Sludge in Engine

**stiv** · 06-14-2007, 07:23 PM

Plus Customer service said that the dealer should've noticed sludge comming out of the engine in the other services whereas Frankston are saying you can't detect sludge from just draining the oil.

they knew about the problem and didn't want to alert you to it hoping that they wouldn't be eating the price of replacing their faulty engine.

i have read the TSBs here in america about this problem, once a few years ago on a 1MZFE engine i had to use compressed air to force the sludged oil out of this guys car. now mind you we serviced his car regularly. toyota claimed that he didn't change the oil enough, if i remember correctly they stated 7500 miles. anyway this guy came back and i printed out all of his service records from our shop. after some *****ing and moaning toyo replaced his engine. so i would press the issue with your dealer as far as the law will allow until you are taken care of.

**Fox_Mulder** · 06-14-2007, 09:59 PM

Now Toyota are offering $5,800 which I will accept we need a car and on the condition that I withold my right to take the Toyota Motor Corporation to court and sue for negligence in maintaining my engine.

Consumer Affairs have decided to help me out and are getting the VACC (Victorian Automotive consortium place thingy) to conduct an analysis on the engine. The VACC are saying that they think it's cos Toyota Frankston used the wrong oil or engine cleaner or didn't change the oil in the car, well well soon find out with the analysis done.

Consumer affairs will then take our case to Court against Toyota Frankston and Toyota Motor Corporation Australia.

**MatrixPC** · 06-15-2007, 11:10 AM

Glad that consummer affairs getting involved. Let see what coming out of this case.
You know, it's really suck to get Toyota to admit any wrong doing giving that they have a good history of reliable cars. Their newer car starting to have problem here and there. A simple case is the Mk3 Supra 7M engine with BHG. They never admit that the gasket design and head bolts they use wasn't strong enought for the engine. They all blame the mod to the engine that cause the problem. Feaking, I don't have any mod on the engine other than a dropin K&N filter. I still have BHG at 95Kmiles when I bought the car at 68kmiles . Previous owner had all services done by a single dealer where he bought the car. Other peole mod their engine also had BHG at about the same milleage. That was for the turbo engine. NA engine also fail but all within 10-20K miles later than the turbo. When people crying out about faulty head gasket and bolts, they start changing the design. If it isnt' a problem, why they changing the design?

**muldrick** · 06-15-2007, 02:43 PM

My 2 cents:
I worked at a Lexus dealer for 5 years, and now at a Toyota dealer.
A dealer would be unable to tell whether the engine is sludged while doing an oil change. They pull the drain plug and remove the filter, they only see dirty (or very dirty) oil coming out. The sludge part stays in the engine.
I've never heard of any dealer (or any shop for that matter) suck the oil out through the dipstick tube...that's nonsense, and actually be more time consuming.
For several years Toyota "readily" did the repairs on these engines, they even sent out notices to owners notifying them to have their cars checked. (One valve cover has to be removed to properly check it)
In the last 2 years or so Toyota has slowly "done away" with free repairs.

About the PCV valve (Positive Crankcase Ventilation): changing the PCV valve won't do anything. When repairs are done (or with a new engine), the engine gets new (revised) valve covers that have better "crankcase breathing abilities" thereby reducing sludge (or gell) build up.

I feel the problem is/was two-fold: lack of proper oil changes (I've seen 100's of engines that where fine when the service intervals where done within 5000 miles)
The valve cover design was an issue, but the bottom line is that oil changes must be done every 5000 miles, and oil sludge most likely will not occur.

I think Toyota has been quite generous in doing these repairs. At my dealer people came in with proof of only 1 oil change per year, and the repair was done for free. Once per year???? or 12,000 miles??? that's rediculous.

CHANGE YOUR FREAKING OIL PEOPLE!!!!

**v8 scimitar** · 06-15-2007, 03:31 PM

so your saying that pulling the dipstick putting a tube down and switching on a pump is more time consuming that raising a car, removing all the undertray stuff which often involves removing the wheels then undoing the sump plug and all the other stuff??
I think if its an absolute must that you change your oil at 5000 miles in an everyday road car Toyota are going to loose market share big time. 12500 miles is the norm on most cars for about the last three years in Europe. It makes environmental and financial sense and reduces the cost of ownership. 5000 miles is a total joke and if they cant do better than that they deserve to go out of business.

**2k1Toaster** · 06-15-2007, 03:38 PM

Even in our lexus manual it tells us to change every 8000 miles. Jiffy Lube and such will tell you 3000. They make that synthetic oil that will supposedly go 15000.

8000 to 10000 miles is about normal in most other countries. They just try to rip you off here. Obviously a cheapo US domestic might need that 3000 mile change though.

**muldrick** · 06-15-2007, 03:48 PM