wurkenman

I traded my little hot rod Honda Accord a few months back for a 97 Tacoma pickup. I wanted something I could drive in the winter and get a little better fuel economy. Was searching on line for an engine code it had and found as forum that talked about rusted frames on 95 - 2000 Tacoma trucks. Sure enough my newest mileage maker has a rusted frame, a hole at least 18 inches long and 1 inch wide. Made an appt. at the Toyota dealer and it falls in the guidelines of Toyota's buy back program. They are warranting the frames on said trucks for 15 years. They will most likely be buying it back at the KBB price plus 50%, and if I buy another Toyota they will even kick in another grand to boot. Something to be said for a major manufacturer standing up and doing the right thing, even for the 4th owner of the vehicle and it has 284000 miles on it. Just had to share

Hvytrkmech

My buddy has an 08 Tundra because of that program. It was a real stand up thing for Toyota to do.


Tim

Rednecktastic

Bravo toyota.... sounds like you made out pretty well. I'd get a base model 4x4 tacoma 4cyl 5speed and apply that extra $1000.

If you really want I'd ask them for NADA value, it's higher usually.

boostjunkie1

Yea,

I am a member over at Custom Tacos and they have been posting about that for some time now. I think that it is great that Toyota is doing this. This also get those people out of a truck that there was no real reason to get rid of and into a new Truck. Makes sense to me in all ways! JB

Danderson

Kudos to Toyota for backing their 2000-up products. Unfortunately,I had everything imaginable go wrong with my '85 4wd truck including a knock in the steering,2 1/2 qts. oil consumption,per 3,000 mile oil change interval and a constant surging in the engine which manifested itself similiar to a defective cruise control. Even the 800 number got me nowhere. My buddy with an '85 oil burner finally got action by constructing a "sandwich" protest board which he wore and paraded in front of Toyota of Carlsbad. They honed his cylinders and installed new rings. Problem solved for awhile. Sucked.

Common

I wish Dodge and Cummins would pay for the KDP, bad paint and dash boards.

Along with VP44's

Timmay2

Toyota aint standing up.. they are double fisting customers.

If they actually repaired the problem itd be one thing, but they are acknowledging the problem and offering to sell you another.

Sick.

It would be horribly sad if dodge said oh your truck has bad paint? Bring it back and we will buy it and give you $1,000 to buy a new dodge.

Rednecktastic

Are you dilusional? They are giving him KBB (assuming retail since that's what they provide on a truck that old) plus 50%........ And if he wants to buy a toyota they'll throw in an extra $1,000.

I'd be first to say I'd very happily buy a new(ish) tacoma and take that extra $1,000.

badme

Or you can take the cash and get something else.

Timmay2

The cash only comes with buying a new toyota. If you don't want a new toyota, they have the option of repairing or buying it back at plain book value. No extra stipulations. Wherever this extra 50% comes from is anyones guess as toyota themselves make no mention:
http://blog.toyota.com/2008/03/living-up-to-ou.html

From the degree that these vehicles have rusted and rotted, this should have been a recall and not a "bring it in and we will buy it back and sell you a new one".

It's a little late to notice so many vehicles falling apart and being huge death hazards on the road. The frames rusted/rotted so bad you can literally have it fall apart on the road.

This should have been a recall LONG AGO. Not a "voluntarily bring back and buy a new toyota."

Toyota owners wouldn't understand, brainwashing has set in.

You dont think for in just a few years for your vehicles frame to look like this, that its not a safety recall issue? That they should fix all of them?


Toyota: $ales first, $afety $econd.

This is not even in the same league as a cracked dash.

chaikwa

Soooo, I take it you don't like Toyota?

I don't care for them either, just not my cuppa tea. But just to be fair, they aren't the only ones to have frame problems. Back when Dodge introduced their newly designed trucks in '94, there were a TON of one ton chassis that had complete frame failure right in back of the cab. We had at least 140 of them come thru our shop, probably more. Dodge never stood behind any of them that we were involved in. Eventually they issued an upfitters update that we were to add a strip of metal on the top and bottom rail of the frame. After awhile, they stopped producing chassis-cabs altogether. When we inquired about removing beds to make a chassis to mount another body on, we were told that the pickup bed is "an integral part of the frame structure and removal will cause any warranty in effect to be deemed null & void." So Toyota isn't the only one to flame about weak frames/poor response!

chaikwa.

96_12V

In addition to this, Toyota (and Lexus) have been backing customer's cars with the 3.0L V6 from '97 - '02 that suffered from engine failures due to oil gelling.

The point that the original poster was attempting to make was that at least Toyota is willing to stand behind thier mistakes. You may have to pull some strings, or work around thier parameters, but at least they do what they can for these serious issues. They are not a perfect company (and they admit that too...) but they are at least attempting to help folks out with a legitimate, operational issue.

Case in Point - what did GM ever do for the scores of customers with head gasket failures on 3.1L V6's? How about Ford with thier catastrophic cruise control switch? BMW even had a rash of V8's in the '90's that would fail prematurly and they best they could do was a 100k replacement.

All manufacturers have some issues. It's refreshing to see someone trying to make positive change when so many others leave owners holding the ball in thier own court.

Timmay2

Ok so I was a little off my rocker...

The point I was trying to say is it would be one thing if they recalled them because they knew about this safety hazard. 10+ years is a long time to know about a problem before attempting to make a resolution.

Jfaulkner

a good friend of mine just did the buy back. He had a 2001 Tacoma for 7 years (bought used) excellent condition but the dealer found traces of frame rust. He bought drove it for 7 years for right around $700.00 (difference in original purchase price and buy back amount) and got a brand new truck for $15k. Knock Toyota all you want but you'll NEVER see dodge do anything like this. If the frame on my 05 rusts through in 7 years Dodge will give me a coupon for 1/2 off my next tire rotation.

wurkenman

Or a coupon for a free oil change that does not include oil or filter