1987 Toyota Land Cruiser Pricing and Specs

The cruise control issue could be a fault with the body computer whose job it is to talk to the computer that controls the car’s engine and transmission and turn the driver’s instructions into actions. If there was a problem with the physical actuation of the cruise-control, it would potentially not work at all. But a problem that resets when you turn the ignition off and on again is always cause to suspect a computer glitch.

The transmission issue is one that has been ongoing sine the 200 Series was launched. Top gear (sixth) is so tall for fuel-economy purposes that the vehicle in its original form would not select that gear below about 110km/h. That’s fine for the USA and Middle East where cruising speeds are higher, but in Australia, it meant that some owners were never seeing sixth gear.

The solution was to tale the vehicle back to Toyota for a reflash of the on-board computer which would then instruct the transmission to select top gear at 95 or 100km/h. If this reflash hasn’t been performed, you might find that the vehicle has never actually selected top gear in its life. Definitely look into this possibility before spending money on transmission services or anything mechanical.

For a start, you can rule out the Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) as the culprit as these weren’t fitted to the LandCruiser until many years after 2006. Nevertheless, if there’s a smell of anything when the vehicle is idling, there’s either something wrong with the mixture the engine is burning or there’s a leak in the exhaust system somewhere.

Since the problem has suddenly occurred, it’s probably the latter and you need to check all the joints in the exhaust system, the system itself for rust holes or damage, and even the turbocharger plumbing which can become loose and allow a leak.

So why do you only smell it at idle? Simply that when the vehicle is moving, the movement of air around the vehicle is whisking the fumes away. When you stop, the fumes `catch up’ with the vehicle, and you can smell them. This needs to be checked out as exhaust fumes can be very dangerous to humans, up to and including carcinogenic.

I agree that the requirement to change hoses with just 30,000km on the odometer sounds like overkill. But bear in mind that those 30,000km probably involved 1000 heat-cycles (where the engine is heated when started and cooled when you stop). And that’s the sort of thing – along with time – that will make components like hoses deteriorate. And that’s the key to this: Time also plays a part in the way materials like rubber degrade in a car’s engine bay.

So, it’s not as simple as Toyota’s engineers having worked out that a car’s hoses need replacing at 75,000km. They’ve also taken into account those effects of time passing. And that’s why the hose-change interval might be 75,000km or three years, whichever comes first.

If your car was still covered by factory warranty, I’d say you’d be mad to skip the hose change and risk voiding the warranty if anything went wrong related to those hoses. But since your car came with a three-year warranty when it was new, that has now expired.

And with that in mind, maybe it’s time to seek out a specialist workshop that isn’t a Toyota dealership and see what it says about the condition of the hoses and whether they need replacing or not.

I’m not saying you’re being unnecessarily upsold or gouged on this service, but it’s worth asking to see the factory service schedule that dictates the hose change you’ve been quoted on. If the workshop can’t produce it, then I’d be going elsewhere.