A Tacoma Story

I'll start this fun story off with a mention of T-SB-0011-18, dated February 2018. I'll attach that here for reference.

I think everyone who owns a 3rd Gen should definitely be aware of this TSB, especially considering how many posts I've read over the last couple years about replacing the front diff driver's side needle bearing with an aftermarket crush bushing (I actually have one of these new in the box if anyone needs it); Or, the frequent FS/WTB posts I've seen on here for the tool required to do it yourself. With all of those posts, I'm sure there's no explanation needed on this forum for that particular issue or the symptoms it produces.

What I wasn't aware of, back when my 2017 first started having the issue at the beginning of this year (2021), was this particular TSB. I actually just checked another thread in this subforum that has many of the TSBs for this truck posted and it wasn't listed there at all. In fact, the closest dealership to me also was also not aware of this TSB (just saying, it's probably worth checking out, especially if you're a dealership). If the truck hadn't been under warranty, I would've just installed that bushing. But I figured, they can replace the bearing for free and it will last another few years before I have to deal with it.

So, they replaced the bearing, and it failed while I was turning out of their parking lot. The mechanic had already driven it for a couple miles (maybe) after installing it, but still. He said it must have been defective and that they would order another one. Sure thing . On my drive back home from not having the vehicle repaired, I also noticed that now the steering felt 'off', to say the least. I assumed it was related to the bearing failure and that it would be addressed when they installed a "non-defective" bearing.

The second replacement bearing was installed a week or so later but also failed before I made it back home from there. At that point it was obvious that they were either doing something incorrectly or there was some other issue causing this part to fail so quickly. When I mentioned the second possibility to them, they actually said they thought my struts needed to be replaced . At that point, the OME kit had about 20k miles on it, most of which were on pavement during my work commute. There was nothing wrong with them.

So, the following week I drove to a different dealership, even further away. They took a drive and looked it over, then showed me this TSB (see attachment). They ordered a new front differential (which was 'reengineered' to replace that needle bearing w/guess what? ...Yeah, a crush bushing. The same part that comes installed from the factory on the 2018 and up b/c that bearing was such an issue and failed on so many trucks they couldn't keep manufacturing the vehicle with this part installed ), as well as both CV axles, and I returned the following week to have them replace those parts. The front axles were replaced b/c, as they expected, there was obvious and visible damage to the inner splines on the driver's side and minor, but premature wear on the passenger side, from the loose fit, bad angles, and metal debris contaminating the fluid. All of which were results caused by the bearing failure(s). They also said the first dealership had probably ordered those bearings from eBay/Amazon. Awesome . I got in my truck and was relieved to have it back in working order.


Unfortunately, there was still a problem. The steering still didn't feel right. I can better describe that if anyone is interested but let's just say, real sketchy. After 5 weeks of driving to work and 5 different 100-150 mile round trips to the 2 different dealerships, other front end and steering components must have also been damaged. Before this happened, the truck steered and handled perfectly fine, exactly, if not better even, then it had the day I brought it home from this very same [second] dealership.

I brought the truck back to them the very next day at which point they told me the alignment was off. They confirmed that they had aligned the truck the previous day and proceeded to align it again. Still not right. I went back a couple weeks later they said the alignment was off again. I had barely driven it and hadn't left the pavement so i'm sure nothing would have knocked it out. Another alignment. I asked for the print out this time and it was obviously off by a considerable amount on the right side... after the alignment. They said, best they could do .

This was interesting b/c, 6 months prior, before the issues had started, I had it aligned at the first dealership, only then bc it had a slight pull (it's actually recommended to have the alignment checked every 10k mi or something like that). But the printout from that day had showed it perfectly in spec and matching exactly from side to side.

Back to the present past. Later that afternoon I had to go to another town a couple hours away. The steering at highway speeds was so bad I went directly to that town's dealership and had the truck's alignment checked once more. It appeared to be out by as much as the printout from the second dealership had showed. The third dealership aligned it again. Afterwards, the printout showed that it was in spec, and had the same specs on both sides, but the steering was still off.

A couple weeks later I took the truck to an independent mechanic to have someone else look at it. They noticed that the ball joint on the passenger side outer tie rod end had a little bit of play so I had both outer tie rod ends replaced (using serviceable HD Moog parts), and had the truck aligned once more. Still no improvement in the steering .



A couple weeks later, the steering felt even worse. I went back to the second dealership. They said everything seemed fine. Ugh . When I got home that night, I got under the truck with a flashlight to see if I could find anything obvious. Right away, I noticed that both of the inner tie rod boots looked dark and were wet/oily on the bottom. Obviously, the power steering rack was leaking from the inner seals. When I opened the hood I noticed that the reservoir was almost empty. I called them back the next day to let them know what I found. They said it wasn't like that when it was there earlier that day. Uh huh . Another trip for them to confirm the power steering rack had failed, yet another trip the following week for them to replace it. Steering was still bad.

I tried to live with it for a while but went back to them about 6 weeks later b/c it felt like it was getting worse, and sort of dangerous to drive. That day, a mechanic who drove the truck, while I rode in the passenger seat, agreed that the steering felt intermittently tight and was pulling hard, then loose and unresponsive, which made the truck seem like it was "darting" even at low speeds. He thought the power steering pump had become damaged when the rack had failed, so they ordered another pump, and I went back the following week for them to install it. The steering still was not right.

A few weeks later, I went back to them once again. This time, they said they couldn't find anything wrong with it. Say again? (to clarify, they didn't say that there wasn't anything wrong w/it, just that they couldn't find the problem). I drove it home, parked it, and the next time I drove it, two days later, the front passenger wheel started screeching and had a lot of resistance especially during acceleration/deceleration. I took it to a tire shop where the mechanic test drove it and said that he thought it was the wheel bearing. That's also what I had been thinking. After getting the truck on the lift, he had me come take a look. It could barely be turned by hand, sounded rather crunchy when it did turn, hung up at different points in the rotation, and the brake calipers/pads were not dragging, which seemed to confirm the wheel bearing theory. But, he said that he was almost reluctant to replace the wheel bearing b/c there was absolutely zero tilt or rock to the wheel itself, which he demonstrated for me. He said he hadn't actually seen a wheel bearing fail to that extent without having some play in it. I had not either but the Google machine showed it was quite possible. I had him replace that bearing and the screech and the resistance went away, and the steering felt slightly better but not entirely.

At that point I went back to the second dealership and had them inspect the drivers side front wheel bearing and they said it didn't have any play so they didn't think it was bad and wouldn't replace it. They said that the tires might be causing, or were at least making the issue hard to diagnose .

I will admit that at this point, all 4 tires had worn unevenly and were starting to look ugly. But, this had happened in spite of the fact that a dealership had been rotating them on schedule as part of the Toyota Care plan, not to mention the 7 or more wheel alignments performed in under a year. I explained that I had already purchased another set of tires, but also that I was reluctant to have those installed, considering how much 4 AT tires cost and that the current set of General tires, which had a 50k mi tread life warranty, had basically been destroyed with under 30,000 mi on them because of all of the front end and steering issues. I've also driven a lot of vehicles over the last 28 years and during that time, have experienced bad alignments, worn components, and and uneven tire wear. This did not feel like uneven tire wear. Still, I swapped out the tires to rule that out. No change in the steering, not even a little.

Over the next several weeks, the steering continued to deteriorate. At the risk of causing damage to anything else, or you know having an accident b/c of a catastrophic failure, I barely drove the truck. Still, every time I had to go somewhere like the grocery store, it became noticeably worse and then developed a chatter/clunk from the front drivers side wheel area when hitting even hard edges or small cracks in the pavement. The noise was especially pronounced when hitting potholes or washboard conditions while driving dirt roads (of which, are probably more common here than the paved variety), at those times, the handling, if you can call it that, is basically non-existent, the front end feels like it's skipping sideways. Also, there was now a whine, or high-pitched hum, coming from that same location. A sound like you might expect of something metallic, either rotating, or lightly grinding, against another metallic something. That sound was more noticeable when coasting, probably because the truck is slightly quieter when not under load, but could still be heard at other times, like when the truck is rolling at just about any speed over 15-20 MPH, and there isn't other louder road noise and it's not very windy.



Additionally, my MPG had somehow gotten worse. For as long as I've had the truck, I've averaged 17 to 18 miles per gallon even with the oversized tires. I live in a fairly rural area with a single, 2 lane, highway that is 55 mph. Basically, no traffic and only 2 stop lights, one of which I rarely ever pass through. So, I'm not dealing with stop and go, or frequent acceleration to high speeds. You get in the car, drive to the highway, keep the same speed until you get to town 1 or town 2, then, slower for the next block or two until you get wherever it is you're going, then you stop. It's hard to believe that a lightweight V6, manufactured in the last few years could get even worse gas mileage than that, but the truck was now averaging around 13 MPG. Similar to the sensation experienced when the passenger front wheel bearing had failed, the vehicle seemed to hang a little on the driver's side when accelerating from a stop or letting off of the acceleration but not breaking. This really made me feel like there was an issue involving the wheel bearing. I mean, it kind of makes sense to me, that both bearings could potentially become damaged when the parts directly attached to them, which at times actually cause them to spin (*there can be snow on the roads here for 8 months of the year so 4 high does get used), have become damaged and loose. I'd even say if both front wheel bearings were to have failed with less than 80,000 mi on the truck, then there might just be something to that?

Oh, and by the way all of these issues started happening when the truck had around 68,000 mi on it. I have only driven it another 12,000 mi since then. The vast majority of those miles are on pavement with the exception of a few miles of forest roads to get to campsites or trailheads. The truck has the extended warranty which covers most things up to 100,000 mi., and as I mentioned, I had the 'Toyota Care' plan and was in a dealership every 5,000 mi even before these issues. Only reason I'm mentioning this is b/c the truck isn't very old, doesn't have high mileage, doesn't get abused, receives regular scheduled maintenance, and supposedly inspections, and all the major repairs are covered. There really shouldn't be any excuse for the truck to handle to handle so poorly, especially considering how often it's been on a rack in a dealership and everything that's been replaced on it so far.

*Just a word of advice for anyone considering buying one of these trucks: Make sure you have the extended warranty (and probably, sell before that runs out). I can't imagine how broke and frustrated I'd be right now had I been paying for all of these repairs out of pocket. Not saying that I'm not frustrated. I mean, it's pretty frustrating having a vehicle which was purchased from a dealership nearly new, "Certified Pre-Owned", is still being paid for, is still under warranty, yet feels unsafe/stressful to drive. But between the TSB and the warranty, I've only paid for a couple of extra alignments, the outer tie rod ends, and a wheel bearing that I'm sure was prematurely worn b/c of the other issues. I just wasn't able to drive the truck back to the dealership to have them repair it.

Likewise, I'm by no means saying this hasn't cost much. That warranty won't cover half the life of a full set of tires, or the warped brake rotors caused by chronic steering issues, nor does it cover all the gas I've spent driving back and forth to the dealership (1.5hrs each way); Or, the time while waiting to have the truck "diagnosed" (1-4 hrs each time, even with an appointment, I've seen the truck just sitting there for an hour before it moves. Also, they never have a part in stock so every time it takes two trips even when you tell them in advance, that a specific part is absolutely going to need to be replaced b/c it's leaked out most of its fluid from a place that should never leak fluids, or is making a noise it should never make); Or, the time spent waiting while the truck is being repaired (or rather not repaired. 2-6 hours every time for whatever you want to call that); Or, the actual money lost from at least a couple of jobs that would have required driving ~4 hours to get to, but that I had to pass on bc the truck had a known failed component and felt unsafe to drive those distances at highway speed until it could be repaired; Or, several client's time when I have to put them off for part of a day or longer while I am unable to work for them b/c I'm getting the truck worked on, again. Days and days that I could have been getting paid, or not doing anything.

Kind of annoying b/c the reason I bought a new, "more reliable" vehicle, with an extended warranty, was that I currently don't really have the time or a place to be constantly wrenching on a truck. When I do have a day off, I mostly just want to go for a ride, find a nice place to camp for the night, and chill. If I had it to do over again, I would probably keep that 15 year old Jeep with the awful resale value, which needed just as much work, maybe as frequently, but cost significantly less, and was already paid for. Anyways, That's all besides .

Tomorrow, I'll have more to add to this "experience" and will update this post as soon as I have a chance. Mostly, I took the time to write this bc I figured it may help someone else diagnose similar issues with their truck, possibly have an expensive repair covered by the warranty if it hasn't run out yet (even though this is a way bigger reason to issue a recall than a leaking high mounted stop lamp ), it might, help someone prevent a bunch more repairs, or it may be helpful as consideration for anyone contemplating buying one of these trucks bc they're so reliable and their old rig needs some work/breaks frequently .

 

What a nightmare.... hopefully someone will be able to pinpoint something that will help correct the issues.....

 

So what was actually wrong with your truck? In short form. Thank you.

 

Apparently, everything.

 

As far as alignments go, toyota is suppose to offer a free alignment if within 10k miles or 1 year of truck purchase. Well they refused to do one one buddies 2019 truck that was lifted shortly after purchased. The reason for not doing it was because the truck was lifted.....said it voided the warranty.

 

Can't hate them for that. The suspension is modified, and it's hard to argue that a lift wouldn't affect alignment.

 

@danasince1979 did the truck have any maintenance history & or issues from previous owner

 

Didn't read that word fortress. However, I like how your dog looks majestic in the second picture

 

Appreciate the write up. Sucks you have to keep going through all that. Personally with that many service appts I would have thrown up the white flag. Something is obviously wrong and maybe you should seek out a well seasoned veteran mechanic that can look into the issues. Good luck and follow up if you do finally get it resolved.

 

Maybe it's me and I've either misread or I don't understand because I'm mechanically stupid, but does it seem unusual to anyone else that two different dealerships are doing all this warranty work on a truck with a modified suspension? Every extended warranty I've seen, factory or aftermarket, would have exclusions to cover that.

 

Sorry to hear about all your issues. I truly think yours is a big exception to the overall quality of these trucks though. Every manufacturer has the occasional lemon, but they are far more uncommon with Toyota Tacomas than most vehicles. It sucks that you seem to have gotten one tho. That said, you bought your truck used... One thing I’ve learned is, “certified used” really doesn’t mean anything except that it’s a used vehicle that was sold back to Toyota, and now they are reselling it for more than the average price, with the remainder of the factory warranty. So we have no idea what the previous owner may have done with that truck, and that could be a factor with all your issues. It also has a lift and 33s, which surprises me that Toyota has done as much as they have for you, since most dealerships would likely tell you the lift voids the warranty when it comes to suspension and steering components. I hope you get it all sorted out, and it’s a bummer. But I do believe for every one like yours, there are 100s running around without any of these issues, and they will probably never have them as bad as yours, for whatever the cause(s) may be.

 

I thought the same thing. Usually dealership won't touch it with a 10' pole if it's been modified. I'm surprised they did the amount of work they did.

 

There were no issues with the truck from the previous owner who bought it new at the dealership and drove it 15,000 mi before trading it in for a tundra. The only maintenance or service that had been done up to that point were the basic fluid changes. The dealership sold it to me as a certified pre-owned vehicle. I drove it for over 2 years with absolutely no issues whatsoever before the differential bearing went out and wasn't dealt with correctly by the mechanic at the first dealership.

The steering issues didn't happen until his second failed repair. It took a couple weeks before I was able to get it into the other dealership and then over a week from then before they got the parts in and replaced them. But by then, other parts had already been damaged by all of the play in the front end.

 

Time for a SAS.

 

Yeah basically what Florida said.

The differential bearing went out was replaced with a another bearing which failed and was replaced yet again and failed both of them the same day they were installed. At that point the differential and both CV axles were replaced. Next was the power steering rack / inner tie rods. The outer tie rods were replaced as well. The power steering pump was replaced after those. The passenger side wheel hub bearing was replaced. And currently the driver side wheel hub bearing needs to be replaced. But, both of those wheel bearings were probably damaged with the CV axles in the first place. Neither of them have had any play laterally though. Which I agree is definitely unusual but like I said, the passenger side was nearly seized completely and still didn't rock with the truck off the ground. Nor did it make a sound until the last half a mile before it failed and at that point it was basically a screech. The driver's side bearing is actually making a sort of high-pitched wine at the moment but the dealership said it doesn't have any play so they don't think it's a problem. Overall, I guess the larger problem has basically been the mechanics who have worked on it either not repairing it correctly or waiting until a component has completely failed before they replace it was but by then something else has been damaged.

 

I would have been glad if all it needed was an alignment. I have paid for two of those myself throughout this process and neither of those or the multiple other alignments that were included with the service work done to replace other components have made any kind of difference. That's because the wheel bearings on both front wheels have been shot this whole time. The truck is in alignment but that doesn't help at all when the wheels aren't rolling true.

 

What a novel!

I did purchase the extended warranty...in the hopes I don't have to use it...I feel better that I did.

As for your experience...I've learned to inspect my Sport before leaving the dealership. I'll probably take a small flashlight on my next scheduled MX (10K Mile) in Feb 2022.

Sounds like the situation was compounded by the initial prognosis...that wasn't properly addressed/fixed.

I do hope the situation with your Truck is resolved.

Ed

****

 

sorry that happened to you op

 

Again I really don't think the truck, the manufacturer or the previous owner are to blame in this case. I mean the crappy design of the diff bearing on these trucks is definitely an issue. Possibly the fact that multiple wheel bearings can go and not have play in them and that seems to be the only thing a mechanic will consider as a failure is also a problem. I think Toyota should definitely educate their service center employees on other symptoms of a failed wheel bearing besides being able to rock it from side to side. Yeah it's lifted, ~ 2 1/4". It also has aftermarket control arms to compensate for the ball joint angles, the rare carrier bearing has been shimmed to the correct amount to compensate for the difference in the rear drive angle, The shocks and springs are manufactured by an international company that spends thousands of hours between design, engineering, development, and quality testing on each specific application for the many different vehicles sold all over the world. They have always been involved with Toyota and they put trucks through way harsher testing then my drive to work and back without any of the issues I'm having. If they had half of these issues they would never go to market with whatever product it is there testing. And really, I would love to hear from everyone else that has 34 or 35-in tires bigger custom lifts etc to see if they have had even a fraction of these problems. But Even without a lift that differential bearing was enough of an issue that Toyota stopped manufacturing the trucks with them in 2018. Again if the service department I took it to initially had repaired it correctly and in a timely manner I most likely wouldn't have had any of the other issues. Instead, both them and the second service department, overlooked a failing component and were just been repairing all of the downstream issues ever since. Ultimately, what it's all come down to is a couple of really crap service departments.

 

Well, the dealership sold it to me lifted and even stated that the lift components were covered under the extended warranty. The third dealership I mentioned in my first post was located a few hours south in UT and had several new Tacoma's inside their showroom for sale which had been lifted w/pucks and blocks. I saw the same thing at another dealership in MT this summer too. I don't think it's that uncommon in the northern Rockies at least.