Truck's back in the shop

We're in the same boat man. Coprorate regional field tech came out, test drove my truck for less than a mile, then documented that the vibration as a normal characteristic.

Not that it changes anything about our lemon trucks.....but make sure you get your free platinum warranty.

 

When I was 21 my first tech'ish job was an ATM tech working on German Wincor Nixdorf ATM's. These things were work horses (when they worked) other than that they broke down often. Too many moving parts and waaayyyyy over engineered, we had other ATM's that were simpler and never broke down. The reason why these thing broke down was it had this claw (that pulled the bills from the cash cassettes) with several servo motors, belts, optical sensors, fine gears and it cycled every transaction even when it didn't pull cash from a cassette. Eventually this claw would jam up, gear wears out or the motor burns out from heat or a mainboard would croak which was pretty common too.

 

Great point.

 

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...^^^... My son ... welcome back into the fold and the "Toyota Gods" will shine up you again ...

I too ... have ventured into the "Devil's Arm's of other brands" ... ... but I always come back to Toyota (some Hondas too ).
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It was the the District Parts and Service Manager who looked at it from corporate. I don't think I can escalate it beyond that.

 

I've tried thy route and it's always a bull shit excuse. "Oh, this truck is a 2wd, or manual or different color." Any and every fucking excuse and I'm done dealing with this horse shit.

 

Reach the VP of customer service for Toyota US.

 

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A good rule of thumb is have Toyota put their words in writing (even an email) ... trust me this works ... this makes their thought process different.

If they won't write you, you write them and "quote their response to you" ... and ask them if they take issue with what they said to you.

Put any manufacturer or dealer in a box ... and see what happens when things are in writing.
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It's not just Toyota. Dealerships are owned by individuals franchising through Toyota, in the same way Subways and McDonalds are. There are crappy owners who flog their employees to make money, and good owners who know providing good service means repeat business. I called 4 dealers in my area and did something different at them all. One was an oil change, one was to fix my BSM sensor on my left bumper that died, one was to do the tranny TSB, and the other was to ASK about the TSB and get a price on mudguards.

The BSM dealership did pretty well. The Mudguards dealership didn't even have mudguards in stock and told me the truck was normal, over the phone, after admitting he'd never heard of the Transmission issues with the Tacomas (so a bold faced lie). The Oil change was ok, but took forever.

Then the dealership (Philpott) who did my TSB. I called on a Thursday, they didn't give me any grief, had me in 7:00 AM on Friday and it was done and in my hands 7:50 AM. The lady said she had heard of it before and was fine performing it without any diagnostic if I was having the symptoms. Drove a Tacoma herself and asked me if she thought she should do it, so we talked about that. Very polite. Before leaving I walked around vehicle, checked hood sticker, shifted a few times, thanked them and drove off happy. That's the winner.

If you are limited in your selection of dealers it's tougher, but I shop them just like I shop anything else.

 

Also, condolences OP, I truly understand your frustration. I left Toyota only because a friend owned a Chevy dealership, and when my tranny died at 69,000 miles, along with many other problems, that was just the tipping point and I came back to what I felt was comfortable. Unfortunately I've yet to find that one "buy this and it will be problem free" truck. I keep hoping people will make things simpler, but tech-y and complicated seems to be the trend.

I really think having a computer background is becoming more useful in troubleshooting a vehicle than a mechanical background these days. I'd really like to find a sweet 80's Toyota and really learn how to fix it up, knowing I could drive it around town and it just wouldn't quit.

 

Sub'd to see what other BS the service department can come up with.