something you pay a premium for at the time of purchase.

You are allowed to have an opinion and voice it here... thats why we have forums isn't it? I haven't read anything in this thread that is even close to defamatory. It's just opinions and anecdotes on peoples direct experiences and problems.
And this talk of unfounded claims and defamatory comments... please. There are two sides to every story people have a right to use this forum as a platform to air their concerns, grievances and frustrations.

As ARB has just shown by joining this forum as a sponsor major corporates are looking to engage with their customers via social media and forums like this... Toyota would know about this forum and could easily join to hear our concerns and address them with their side of the story.
This forum is one of the most popular 4WD forums on the net and the premier Hilux forum. 4WD Action, ExplorOz, and Overlander are all popular forums as well, and they all have a lot of threads and posts regarding D4D injector and bad fuel issues. There is a lot of info out there on the net regarding this, it is right there on the net for everyone to see.
Toyota like any big corporate has teams of people trawling the media and net looking for stories on their brand and know full well customers vent on forums like this, and yet they still do nothing.


The head hounco's at Toyota Australia and globally should be ashamed of themselves for their lack lustre response to this problem with injectors, and bad fuel killing D4D's. They have turned their backs on their loyal customers, not just with the motor issues, but also bad clutches and clock spring failures as well.

It is a real problem.
It is a major problem.
It stinks and they know it does.

I would suggest if they didn't have that massive recall issue in the US they might have acted on this, but I guess there is not enough money to fix this "small issue" with D4D's.


A lot of the service managers in Toyota dealerships leave a lot to be desired as well and don't help as much as they could.
They don't help, or go into bat for you even if you bought the truck off that dealer when it was new unless you know them personally or get them onside.
I dealt with Sydney City Toyota, a Toyota Motor Corporation owned dealership when I had my first engine failure. I'll refrain from letting you all know exactly how I feel about them, as 4 letter words aren't polite.
But I will list a few other longer words that come to mind:
Incompetent. Misinformed. Under-trained. Wrong. Puppets. Un-organised. Expensive.


Bottom line is that Toyota has real issues with their current crop of diesel motors and they know it. As do all of us.
Major issues with the V8 diesels in the 70 Series cruisers, and the 200 Series.
But the 200 Series owners get looked after a hell of a lot better than the rest of us... couldn't have them unhappy.
Toyota is still yet to release the new 6 cylinder diesel motor it has been working on for some time, as it doesn't want the embarrassment of a repeat performance of the issues experienced with the 3.0L 4 cylinder and 4.5L V8 D4D's. The Prado 150 was supposed to get this motor and it still has a 3.0L D4D. A 10 year old motor that is seriuosly outdated in a car worth $60 - $90K... way off the level of refinement, power and fuel economy offered by the European diesels. About half the power and torque, but uses more fuel actually.

Toyota hasn't released the V8 diesel in the Tundra in the US as it doesn't want the backlash from issues they will have like they have here in the LandCruisers... and there is a massive call for a diesel in this truck in the US.
Toyota are working double time to fix these issues for the next update on the Prado 150 and the new Hilux... the reliability issues is seriously hurting their brand.

But what I believe is hurting their brand even more is the blind eye they have with the issues.
Had they have put their hand up and said ok... we have an issue with injectors with the D4D's and bad fuel issues causing motor failures. We accept it and here is what we will do to fix it it would be a much different story...
this is a reasonable course of action in my honest opinion:
1. Cost price injectors for trucks out of warranty under 5 or 6 years old or whatever is a reasonable life span for a injector to work for based on comparisons with their other older diesel motors like 1HZ's etc.
2. Cost price for parts needed to re-build motors that fail due to bad fuel. Common rail pumps, common rail, fuel lines etc. Again with an age limit... I'm after fairness not charity.
3. Fixed price injector replacement at dealers.
4. Free injector testing and diagnosis for all trucks if brought in to a dealer for a service. You pay for the service obviously. If they are faulty you can have them replaced on the day for the cost price of the injectors and a set install fee nation wide.
5. Additional fuel filtering available as an option when you buy the truck new, or take it in for a service.
6. Upgrades to the clearly sub standard stock fuel filtration system from factory.
7. Replace fuel filter at every service added to the maintenance schedule.

But instead they have done none of this... not one thing.

Some 5-6 years after the first re-builds started happening people are still having the same issues in brand new cars and still getting the run around and NO REASONABLE AFTER SALES BACK UP OR SUPPORT.

It makes no sense.
It is grossly unfair.
It is so far from what Toyota built it's reputation on it's not funny.
But they keep on selling massive amounts of these Hilux's in spite of the price premium and issues... so I guess they know how to make money and sell cars. That said they are losing the retail sales war... Hilux is often outsold to private buyers by Navara and Ranger will be hot on it's heals as well... The new Colorado as well. With a new model some time away Toyota is up for a fight to retain market share that is for sure.


Unbreakable?
Not any more.


Oh what a feeling?
Putting your hand in your wallet to fix things that you shouldn't have to when you pay a premium to buy Toyota "Quality" isn't a nice feeling.
Trust me on that. It burns and hurts and really leaves a sour taste in your mouth especially if you are still under warranty.


Just my $1.77's worth of opinion, thoughts and constructive criticism.


To all those unfortunate people who forked out their hard earned cash to buy a D4D Hilux and have injector issues and motor failures... PUSH HARD to get them fixed under warranty.
Kick, scream, call talk back radio stations, write to newspapers, forums and wherever else you can be heard, make a scene and let yourself be heard... do your darnedest to get a fair outcome for yourself.
Perhaps a facebook page would be a great way to unite all of us who have had issues?

I wish you every success and hope you get your stuff done without having to put your hand in your pocket.


Cheers,
Matt

[SRD4D]

Well said Matt.(10k)
I'm with you 100% it needs to be moved up the media chain to knock Toyota down a few pegs.

[outbackjoe]

Filters don't filter less as they age. Filters become blocked as they age, impeding flow. In industry, lube systems protecting multi-million dollar equipment have their filters replaced when an instrument senses the filter is blocked. It measures the pressure drop across the filter. I'd suggest Toyota have adopted this proven method of fuel filter maintenance on their diesels.

So in my opinion replacing the filter more isn't the solution.

[kyle300exc]

Just wanted to throw my 2 cents worth in, Ive installed underground fuel tanks and removed them. They do deteriorate over time and can, in our case did allow water to penetrate the tanks through rust spots. Although these days a lot of tanks are installed with dual skin and pressurized to indicate a breach. That doesn't help with a lot of older fuel tanks out there.

[SRD4D]

Filters don't filter less as they age. Filters become blocked as they age, impeding flow. In industry, lube systems protecting multi-million dollar equipment have their filters replaced when an instrument senses the filter is blocked. It measures the pressure drop across the filter. I'd suggest Toyota have adopted this proven method of fuel filter maintenance on their diesels.

So in my opinion replacing the filter more isn't the solution.

Mmmm your not getting it joe.
An impead/restriction in flow will cause a lean mix(more air/less fuel, result is detonation), so will start to burn holes in parts,which is what's Happening to our engines if they are serviced as per Toyota scuedule.
Just change your filters boys if you want more life,fit a secondary filter/separator.
Toyota do have this technology but its not calibrated correctly,its really just a flow/pressure switch.

[Qwerty]

Thank god I went the 1GRFE then!

Btw 10k, they are honouring the clocksprings , had mine replaced out of warranty (by several years) ... after almost abusive driving down horrid corrugations. I suspect that was due to it being a safety issue, some government organisation ordered them to do it, I suspect.

[outbackjoe]

The instrument on the filter is designed to protect the system from low flow. Plus, I don't think the injector metering system would allow a lean mixture. If there was fuel starvation it would manifest with no power, an engine light and probably your engine stalling. My thoughts anyway.

[Alby]

You can change your filter everyday if you want but that won't stop water ingress from bad fuel nor will a second filter. Some sort of audible alarm is the only way to prevent the problem unless you can see the glass bowl whilst you are driving.

It does seem crazy from Toyotas point of view to not stipulate a regular filter change though given it is a $28 part and minimal labour required