2018 TRD OBD Issues

Aloha Tacoma Fam,

I got a little issue and I'm quite irritated about it... Recently I took my truck to the dealership to get my brake system recall fixed.. I had just plugged in a GPS tracker in my car and i get a call from the dealership telling me that my OBD port had some issues because the tmobil prongs were messed up. They also said they found a crack and it may have been forced in there and they couldnt get a reading to fix the recall issue. I said ok maybe I may have kicked it in or something getting into my truck with my military boots. First I told him I wanted to see the part and see... one of the pins was bent on my gps tracker so I said ok how much would it cost to fix? Dealer told me 250 and because I want my truck back I agreed. Now he calls me today and tells me they changed whatever it was that was cracked but the scanner is still not reading and its possible that the port spaces may have to much of a gap and they may have to change the wiring and he goes "and it cost a lot of money".. so now I'm like ok.. you call me at the end of your day to tell me this so I'm already frustrated.. He said maybe there's an object obstructing the port and it could of broke off from the gps tracker. I told him no way.. we verified all the pins were still in the gps tracker and I told him how can he assume it was my tracker when they are the ones plugging things in it constantly and it still not work? He said he understand and will talk to his manager about it tomorrow. My question is how did they change the port, it is still not working so it could be the wiring? I'm sort of confused on how to go about this.. I asked him if there was a warranty and he said based on the condition they found it, the warranty will not cover. But the wiring? sounds like the tech messed it up or they messed it up.. you guys have any suggestions?

 

I'm sure this will cause a shit storm, but there should never be anything other than a scan tool plugged into the OBD2 port.

 

What?

 

What did they state is the condition they found it in?

 

basically their scanner cant read the OBD port and they think its a wiring issue... Basically im going to have to pay for it even though they cant prove what the problem is. They just assume its from my gps tracker or the bottom of the ODB Port has gas to where the pins cant engage.

 

Try another dealer. Their machine might be the one that's defective.

 

Tough pill to swallow with no guarantee it'll get fixed.
Is corporate involved?

 

It’s very likely the pins got bent and aren’t making contact. If the plug was cracked and they replaced, they had to de-pin the OBD-II plug to replace the connector. It’s possible if you kicked the GPS it damaged the pins. Or if they didn’t remove them properly than they may have screwed up the pins changing the connector. I would take the truck back and bend the contacts on the pins with a pick or pin tool. Or find a pig tail replacement and solder a entire new connector on.

 

Sounds like that dealer found a gold mine. $250? Caching! Now they are coming back for more.

Wait to hear back from the service manager. If they don’t change their tune, I’d try another dealer before giving this one another cent without any guarantees.