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Good evening,
I own a 2013 Prado D4D Altitude which has roughly 112,000km on it which I bought new in July 2013. It's been serviced regularly at Castle Hill Toyota. Only accessories fitted are a Safari Snorkel (fitted about 1 year after vehicle purchase) and a tow bar. Vehicle has never been used off road, to be honest it normally doesn't do much more than the run to the local railway station with the odd weekend road trip. Until late last year, it had never missed a beat. I always fill up with BP ultimate diesel - mostly from the same BP station.
Last November, when I was driving home, the engine stalled whilst driving home and the engine warning light came on. I was only a couple of hundred metres from home and was able to get parked outside my house. I had it towed to Castle Hill Toyota and after a couple of days of checking, they couldn't identify a fault (the car had stopped displaying the engine warning light) and they returned it to me after cleaning the injectors. Amazingly that was done at no charge!
Fast forward to January and as I am driving along the street the engine stalls and the warning light comes on again. I pull over to the side of the road and tried to restart. This time, the engine went into 'limp' mode and although it would start, I couldn't go more than 1000 rpm and a matching speed, so I wasn't prepared to try and drive home. Back on a tow truck home (it was a Saturday) and then on the Monday morning I had it towed again to Castle Hill Toyota. This time, they told me it was a fried ECU which was $2.5K!!!! So, I stumped up the money, much to my disgust. I asked for a root cause and they basically said, "don't know, it's really rare, only ever known one other ECU to go in 10+ years here". So, I asked "what happens if it goes again, am I up for another $2.5K?" The response was, "that'll never happen, it's a one in a million chance of an ECU failure, two on the same vehicle, impossible".
Anyway, I'm driving from one work site to another today and as I arrive in the car park, the engine stalls as I am about to reverse into a parking spot. I look down and sure enough, engine warning light is on and vehicle is in 'limp' mode again. I had work to do so all I could do was arrange for a tow truck to take the vehicle to Castle Hill Toyota and the earliest I could get one is tomorrow morning. Toyota have said that if it proves to be the ECU again, then they will cover the tow truck cost and obviously replace the ECU under warranty. At this stage I don't know if it is the ECU, but the symptoms are identical and I was pretty certain that they hadn't got to the bottom of the problem the last time.
So, I'm hoping that the collective wisdom here might offer some advice:
I own a 2013 Prado D4D Altitude which has roughly 112,000km on it which I bought new in July 2013. It's been serviced regularly at Castle Hill Toyota. Only accessories fitted are a Safari Snorkel (fitted about 1 year after vehicle purchase) and a tow bar. Vehicle has never been used off road, to be honest it normally doesn't do much more than the run to the local railway station with the odd weekend road trip. Until late last year, it had never missed a beat. I always fill up with BP ultimate diesel - mostly from the same BP station.
Last November, when I was driving home, the engine stalled whilst driving home and the engine warning light came on. I was only a couple of hundred metres from home and was able to get parked outside my house. I had it towed to Castle Hill Toyota and after a couple of days of checking, they couldn't identify a fault (the car had stopped displaying the engine warning light) and they returned it to me after cleaning the injectors. Amazingly that was done at no charge!
Fast forward to January and as I am driving along the street the engine stalls and the warning light comes on again. I pull over to the side of the road and tried to restart. This time, the engine went into 'limp' mode and although it would start, I couldn't go more than 1000 rpm and a matching speed, so I wasn't prepared to try and drive home. Back on a tow truck home (it was a Saturday) and then on the Monday morning I had it towed again to Castle Hill Toyota. This time, they told me it was a fried ECU which was $2.5K!!!! So, I stumped up the money, much to my disgust. I asked for a root cause and they basically said, "don't know, it's really rare, only ever known one other ECU to go in 10+ years here". So, I asked "what happens if it goes again, am I up for another $2.5K?" The response was, "that'll never happen, it's a one in a million chance of an ECU failure, two on the same vehicle, impossible".
Anyway, I'm driving from one work site to another today and as I arrive in the car park, the engine stalls as I am about to reverse into a parking spot. I look down and sure enough, engine warning light is on and vehicle is in 'limp' mode again. I had work to do so all I could do was arrange for a tow truck to take the vehicle to Castle Hill Toyota and the earliest I could get one is tomorrow morning. Toyota have said that if it proves to be the ECU again, then they will cover the tow truck cost and obviously replace the ECU under warranty. At this stage I don't know if it is the ECU, but the symptoms are identical and I was pretty certain that they hadn't got to the bottom of the problem the last time.
So, I'm hoping that the collective wisdom here might offer some advice:
- Has anyone else encountered similar problems?
- Any ideas what might cause a perfectly good vehicle which has behaved itself perfectly for more than eight years to fry two ECUs in two months?
- Could this be related to DPF problems?
- Any other ideas of what to look for int this scenario?
- What sort of questions should I be asking of Castle Hill Toyota.
- Who do I contact to escalate this if I'm unsatisfied with the response of Castle Hill Toyota?
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