Originally Posted by primo (Post 397335)

I received a phone call from Santa Monica Subaru on Friday, 8/17/12, informing me that my BRZ had arrived! Super excited, I signed all the dotted lines and drove away from the dealership. I live about 30 miles away and at some point while driving after showing my family the car, the check engine light and traction light came on. Started her up Saturday morning and everything seemed to be okay, but I took it to the dealer anyway just to be sure.

A diagnostic was performed and the mechanic told me that there was a problem with the ignition timing. I'm not sure if anything was done at that point to my car, but they sent me on my way and told me to come back if the lights came on again.

I drove around for about 100 miles on Saturday and at times my car just did not feel right. Shaky engine which shook the whole car, rpm fluctuations while idling, slow acceleration from first gear. But no return of the check engine light.

Well, Sunday I went for a drive around Torrance Beach and the check engine light came on. I parked my car, snapped a few pictures for memorial purposes, because I was upset and started to believe the past 2 years I spent following the production of this car, + the 5 months waiting after pre-ordering the car were all in vain.

I was able to get my car back to the dealer on Tuesday and pretty much told them I didn't want to see her until she's fixed. I felt bad for abandoning her but I had no choice. I'm no car scientist.

Yesterday I got a call from Dan, a Subaru tech at the dealer, who told me that Subaru had released a fix for this problem that my car and another BRZ that had recently rolled back in on a tow truck... belonging to another forum member, Hammer. The fix includes the addition of a cam sprocket. I looked it up on the internet but I won't claim to understand what it is exactly, only that it is supposed to fix and/or aid the engine timing. Does anyone know if this is a major fix? It doesn't sound very complicated but it's still worrisome.

I'm hoping that this fix is not some sort of trial and error experiment, but only time will tell. I'm happy at least that I went ahead and purchased the 100k warranty through my credit union.

My car was born 06/12, last 4 digits of the vin are 2739. Good luck to all the others in the same situation. (side note: when I dropped my car off on Tuesday another guy was in the process of buying the red car in the picture below. I don't know if his car will have the same problem as mine but I think it arrived the same day mine did. I didn't have the heart to tell him and rain on his happy day. Sorry dude if you're a member here.)

Pardon the narrative but I just needed to vent my situation. I rode a bike in college and borrowed a parents car for the past couple years waiting for this to be my first car. And I'm driving a crappy rental right now.

Originally Posted by Hotlava86 (Post 397494)

yeah this is a huge issue. BRZ owners aren't noticing it much because there aren't as many BRZ's on the road. What is happening is, there is an Actuator in the timing setup or VVTi (variable valve timing (intelligent)) and well over 30% of the actuators made are faulty. they are failing to advance or retard the timing of the car properly to allow the car proper acceleration and cause RPM fluctuations like you were noticing. Toyota is actually rebuilding the entire top half of some customers engines because the problem is so severe, HOWEVER they are NOT informing their customers of this. I am good friends with my technician at Toyota and he said that he had done the job twice now, and that over 200 FR-S have already been repaired for the issue and about 20 of those are already showing signs or problems again....Sorry man it really sucks first year woes are always the hardest just remember warranty warranty warranty! they will get it right soon

Originally Posted by earthsscum (Post 406039)

looks like water were you running ac, could just be condensate... won't explain the hesitation though hopefully nothing major good luck

Originally Posted by ngabdala (Post 406091)

Umm the picture you have of the tachometer and speedometer with the check engine light on has all of the lights on meaning the picture was taken right when the car was started

Originally Posted by ngabdala (Post 406515)

Anyways it was most likely because he wanted us to see the ODO

Originally Posted by Hotlava86 (Post 397494)

yeah this is a huge issue. BRZ owners aren't noticing it much because there aren't as many BRZ's on the road. What is happening is, there is an Actuator in the timing setup or VVTi (variable valve timing (intelligent)) and well over 30% of the actuators made are faulty. they are failing to advance or retard the timing of the car properly to allow the car proper acceleration and cause RPM fluctuations like you were noticing. Toyota is actually rebuilding the entire top half of some customers engines because the problem is so severe, HOWEVER they are NOT informing their customers of this. I am good friends with my technician at Toyota and he said that he had done the job twice now, and that over 200 FR-S have already been repaired for the issue and about 20 of those are already showing signs or problems again....Sorry man it really sucks first year woes are always the hardest just remember warranty warranty warranty! they will get it right soon

Originally Posted by Hotlava86 (Post 406660)

you picked the right quote. If your RPM's were dipping every time you came to an idle then you sir have yet another faulty Timing actuator in your VVTi system. Really sucks seeing this happen so frequently now...