Warranty question for a new 2020 Tacoma

Hey guys,

I just got a new 2020 tacoma and have a basic warranty on the truck. I'm wanting to add tires/lift/gears/ECU Flash and some armor but I have concerns of making my warranty invalid by doing so. Speaking with the Toyota dealership they said as long as you aren't doing the work yourself and you go to a 4x4 shop you are fine. Has anyone had any issues come up by doing something similar? Thanks in advance.

 

That’s not true it has to be installed by the dealer other wise it voids your warranty on parts that were replaced . Some stuff will still be voided since Toyota won’t cover . The tires won’t ever be warranted threw Toyota since it’s basic wear and tear stuff .

 

They can deny a warranty for just about anything. Even if you off road your off road, which is common, no shit, kind of crazy.

If you ever do go in for a warranty, spray off every spec of dirt and tell them you only drive on pavement.

 

I see a Magnuson-Moss argument a brewing

 

Agreed, but they could still say no and make you fight their lawyers if they think it's in their favor.

edit, I see you meant arguement on here.

 

They will try to find any reason to decline your warranty repair.

Ive had several cases of a warranty issue denied for something that is not even related.

Most recent was was water leak on the drivers side. They blamed it on the power wire for my amp... on the passenger side. They somehow decided that water was moving along the wire, then jumping over the transmission tunnel and pooling on the driverside without leaving any water on the passenger side.


So, if you do any mods, make sure you diagnose the issue before setting up the apt, make 100% sure its not a issue with the mod you did, and if it is even slightly close to a issue with the mod, remove the mod and put it back to stock again.

 

Thanks for all the feedback everyone. First time in this situation and the reason I got the truck is to take it off road with some mods. It makes me feel more at ease that changing one thing might not void the entire warranty. Swapping to the original part is also a great idea which I didn't think about up front. I think the one mod that had me most concerned but I wanted was the ECU Flash since that is a computer change and this truck has 35 computers on it.

 

The 2020 should be up to date with the most recent version. Unless you're talking about ovtune, etc.

 

Sorry should have been more clear, I was talking about the ovtune. https://www.ovtuned.com/collections/vf/products/tacoma-3-5l-vf-tune-pack

 

I'm no expert on ovtune, but there's a couple hundred owners on here that are. They'll chime in.

 

I'm not familiar with the Tacoma specific ovtune, but I'm assuming it's like any other. Once you flash the ECU with a tune, if something happens that they can possibly say was caused by the tune, they can deny the warranty claim. I know with Audis, dealerships actually blacklist cars in the database with tunes. As they say, pay to play.

 

". . . tires/lift/gears/ECU Flash . . ." Forget the warranty, especially the Gears and Flash. No dealer will touch that shit.

They will definitely find a way to say "you did it".

G.

 

If you (op) are going to blow money on a new truck then blow money on new parts and labor for what you just paid toyota for then worry about the warranty... well that's not why most sane people would spend money. What do I mean? You pay 40,000 bucks for a truck, you're paying for every peice of the truck to be installed to an extremely particular standard with guarantee that it will perform as intended and then you're going to pay again for someone to do the work to a likely lower standard with maybe better but probably lower quality parts and no real guarantees? You paid twice for a more questionable outcome.

If anyone other than toyota has put hands on a part, toyota won't warranty anything it touches and they aren't wrong for it. If I built a pair of axles for a guy, I will absolutely stand behind them. If the carrier bearing starts growling and "oh, i had a buddy who's a mechanic regear it" then no, I'm not going to warranty anything. It's no longer my work, it's your buddy's and it's his problem, not mine. Change the names and it's completely logical.

If you've got it and that's how you want to spend it, go for it. I'm just trying to put some context on all of it for you. I both work in vehicle manufacturing and do all of my own work including restorations and builds, I have a little bit of my own experience and context on the matter.

So what's more important to you, the benefits of a brand new truck or a built truck? If you're going to build and really use a new truck for how you built it, it won't feel new for long and you'll wonder why you bothered. Flame me if you want to, it's not my money, I don't really care.

 

I have a 2020 and did all of the mods you want to do and then some. I fully expect all of the items I replaced to not be covered by warranty. But I'll be damned if they won't warranty my head unit and try to blame it on the suspension I installed (extreme I know). You have to be realistic in your expectations from the company. If they can prove that what you did to the vehicle caused the issue, then you're SOL. Accept that and understand that before you decide to make any changes. Me, I'm good with it. I don't ever leave anything stock.

 

Dude....you may have just questioned the choices of 99.99% of all Tacoma owners. Basically every thread on here is about some mod or another.

Also, seems pretty hypocritical since you list your other vehicles as getting the mods. If you lived by what you just said, you'd keep everything you owned stock AF.

 

If you replaced your suspension, then went in for a clunk over bumps. First thing they will do is pass it off as your suspension. Then you go home, find out its actually a body mount, bring it back again, explain it to them that its a faulty body mount, they might replace it, or they might say its caused by extra stress from the lift or some BS.

 

Exactly. Be prepared to battle as soon as you make a change that “might” have caused the failure.

 

Only thing my dealer told me when doing any suspension work like a lift, your altering the trucks geometry that was designed by engineers... its likely the reliability can suffer by doing so.