DPF and white smoke

[JohnLynn]

Never expected a 6 month/10000km car would have issues like this. Is this just one-off or the start of the inevitable failure?

Have you contacted Toyota about the issue? and can you as Cuda suggests monitor the DPF temperature?
I know that you should not need to do this and certainly wouldn't expect a new car to have a problem like this so I would think that the more Toyota are made aware of issues the more likely they are to do something about it.
I have been monitoring my DPF regens since the ECU update and must admit that I haven't noticed any difference whatsoever in distance between regens or length of time completing or temperature or anything at all. I would love to know what this "upgrade" was supposed to do. Does anyone know?

[sia535]

Not normal !!! Betting the 5th injector is blocked. Request they pull apart the injector housing and check its not blocked. If you have a OBDII monitor you should keep an eye on the DPF temp when its burning.

Never expected a 6 month/10000km car would have issues like this. Is this just one-off or the start of the inevitable failure?

[cuda]

Hi, my GXL (built June 17) blew a lot of smoke when I drove off at a traffic light while the car was doing a dpf burn. The car only travelled 9700km at that time.

I monitored it ever since and currently at 10650km, it didn't happen again. I talked to the dealer while the car was in for 6 month service, they kept telling me it's normal.

In April next year I'll have a long trip from Sydney to Uluru, I'm a little concerned with what might happen. Any advice? Thanks

Not normal !!! Betting the 5th injector is blocked. Request they pull apart the injector housing and check its not blocked. If you have a OBDII monitor you should keep an eye on the DPF temp when its burning.

[sia535]

Whilte smoke while DPF is burning

Casualty number one for Prado DPF. Prado was doing a DPF burn today and I take off from the lights only to see a large plume of white smoke in my rear mirror. Cars only done 22000km and notice DPF temp wont go past 600deg while driving. In for inspection Monday morning .Will keep everyone updated.

Hi, my GXL (built June 17) blew a lot of smoke when I drove off at a traffic light while the car was doing a dpf burn. The car only travelled 9700km at that time.

I monitored it ever since and currently at 10650km, it didn't happen again. I talked to the dealer while the car was in for 6 month service, they kept telling me it's normal.

In April next year I'll have a long trip from Sydney to Uluru, I'm a little concerned with what might happen. Any advice? Thanks

[Phs]

http://www.liqui-moly.com.au/product...nti-clog-2729/

Interesting to see if this is worth a shot once a month

[LeadWings]

Thanks John, I missed that other thread. Were lining up for a year around Oz, so I'm pretty keen to know what we might be in for if the dread white smoke starts following us around. Having the ability to initiate a burn will be invaluable.

I've ordered a wifi dongle because apparently Apple speaks bluetooth with a lisp so has trouble talking to the bluetooth dongles.

Were off over xmas but might be in touch after that - both because I'm keen to see your head unit (we've similar opinions on the satnav from the thread on that) and to see how you've implemented the DPF stuff.

[JohnLynn]

I have monitored the first burn since my reprogram, I was looking for differences but I am now more confused.
Despite the % appearing to increase more quickly the burn still happened after around 300 Km travelling on a freeway at 100 Km/hr. Unfortunately I had to turn off into city traffic which was a shame as I had been told that the burn characteristics had been changed for relatively high speed driving.
Temperature at 100 km/hr was around 630 which increased a bit when stationary in traffic. Once I had reached my destination the % was down to 10, the distance covered for this with stop start driving was only 25 Km, lower than I expected. I decided to leave the engine running at 1200 rpm, the temp increased to around 730 and the % continued to fall until 8% when the revs dropped to 650.
Usually I have been driving when the % figure gets to 8 or 6 then the temperature drops rapidly and the % increases. This time with the engine on normal slow tick over the temperature did not drop so I left it running and watched as the % continued to fall to 2. Only then did the temperature seem to slowly decrease. By this time I was bored and my wife annoyed so I switched off and got on with life!

[JohnLynn]

I don't use any Apple stuff (I find it far too restrictive) so unfortunately I can be no help re the iphone question. Will an iphone work with bluetooth or does it have to be wifi? as I bought an "OBD2 Mini ELM327 V2.1 Bluetooth Car Scanner" for the princely sum of £3.90 including delivery from ebay when I was in the UK. This works fine with torque pro running on my replacement Chinese head unit.
There are four exhaust temperature sensors shown, three of them work, I think the DPF is bank 1 sensor 2 but it is all in this thread including how to add the % clogging gauge which I am sure you have read: http://www.pradopoint.com.au/showthr...with-OBD-tools
It is a shame the PM or email system doesn't work as your location is shown as Perth, you are welcome to have a look at my set up if it would help.

[LeadWings]

I'm keen to be able to monitor the DPF and burn temps etc. I have seen the OBD transmitters, and also that you need to know the right codes to get the read out from certain sensors.

Can anyone advise if I can use a wifi OBD transmitter and iPhone app to get to the data/create a display I can monitor while driving? Any tips on which app might work best?

[Tailshaft]

CamJam - Me too, I flat out said to them I refuse to buy a current model car until these issues are fixed. He agreed with me and also mentioned he was steering clear of the current models too due to the same problems.

[Phs]

Only Time will tell how many more will need replacing, we are at 28k no issues so far - fingers crossed, since update it seems to do burns a lot, fuel usage is also up about .5 a litre

I was tossing up a retune but am only hessitent because of these troublesome DPFs don't want them blaming the tune.

[Hally]

All I can say is F$*!. New DPF replaced at I think 22,000km. Car is now coming up to 40,000km service and guess what the DPF is now playing up again.

Symptoms
1. DPF temp while running at 100km/h drops below 500 deg unless I change down to 4th and rev the engine.
2. Temp when idle on burn seems to be also below 500 deg.
3. Current burn ceased twice through cycle and percentage full started to increase.
4. Current km's travelled since start of burn up to 72km and this was with a high percentage of the burn on hwy speed.
5. No white smoke visible

My guess the 5th injector has ceased to inject or is blocked. Will have it in to Toyota in the next few days to sort out.

Question for all though is once vehicle is out of current warranty how is the DPF issue going to be handled? If its failing to frequently then there needs to be some leeway into how warranty claims are made on this issue outside normal warranty period.

Not happy

cuda

That sucks arse, I thought mine was shit even after there update!
Best thing Doug would be to let it fall out and get a ecu reflash.

[CamJam]

My Prado had just completed a burn on arriving for the service and was on 8% when I left it, and 10% when I picked it up. I have driven about 40 Km since and it is already up to 36%

I took mine in to have another look at it - after the whole white smoke/ ECU update I and ECU update II, then after a replacement DPF... that I now suspect is failing again.

I have to say - Toyota in Canberra have been awesome (Phillip and Fyshwick - both same mob). The Tech manager jumped in my car and drove with me for 20 minutes trying to see when it'd burn off and listen for a squealing sound. He was adamant he wanted to hear the squealing, so we drove for some more and it ended up about 30 minutes out of his day. That's the good part. The bad part is that at no time did we hear the squealing, nor did the car do a burn. It had be manually burnt just prior to us stepping off, and by the end of around 30km it was at 28%... now that seems high to me - 30 min/ 30 km's and it's more than a quarter full? He had is diagnostic thing into the OBD and hooked up to a computer and was monitoring the EGR, EGTs etc. Unfortunately without a burn, not a lot of point. But I just though I'd add to John's post by indicating that the 40kms'/ 36% that he has seen is about on the money - and I also reckon that's very, very high. Add's weight to the idea that a lot of people (myself included) have seen higher MPG figures since the recall.

Tailshaft - I hope that the manager was speaking the truth and Toyota get to the bottom of this...

[JohnLynn]

Sorry to hear your ongoing issue cuda, by co-incidence my manual GXL had it's 40,000 Km 2 year capped service today, even though it has only covered 20,000 Km.
It had the "Ecu reprogram for IMV/Prado" the invoice says they "carried out the DPF ECU reprogram as per campaign"

It took much persistence to speak to someone who knew anything about it but eventually I chatted with the service manager.
He said that the reprogram "changes the parameters of the burn" When pressed as to exactly what this meant, was it to make the burn hotter or more frequent he said no it changes the way the burn time is arrived at.
For instance if you were driving a very long distance at say 110 Km/hr the burn would not now take place because they had found that doing a burn under such circumstances did not reduce the soot to ash but could make an oily residue.
He also said that the ECU does detect the pressure difference and the burn is started between 80-120% (don't ask me what 120% is)
My Prado had just completed a burn on arriving for the service and was on 8% when I left it, and 10% when I picked it up. I have driven about 40 Km since and it is already up to 36%

What does everyone think about what I have just been told? It does contradict what has been written on here, that the burn is calculated by distance travelled and fuel used. Is it B/S? I would love to think that it was true, the no burn if the engine is working at constant high (ish) speed seems a good idea.
I will keep monitoring my vehicle as best I can with torque pro on my head unit and will post if I notice any changes in behaviour. I still cannot understand why the DPF needs such regular regens, the manual which increases revs to over 1200 when stationary is a pain in the arse. Last night I was trying to reverse a boat into the garage while not disturbing the neighbours small children who were asleep and find it irritating to have the engine roaring away if a burn is in progress.

[Tailshaft]

cuda - i know this doesn't help your cause, however when I was at Nunawading Toyota last week (I was there looking for a 2015 or older Prado and he asked why I wanted an older one..), I spoke to the service manager about the DPFs and the ongoing issues. Apparently Toyota have recognised the issue and are doing research into why these keep failing. He said there's no expectation as to what will come of it though. Sorry for the bad (unresolved) news.