Engine failure
 

Hello everyone,

I own a BONE STOCK 2013 FR-S and my power train warranty expired June 10th 2018, on June 11th 2018 on my way back from school I began hearing a strange noise coming from the engine bay. When I got home I immediately tried to find out what was wrong, looked over it nothing seemed out of place, no CEL, checked the oil, oil was fine.

Moving on June 12th, I take the car to Toyota and they charged me $1410.60 for a "diagnosis", they called me a day later to ask some questions "Did you fill the car up with oil before bringing it in" my response "No I did not", "Did you miss a gear" my response "No its an AT", "Did you over rev" my response "No its an AT". Two days later they claimed the issue to be a spun bearing due to lack of lubrication/oil starvation.

This is what they did/said
Removed valve covers all rockers in place, no top end damage VISIBLE, removed timing cover all components in tact, removed oil pan oil was recently changed still signs of metal in pan has lower end damage lack of lubrication must completely remove engine and remove heads from block for additional diagnosis.

Now I keep telling Toyota that there's no way that this happened because of oil starvation (unless something is wrong from factory), My last oil change was May 3rd 2018 at 38,127 miles and it is currently only at 38,840 miles. And like I said prior to taking it into Toyota I checked the oil and it was fine, even the techs at Toyota said the oil was "fresh".


Since I was out of warranty by 2 days and they claimed it not to be a manufacturer defect they then proceeded to offer me a short block for $8,100 or a used engine for $8,400 which imo is absurd.

I have all my receipts for my oil changes (0w-20)

The car runs perfectly fine at the moment, no powerloss, no smoke, nothing apart from the knocking.

What do you guys think, what should I do ?

Thanks,

You are out of warranty so they are responding accordingly. You should contact you local Toyota rep and ask for special consideration due to the circumstances. It may work or it may not but I would not accept the first no. Be sure to documented all communication.

if everything you are saying is true you should call Toyota of north america, if it was only out 2 days a lot of times manufactures will be gracious and cover you.

There are other threads here like yours, some of them recent and with good outcomes. Just google "engine failure ft86club", don't bother with the search function on here, it doesn't work well. Might be some good advice there

Well, Geex, welcome to the forum …:clap:

That's just damn bad about your car acting up … :(

I see you just joined the forum … if you would have signed up sooner, you could have been worrying about a spun bearing for quite a while by now!

(sorry, bad joke … :sigh:)

What to do has been said up above.

I wish you well.


humfrz

Man that sucks!!!


I'm with the others in asking Toyota to fix it for you. Worst they could say is no.


Good luck!

Well you need the engine out to get the full diagnosis and you already need the car towed as its undriveable. Toyota won't make a decision on "goodwill" repair until it is fully apart and diagnosed. IMO let them finish the tear down and hear back from Toyota. If they deny it pay the teardown bill and have it towed to your preferred shop.

Welcome to the 2013 spun bearing club. Mine spun the #3 bearing with fresh oil up to the full mark. Typically cars only spin bearings due to starvation which is typically caused by low oil levels. This car seems to eat them for fun. I think what is happening at your dealer is the car isn't sold in masses and the 2013s are just now getting old enough to have spun bearings and the dealers are treating them like their other Toyotas which only spin bearings due to neglect. They are just assuming it is your fault.

The MSRP for a short block is 2250 (I paid 1850 for mine) and the gasket kit is like 240. Packing seal is $24/5.5oz tube. At 8K they are charging a shit ton of money for labor. The problem is that this engine uses RTV all over the place so it takes forever to clean up all the old RTV before putting it all back together. No question there is more labor in rebuilding this engine than most but 8K still sounds a bit ridiculous.

I would push Toyota on this. Good luck!

Thanks for all the replies !

I called Toyota and they are insisting that the issue was due to oil starvation and that they wont cover it.

Can they confirm or deny if it's the rtv they use that clogged up a passage? If you can prove something like that you might have a shot, but you're still out of the warranty period. Don't expect much of anything, and they dont HAVE to do anything

Well at 30,428 miles they resealed the front timing cover at a Toyota dealership, can I use that against them?

Only if there is silicone in the oil galley. For that you will have to accept financial responsibility for the investigation, plus trust the mechanic/dealship to be honest of the findings.

Wait, what? It sounds like something big was missing in your original story. Why was the timing cover resealed?

Previous owner owned it during this time, the report says "engine minor, engine front oil leak" they said that couldn't be the issue that caused it because it was about 8,000 miles ago (And has never leaked again).