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SUVs Toyota Highlander Toyota Highlander Maintenance and Repair
4687 messages, Last post on Nov 09, 2009 at 7:10 PM
You are in the Toyota Highlander Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & tidester
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Replying to: dv8er (Jul 14, 2004 8:13 pm) My first experience with a Toyota was when I sold my '73 Chevrolet Vega and bought an '83 Toyota pickup. The Vega was notorious for always breaking down, whereas the Toyota pickup never broke down, save for replacing the water pump a couple of times and an oil seal in the 21 years I've owned it (see my profile). Great things about Toyotas: 1. I've almost forgotten what the inside of a repair shop looks like. 2. I'm almost hoping my car breaks down just to inject some excitement into an otherwise mundane reliability experience. 3. Can't use the excuse of my car breaking down for being late to work any more. 4. If you plan to drive your Toyota into the ground before buying another, take heed; your car may outlast you. 5. Reason Japanese cars in the 'early days' were notorious for water pumps going out at 100K miles: in the early days most American cars never made it to 100K miles. (Of course, that's changed in the last 20 years, thank goodness!!) 6. Without the hassle of dealing with broken-down cars I have too much spare time on my hands. The Highlander may not be quite as reliable as the '83 pickup judging from some of the posts here, but my experience with it has been excellent. Only problems I've encountered are a glovebox rattle and side wind noise, both of which were fixed by the dealer under warranty via TSB. Other known quirks are somewhat cumbersome shiftpoints with the transmission on V6 models, buffeting effect with rear windows only rolled down (exhibited by many other vehicles and easily alleviated by cracking front windows), wheel baring noise, warped brake rotors, and vibration from engine transmitted into passenger compartment. Except for the last two the problems are very minor and usually easily addressed by dealer under warranty; some of these known problems may have been corrected on more recent Highlanders (havn't heard anything about side wind noise and wheel baring noise in a long time). As for the last two these are more serious but the prevalence of these problems (percentage of Highlanders afflicted with them) is not readily ascertained from the posts here. There may be one or two quirks I may have forgotten, and I'd encourage you to scan all of the posts in this discussion for further info. In general the Highlander is an excellent vehicle; very few are disappointed with their purchase, and I wouldn't let reliability or fear of repairs dissuade your decision in any way in this instance. I wouldn't hesitate buying another Highlander if I was in the market for another one! The hybrid is expected to cost perhaps $3000 more -- supposed to be available early next year but with a long waiting list expected, but may be worth it if this is what you want; there's a separate discussion on the Highlander Hybrid that you should check out for more info. Good luck!
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Is yours an '04? Does the rear wiper lock in an "out" position so you can clean the glass underneath the wiper with a squeege? Mine was made in Japan. Other '04s at my dealer have the same rear wiper set-up, and another poster tried some '04s on a lot in his area and found the same thing. If yours is different, I wonder if maybe a bunch of them came through with a defective black plastic cover.
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Replying to: herzogtum71 (Jul 17, 2004 10:37 am) japan - yes the plastic cover on mine will snap off. when it is off the wiper arm will tilt out all the way and lock at 45 degrees. the cover has two tabs that hold it in place. It also has a locator "pin" that goes down beside the wiper arm, that causes the interference and keeps the arm from coming out more. Sounds like a design screw up to me. I am tempted to cut the tab off. |
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maybe to keep dirt and grime out and reduce the wear rate??
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Replying to: wwest (Jul 17, 2004 10:35 pm) |
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Thanks, wain. I'm tempted to snap off the pin, too. Would the design with pin possibly add strength to the wiper arm and help keep it from sagging under the weight of ice and snow? I wouldn't think so, but it's the only thing I can think of to explain the design if it isn't a design screw up. |
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| My '03 Toyoya Highlander Limited V6 Automatic makes a humming sound in the engine compartment when the key is placed in the ignition but not turned on. Car has been at the dealer three times for a toal of 15 days. The dealer, on the advice of Toyota techs, replaced the ECM computer, then a solenoid in the transmission. After all this we were told "this is normal" !! I have listened to several other like vehicles and here no sound. Has anyone out there experienced this? | |
My car makes the same humming sound. Never had it checked out though.
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My new 04, V6, 4WD, highlander is getting about 12 mpg and has a severe hesitation when accelerating from very slow speed. A dealer said this was normal. I disagree. What do you suggest? Matt
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Replying to: mpg (Jul 21, 2004 11:28 am) Mine in mixed driving gets 19.5 - 20.5 26 at steady 65 with air on |
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