You Get What You Pay For

Hey Folks:

Looks as if my truck needs a Transmission Position Sensor ( PO 9050). Toyota has them for $105 but if you look on line they are around $25. I'm sure the cheaper ones are from China where they see a need for them globally and offer a unit without the the outrageous mark up Toyota puts on their parts. Question is: Has anyone used one of these bargain sensors. The past has shown me that ,"You only get what you pay for" but are these aftermarket sensors a risky purchase?

Bob

Bob

 

Not a huge difference in price, and I personally would go with a Toyota part in this instance. Not worth the possible headache for $80 bucks.

 

I'm asuming you mean the Transmission Range Sensor/Park/Neutral Position Switch?
With the amount of frustration typically involved in changing one of those I think I'd stick with OEM.

 

"most" knock off switches have crap solder, crap quality control, and all around just crap...if it is easy to change, sure, try one...you may get a good one! if its difficult, I'd go with OEM...

 

^

 

Your truck isn't worth $105?

 

If you have to crawl under the truck: OEM.

 

If that nut is corroded on, it is worth way more than $105.

 

OP, do yourself a favor.
Go ahead and started soaking the nut on the sensor. Might as well buy a spare nut, just in case.

The big nut with the brown rod sticking through it.

 

Go with OEM or the same manufacturer brand for aftermarket parts.

 

For sensors I usually get it from whoever made the part without dealer markup. Whether that be Bosch or whoever.

for example. All of my O2 sensors replaced that way via RockAuto

$80 extra for it to be at a parts counter doesn’t mean it wasn’t kicked on the way there.

dealer has to earn and do good business
Adding $80 for breathing on something isn’t business

not when it’s old with high miles and parts add up/cost multiplies to it all together needing 12 parts not just a one time thing

 

Getting the nut off isn’t the problem (no pun intended lol), but it pinches the switch body onto the shaft and that’ll definitely be fused. The trick is to get the switch off without destroying the shaft or the oil seal behind the switch. I ended up totally destroying the old switch

 

I found the adjustment of the new switch more annoying than removing the old switch. Best done with another person in the truck, so you can verify it cranks in both park & neutral before torquing it down in position.

 

You've already answered your own question.

 

As a former automotive service advisor, I recommend using OE for electrical parts as others have mentioned. The after market stuff is a crap shoot.

Here's the good news. A lot of dealerships parts departments will sell at wholesale prices if you buy from them online. I was buying a lot of Subaru parts from a dealer in Washington state as they had great prices, but you had to figure in the cost of shipping. I recently found a dealership here in Denver, under new ownership, who's parts department sells at wholesale if you buy on line only.

Since my Tacoma is the first Toyota product I have ever owned, I was looking for the same wholesale pricing for it as well. Turns out that the dealership I purchased it from does sell wholesale ONLY if you purchase on line. If you walk into the parts department, you pay 15-20% OVER MSRP! Go figure. Hope this helps!

 

your title says it all