I gotta say that I’m plenty upset with car manufacturers these days. Quality is in the toilet and just when I think I’ve helped myself, I realize I’ve only hurt myself worse (literally)
For those of you that don’t know, I went after Acura (Honda) back in 2005 after going through no less than 4 transmissions (while under warranty) in my 2001 Acura 3.2CL Type-S. While the initial pro-bono lemon law attorney did crap for me, the one that I actually paid got me a settlement that I’m not allowed to discuss 
Fast forward to the present – and I’m stuck in a similar mode with Toyota (note that we traded two Honda vehicles in for two Toyota vehicles since the last fiasco). Unfortunately, it seems to have gotten us nowhere. With the latest Toyota quality fiascos, and now, personal experience with quality issues, things are just getting worse.
So today, I’ll let you view first hand what’s going on with my 2004 Toyota Sienna XLE Limited. Note that this video is poor on quality due to the fact that I snapped it with my mobile phone but at least it’s real video of the problem occurring. My local Toyota dealership wasn’t interested in viewing this but the good news is that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration was!
Here’s a quick description of what you’re seeing: My Sienna has an automatic lift gate. You push a button on the overhead console or on the key fob and it opens the rear lift gate. Very cool, very convenient – and easily one of the things that drives the options price up on the price of the vehicle. The bad news, sometimes it starts closing immediately after you open it… you know, right when you’re trying to put something in the trunk or take something out? Or worse, when your child is retrieving something. It does this without warning, no alerts, nothing… and let me tell you, when it comes down, it happens so fast, you don’t know what’s happening. It literally starts crushing you, and with significant force I must say. I’m a big guy (6′0″ tall, 230lbs) and when it catches me off guard, it’s even hard for me to get a stance and push back on it. It’s bashed my wife on the head probably about 30-40 times in total. The good news is that the latest set of struts they put on the rear lift gate in an attempt to fix the problem (that they, of course, could never replicate), seem to be doing the trick (fingers crossed). I’ll stop rambling and let you get to the video –
Some qualifications for this video:
- There’s 1.5″ of clearance between the lift gate and the top of the garage (where the garage door is rolled up open) – it does not hit the garage at any point (never has.)
- This is before the last set of struts they put on the lift gate
- The van is on level ground in the garage and has just been driven approximately 80 miles in the evening in ~40F temps when this video was taken
- To open the lift gate, the button the key fob was pressed once.
- Only beeps on the way up; none on the way down
- The video was taken on 12/29/2007 – the vehicle is a 2004 Toyota Sienna XLE Limited – no accidents, all regularly scheduled maintenance
- The struts had already been replaced twice I believe when this video was taken
To Toyota’s lawyers, I’ve taken great pains to ensure that I’m only stating witnessed facts in this post. Should you ever decide to recall these lift gates and make things right, I’ll be happy to give you appropriate positive credit in this article. Until then, I’m genuinely worried about the similar Toyota vehicles on the road with this problem and your lack of proactive attention to do anything about it.
Stay tuned for more Toyota defects – I’ve got a ton. Up next, the crazy things my Prius on-board computer is doing as of late.
