2013 FR-S Spun Bearing

[kyjondeere]

I am posting here to share my experience related to my 2013 FR-S and a spun main bearing. Through PMs I have talked with a couple of good folks here who provided great advice so I just wanted to share my outcome.

The car is a 2013 Automatic with 69,900 miles. I am the second owner, I bought it as a certified pre-owned from a Toyota dealership with ~30,000 miles. It came with an extended 7 year/100,000 power train warranty.

My currently 20 yr old son has been the primary driver of the car since we/he bought it. It has primarily been used as a daily driver locally in Western KY and then shipped (March of this year) and driven in So. California when he joined the marine Corps. The car has always been bone stock, at least since we have owned it.

4 weeks ago on a Saturday evening my son called and reported a "knocking" resonating from the engine bay. He said he had been driving on the interstate at normal speeds and only heard the knock when he stopped the car. I'm sure this is what I would have told my dad too Upon hearing the noise through cell phone, I had him shut it down and discontinue driving it until further evaluation.

On the following Monday, it was taken to a local So. CA Toyota dealership. The initial questions came up as to maintenance records, modifications etc. I had performed all maintenance/oil changes prior to him taking the car to CA so there were no records and even though maintenance was always performed at appropriate intervals, I did a poor job of retaining receipts. I had some receipts, however, there were some gaps. In the end, no receipts were requested.

All that aside, Toyota tore down the engine to discover that the No. 2 main bearing was spun caused by "oil starvation". No other diagnosis as to the reason for the oil starvation was identified or given. I did inquire as to whether any contamination (sealant) was found and got a negative response. They reported that the oil level was appropriate and the oil was in good condition. It had been changed in So.Cal approximately 3 weeks prior.

The local dealership then filed a warranty claim. A regional Toyota representative inspected the car and approved the repairs, no questions asked. I contribute this mainly to the Dealership. I feel the dealership and specifically the service advisor where instrumental in helping me get this covered under warranty. I could not be happier with the service we got there.

A rental was provided as included in the extended warranty for the length of the repairs.

I don't have a full list of everything done yet but I know it included a new short block and was just over 10K for the total.

The repairs were completed and the car was picked up yesterday. Everything seems fine so far, however, it has been only driven about 50 miles so far. Hopefully everything is good to go, but I assume the warranty will continue to cover any issues up to 10/22/2019 or 100,000 miles.

I think, in the end, we will probably be putting the car for sale. I don't know the likelihood of future issues, but its just not something I want to risk dealing with again. It was a little stressful, at least when wondering how the warranty claim was going to come out. I am happy that in this case Toyota did the right thing. Maybe this being an early model 2013 was part of the decision making process, who knows?

[StraightOuttaCanadaEh]

Great outcome, and that's good to hear!

As for the stressing part, I'm not sure how many recurrences happen with a short block replacement but I'm sure they're few and far between. If it does happen, it'll be a long time before it does. It most likely happened because it's a 2013, which are known for this issue. If you replace it with another car, who knows what issues it'll give you. Better off with the devil you know, and all that.