V35A-FTS bearing issue? (1 Viewer)

[Jetboy]

I'm very surprised by this. Out of character a bit for Toyota as of late. Must be worse than we know for all the existing engines that haven't failed. But also think it's the right decision. Good for Toyota. Good for customers. I think the long run value of this for the brand is high. As a long term shareholder I am in favor of this even as a non-owner of this engine and someone who generally thinks the new tundra is a poorly developed product.

 

[OSS]

Toyota has disassembled apparently good V35A engines for examination, only to find machining swarf contamination in the crank bearings on many of those “good” engines too. Just not enough to seize the engine or present suspicious behavior.

Apparently some V35A engines are contaminated with machining debris more than others.

That being the case….
This warranty recall is for AFFECTED vehicles. What constitutes an affected vehicle? Knocking? seizing? Bad sounds?
What about all the thousands of other users with lightly contaminated engines that are apparently running “fine” right now?
No new engine for you.

And what happens when that lightly contaminated engine seizes up after its out of warranty? Tough luck?

 

[TheLCProject]

This will be pocket change for Toyota.

It's paid for by the generous margins on the 250 series.

$3.1B at $30k/engine. It's not business-ending for sure but will come right out of profits. If their gross revenue is $300B per year, and profit is 10% or $30B (presumed, not verified) it's a 10% reduction. Probably worth it for brand reputation, but we'd get a lot of nasty grams in my line of work with a profit reduction like that.

I'd be surprised if Toyota's cost is $30k per engine. That's what they charge the suckers.

 

[TheLCProject]

That being the case….
This warranty recall is for AFFECTED vehicles. What constitutes an affected vehicle? Knocking? seizing? Bad sounds?
What about all the thousands of other users with lightly contaminated engines that are apparently running “fine” right now?
No new engine for you.

And what happens when that lightly contaminated engine seizes up after its out of warranty? Tough luck?

Further justification for getting oil samples on every oil change you do on these engines - compared to just sticking your head in the sand hoping that Toyota's deems your vehicle "affected".

 

[OGBeno]

$3.1B at $30k/engine. It's not business-ending for sure but will come right out of profits. If their gross revenue is $300B per year, and profit is 10% or $30B (presumed, not verified) it's a 10% reduction. Probably worth it for brand reputation, but we'd get a lot of nasty grams in my line of work with a profit reduction like that.

I'd guess (well, educated guess) they aren't even paying $10K per engine in a mass volume manufacturing environment.

My educated guess is that their write-down for this will be between $500 million and a billion dollars. Again, pretty much pocket change for Toyota. They most definitely have this type of risk analysis done on every single part or assembly they use for any vehicle they manufacture.

 

[rexington14]

Unfortunately there's still some ambiguity in this update? Are all of the vehicles within the affected production periods getting new engines or only the vehicles that fail some sort of diagnostic? (It reads like the former to me.)

Regardless, if I owned one of these vehicles I'd be piling on the miles for years and years until the recall fix period is about to expire, or, my engine blows - whichever occurs first. Only then would I take it in and get my brand new completely free engine.

 

[Acrad]

https://www.motor1.com/news/727930/toyta-replace-100k-engines-tundra-lexus/

“ The recall applies to Tundras built from November 2, 2021 through February 13, 2023. For the Lexus LX600, it's July 30, 2021 through November 25, 2022.”

 

[Phillyd2]

I'm very surprised by this. Out of character a bit for Toyota as of late. Must be worse than we know for all the existing engines that haven't failed. But also think it's the right decision. Good for Toyota. Good for customers. I think the long run value of this for the brand is high. As a long term shareholder I am in favor of this even as a non-owner of this engine and someone who generally thinks the new tundra is a poorly developed product.

I don't think they had another option.

 

[Phillyd2]

This will be pocket change for Toyota.

At the end of the day, it’s the customer (we all) who are really paying.

 

[Rednexus]

At the end of the day, it’s the customer (we all) who are really paying.

Truth. It's money that will be charged back to customers in some way or another - via higher prices on new vehicles or worse financing - or R&D money left on the table. I'm sure someone will get a smaller bonus out of it, but executive compensation is only so much and they aren't going to be able to actually "eat" $1-3B internally with no customer impacts (depending on if you believe the recalls can be implemented for $10K a vehicle or the $30K costs per current dealer documentation).

FYI, I do really think they made the right call on the revised recall. And it shows they were not able to figure out a defensible way to isolate the VA35F issues to a specific batch of vehicles.

The kind of strange decision was to keep making them for a year plus while they knew this issue existed. Presumably they would have estimated the costs of this recall and decided it was worth rolling the dice that the problem could be isolated. Assuming they are making $20K profit per vehicle - that's $2B in profit for 102,000 Tundra/LXs. The recall will eat most if not all of that.

 

[Specialeyes]

Truth. It's money that will be charged back to customers in some way or another - via higher prices on new vehicles or worse financing - or R&D money left on the table. I'm sure someone will get a smaller bonus out of it, but executive compensation is only so much and they aren't going to be able to actually "eat" $1-3B internally with no customer impacts

You mean they won't just take it out of the record profits they enjoyed last year?!?

 

[Rednexus]

You mean they won't just take it out of the record profits they enjoyed last year?!?

I'm sure those all already all gone in dividends, R&D, bonuses, acquisitions, expansions, etc .

 

[Jetboy]

I don't think they had another option.

Not sure. The domestics have higher failure rates and do nothing on various engines. I think the current failure rate on a new GM truck engine is 4% on the L87 gas engines (according to GM). That's 4 times as many as the current number of V35A failures. I'd bet that failure rate on all diesel light truck engines is over 10% in the first 100k miles. I'd actually bet it's close to 25% or more have at least one one failure to run within the first 100k. They're either ignoring entirely or just fixing as they fail and letting the rest age out of warranty.

But - I think Toyota had little choice given that the brand and value proposition is based so heavily on reliability and manufacturing quality.

 

[Brown98LC]

I think the Middle East was experiencing far higher failure rates than North America when comparing % of vehicles sold and % of failure rates.
Issues were happening very early on here from 2021 when it first came out. I didn't believe all the videos at first but yeah I guess it was true.
The reputation of the LC is very important t here and its already damaged for the time being but people will still buy them because Toyota acknowledged the issue and that gives people confidence. People will definitely be more cautious of newer engines in the future or newer tech on LC after this though and I'm worried a hybrid LC/LX won't sell as a result because people will be afraid the same issues will happen again, not based on logic but emotion/rumors; etc.
People will eventually move on and this will be a distant memory and I think that the fact Toyota is taking it seriously is definitely a good thing.
The recall was also announced in the GCC countries a few days ago.

Nissan is announcing the y63 in a few days and just right after the recall of the lc 300 was announced..

 

[04UZJ100]

Now the question for those “without the issue” is will the engine be more or less reliable being rebuilt in a Toyota dealer???

 

[M1911]

Now the question for those “without the issue” is will the engine be more or less reliable being rebuilt in a Toyota dealer???

It sounds as though Toyota is going to change the process and no longer rebuild the engines at the dealer.

 

[TWILLY]

Not sure. The domestics have higher failure rates and do nothing on various engines. I think the current failure rate on a new GM truck engine is 4% on the L87 gas engines (according to GM). That's 4 times as many as the current number of V35A failures. I'd bet that failure rate on all diesel light truck engines is over 10% in the first 100k miles. I'd actually bet it's close to 25% or more have at least one one failure to run within the first 100k. They're either ignoring entirely or just fixing as they fail and letting the rest age out of warranty.

But - I think Toyota had little choice given that the brand and value proposition is based so heavily on reliability and manufacturing quality.

Those are dismal failure rates on the domestics. Sort of shocking, but, I’ve never looked into it before.

 

[Phillyd2]

Not sure. The domestics have higher failure rates and do nothing on various engines. I think the current failure rate on a new GM truck engine is 4% on the L87 gas engines (according to GM). That's 4 times as many as the current number of V35A failures. I'd bet that failure rate on all diesel light truck engines is over 10% in the first 100k miles. I'd actually bet it's close to 25% or more have at least one one failure to run within the first 100k. They're either ignoring entirely or just fixing as they fail and letting the rest age out of warranty.

But - I think Toyota had little choice given that the brand and value proposition is based so heavily on reliability and manufacturing quality.

This is to address a very specific issue with very specific engines and nothing to do with overall brand reliability or reputation

 

[Jetboy]

This is to address a very specific issue with very specific engines and nothing to do with overall brand reliability or reputation

I'm just not sure how it would legally require the full replacement program when other engines that fail at 4x higher rates do not. Those failures also result in unexpected power loss on little or no notice.

 

[Phillyd2]

I'm just not sure how it would legally require the full replacement program when other engines that fail at 4x higher rates do not. Those failures also result in unexpected power loss on little or no notice.

The only thing legally required is a fix. Toyota happened to decide that a new engine is the best way for them to do it but I don’t know of any legal requirement mandating it.