Toyota "Care" Nightmares Continued

Hi All,

So, this past summer, I had an experience with Toyota Care at the dealer I bought my Taco from. You can read all about the fun here: https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/toyota-care-nightmare.676534/

Suffice it to say, I thought I had a leak, dealer picked up the truck, re-did the oil change and brought the truck back. Everything seemed fine/OK.

Fast forward to two weeks ago. I take the truck to a different dealer for more "care". I ask for an oil change, knowing that I'll have to pay for it since all the plan covers now is a tire rotation. The truck almost exclusively rides on forest service roads since I work from home and don't have a commute.

I get the truck back and my paperwork says no oil change was done. Service guy says I don't need one. I shrug it off as a miscommunication and go on with my day. I was already there for 2.5 hours and needed to get back to my home office, since work was pinging me about stuff.

I ended up doing some research on independent mechanics in the area. I am not at all mechanically inclined and know my limitations. I honestly wish I could go back in time and take auto shop in high school, but here I am. My idea here was that if I'm going to have to bring the truck to someone again and pay for it, why pay the dealer rate. I had a Toyota/Lexus shop recommended to me by a few people and their reviews looked great. Sure, they had a few one star reviews, but they seemed like they were from the kind of folks you can never make happy.

Fast forward to today, my oil change appointment. Guy comes to find me five minutes after they got the truck back. THE OIL CAP IS MISSING. They searched for it in the engine bay and it is indeed AWOL.

I'm honestly lost as to how the oil cap could be missing. Some scenarios:
1. It's been gone since July. I don't think I opened the hood since the dealer re-did the work (my fault, should of at least checked). That means about 4.5K miles with no oil cap.
2. It popped off at some point. Like I said, truck has a good amount of forest service roads on it. That said, there's a few turns of the cap to get it tight. Maybe at the July oil change they didn't tighten it?
3. It's been gone since two weeks ago. I'm wondering why the second dealer would of removed the oil cap. Maybe they started an oil change and then realized I didn't need it? Also, they might have never opened the hood and only did the tire rotation. I feel like if they did the inspection they claimed to do, they'd notice a missing cap. I have put about 120 miles on the truck since this appointment.
4. The independent guy today forgot he took it off or lost it and is covering his ass. I don't think this is the case since these guys seem to have their stuff together. Also, like I said, they came to find me a few minutes after I saw them take the truck back.

I should add that there was no spray of oil on the hood or anywhere. It doesn't appear like oil was coming out of the filler neck.

Given the above, I have a bunch of questions:
1. What's the most likely scenario? Like I said, no oil splashed anywhere and the only real thing I noticed was a slightly rough idle this winter (I chalked this up to winter mix gas) which I didn't notice today (could of been because of the oil change and cap being replaced, but I need to drive the truck more to convince myself the rough idle is gone).
2. What did I potentially break? The independent shop didn't seem at all concerned since it didn't seem like I lost any oil. I'm worried that if the cap went AWOL in July, I put a good amount of miles on dirt roads on the truck.

Appreciate the help. If you read that massive wall of text, I feel like I owe you a beer. Suffice it to say, I'm done with Toyota complimentary maintenance.

 

I feel like if you're not having major issues already then you're probably OK, but I'd change the oil immediately to be safe.

I think you've probably got a lot dirtier oil right now, driving without the oil cap is not without danger but unless you're submerging it or in high dirt in the engine bay all the time environments then you might be OK at this stage.

Significant induction of particles into the engine would definitely reduce reliability / increase wear at some point but it's impossible to tell what level it's at without looking at the oil.

 

IMO, the cap can't have been gone too long or you'd have oil in the engine compartment; at least a fine mist around the filler neck. I'd say someone failed to tighten it and it worked loose. I would not be worried about damage; buy a new cap (yes, annoying), change the oil, and fugget aboutdit

 

When the oil change was done, it was probably placed on a flat surface maybe the engine cover or battery and was not put back on. When you drove off, it prob when slipping and sliding until it got stuck somewhere or it’s on the street now never to be found again.

 

If it fell off months ago, i'm surprise you didn't hear it rattling around if it fell into the engine pan below. I even wonder if the cap could caught in the engine bay somewhere especially if it recently fell off. If it can't be found, kind of tells you whoever serviced your truck likely placed it somewhere in the shop while changing the oil.

 

What's this extra cap go to?
Sounds like hourly oil change goobers that help the actual techs, may have found an extree later that day.
One of my buddies was a lead tech before he retired, at their shop to they're called helpers,,,,, my buddy used to call his the hinderer .

 

I'm starting to think scenario 3 (from my list in my OP) is what happened.

I don't think it happened back in July. Reason being is that when the work was re-done, it was the shop foreman and service manager from the original dealer that came out. While mistakes happen, they were going above and beyond to make sure things were done right this time. Also, I'd expect that in 4.5K worth of driving, some oil mist would of made it out. There's a good bit of dirt/dust in the engine bay, but no signs of oil spray, even a mist.

What I'm guessing happened is that two weeks ago, I took it to a busy dealer's shop. Someone opened my hood, undid the oil filler, preparing for an oil change that never happened. I since drove the truck 120ish miles with no oil cap.

Luckily, by chance, I decided to do 5K/6 months intervals and had the truck serviced again now instead of this summer.

Lesson learned: trust, but verify. And avoid complimentary service at all costs.

 

I drove 100ft once without the cap on my 22r back in the day and spent the rest of the week cleaning the huge mess.. Even with the filling tube on the 3.5 I think you would've made a mess driving it for 6 months without a cap.

 

Honestly, I would be surprised if it had been gone for more than a day or two; I've test-run engines without the filler cap on for one reason or another (usually either (a) laziness; or (b) forgetfulness) and it doesn't take much time at all before oil vapour starts to land everywhere. Never done this with a Tacoma, but based on other experience, I don't think this was gone for long at all.

 

It's never too late to learn to do your own maintenance. There are tons of youtube videos on how to change the oil. Giving up the truck to someone else is like give your 5 year old to Chuck E Cheese to babysit and we all know what the mouse do with his cheese when you're not looking.