Toyota Problems

Here’s a figure you won’t find on the specification sheet on the brochure. The internet is no help either, so I took my trusty tape-measure around to a Toyota dealership and worked it out old-school. The answer is 400mm (40cm) but that’s for a standard vehicle. Bigger tyres and lifted suspension will throw that into a cocked hat.

completely redesigned the RAV4 for an Australian launch back in January 2019, so don’t expect wholesale changes until the mid-life facelift probably in another coupe of years. That’s as far as the basic engineering goes, of course, but in specification and option terms there could be some shuffling around as Toyota is continually homing in on the sweet spot when it comes to equipment versus price-point.

The other thing to watch out for – and Toyota is very good at this – is the limited-edition variant of the RAV4. These variants usually offer a load of standard equipment at a bargain price and are a car company’s way of clearing the shelves. Look out, too, in coming weeks, for good deals on RAV4’s (and any other make and model) with a 2019 build-date as these are often heavily discounted in the first few weeks of a new year. Again, it’s a shelf-clearing exercise, but it can mean very good deals.

The short answer is yes. All Toyotas sold brand-new in Australia after the turn of the century (and some models well before that date) can run on E10.

There are circumstances under which you would stay away from a modern turbo-diesel, but they have more to do with how you’ll use the vehicle than they do with the vehicle itself. The rule of thumb is that you should really only buy a diesel version of a particular car if you plan to use it for at least one decent trip at freeway speeds every three or four weeks at the very least. Along with that is the proviso that you’ll cover enough kilometres each year to balance the higher purchase price and servicing costs of a diesel against the lower fuel costs.

The highway-driving caveat is all about long-term reliability and emissions. Modern turbo-diesels are often fitted with what’s called a diesel-particulate filter (DPF). This filter, designed to trap some of the more harmful exhaust emissions) eventually fills up with the soot from the diesel’s exhaust and, when that happens, it’s designed to burn off that soot and regenerate itself, ready for another go round. But if you only drive short distances or only ever at suburban speeds, the filter can often not get hot enough to perform this burn-off and regeneration. When that happens, the filter warning light on your dashboard lights up and it’s off to the dealership for a – sometimes – costly manual regeneration. In extreme cases, the DPF may even need to be replaced and that’s not cheap either.

So, if you’re not planning regular trips at freeway speeds, conventional wisdom says a modern turbo-diesel is not for you.

I’ll take a punt here and suggest that the $55,000 price was the trade-in value at a Toyota dealership. Certainly, it’s about what a dealer would offer as a trade-in on a new LandCruiser, so it’s a good deal at that money.

The best thing you can do is sit your mate down, look him in the eye and get honest answers about how the vehicle has been used and what condition it’s in. This was a relatively early example of the turbo-diesel V8 and while they improved as Toyota made running changes, the early engines were known to burn a bit of oil. After his years of ownership, your pal should be well aware of things like that, so get some straight answers.

If it checks out, that’s great, but you’d still want to have a contingency budget for repairs as these were complex machines, and even jobs like replacing the starter motor (which lives up under the inlet manifold on these V8s) can cost a motzah to complete. That said, I love the idea that the vehicle has done mostly highway kilometres and that it’s never been off road. Seriously, that’s the second-hand LandCruiser you want to buy.

Driven very, very carefully, a Toyota Yaris would probably make it up the Oodnadatta Track, but it would be a very slow process and the car may never feel the same again. Even a proper off-road four-wheel-drive can suffer at the hands of outback roads like these, and the corrugations have to be experienced to be believed. That theory also presupposes that the track is in relatively good condition at the time and it hasn’t been raining in those parts.

Given that the vast bulk of your driving is, indeed, in Yaris territory I can see your point. Perhaps renting a four-wheel-drive for the Oodnadatta Track holiday would be the way to go.

The world of hybrids is moving very fast, Hannah, and the rule of thumb is that newer is better purely because the technology is improving all the time. You’re obviously concerned with running costs and your carbon-footprint, so the latest hybrid technology with a full factory warranty would seem to be an obvious way to go.

That puts the new Corolla Hybrid firmly in the frame as both a car with the latest planet-saving and life-saving tech as well as Toyota’s five-year/unlimited-kilometre warranty as well as a ten-year warranty on the hybrid’s batteries. For some reason, Lexus hasn’t budged on its four-year warranty, meaning that a 2017 CT200h might only have a few months of factory cover to run if your bought it now. You’ll also potentially pay more for the second-hand Lexus than you will for the brand-new Corolla.

The only real drawback with the Corolla Hybrid is that its luggage space – because of the battery-packs – is quite shallow. But beyond that it’s a great car with the hybrid driveline thrown in for just a couple of grand extra. That’s a bargain and it’s one of the reasons the new Corolla will be a lot of Australian families’ first hybrid.

Flat-towing – where the towed vehicle has all four wheels on the ground – is common in North America where it’s quite normal to see a motorhome flat-towing a Chevy Suburban or Ford SUV. The idea is that the motorhome is the mother-ship and the SUV becomes the grocery-getter once you’ve settled in somewhere with a nice view. They take their fun seriously, those Americans.

The practice is much less common here, but I’ve seen a few Suzuki Sierras and Vitaras and other small four-wheel-drives being flat-towed, so clearly it’s possible. As you’ve identified, a two-wheel-drive vehicle with a conventional manual gearbox shouldn’t suffer any dramas from being flat-towed. That said, I’d be careful with a four-wheel-drive, particularly a permanent all-wheel-drive example - because these are more complex drivelines and sometimes don’t appreciate being back-loaded.  It’s also worth remembering that a vehicle with a conventional automatic is a no-no for flat-towing as, unless the engine is running, the pump that lubricates the transmission isn’t working and the gearbox will be destroyed.

Unless the dealer can show you precisely why a particular year-model HiLux shouldn’t be flat-towed, I’d be a bit suspicious (especially when other dealers say yes) but the fact that nobody wants to offer you a warranty on a HiLux that’s being flat-towed also suggests to me that you could run into problems if there’s ever a claim.

It would also be worth checking what your insurance company says about flat-towing and don’t forget that different States and Territories have different rules and regulations. In Queensland, for instance, the law says that unless the unladen mass of the towing vehicle is at least three-and-a-half times the laden mass of the vehicle being flat-towed, you need to somehow make the towed vehicle’s brakes part of the package. On that basis, unless you’re towing your 1500kg HiLux with a vehicle that weighs at least 5250kg unladen, you’ve got yourself a problem that could involve the law and the insurance industry if something goes wrong.

It’s a fact of life, Ted, that fuel-efficiency has been a big focus for car-makers in the last decade. So, the most economical models tend to be the newer ones which tap into better technology (such as stop-start functions) and improved engine and driveline designs.

But beyond the improvements in petrol-engine technology, diesel engines have brought some big improvements, as have hybrid vehicles. The real headline makers have been, of course, the plug-in electric vehicles which are now available second-hand for sensible money. I’ve seen Nissan Leafs for sale for less than $20,000 and the plug-in hybrid Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV for similar money.

If economy is your number-one aim, stay away from all-wheel-drive cars as the extra driveline friction requires more power and, therefore, fuel to drive it. And don’t forget that how you drive, where you drive and even whether you check you tyre pressure regularly can also have a huge effect on your ultimate fuel economy.

The problem with all these vehicles, Darren, is that they seem to have covered huge distances (200,000km is a lot for a car that is just eight years old, no?). Also, some of them have covered those kilometres towing huge, heavy trailers and a full tray at the same time. So, the first piece of advice is to buy one that has a full service history and hasn’t been worked half to death. A Ranger with a huge bull-bar, suspension lift, winch and mud tyres, for instance, is a dead certainty to have been thrashed through the bush every weekend of its life. So be careful and take each vehicle on its merits and overall condition.

It seems you’ve heard of the Ranger’s engine troubles (overheating due to faulty EGR coolers and failed fuel injectors) but the Toyota three-litre turbo-diesel is not without its faults either. Cracked pistons between 100,000km and 150,000km are not unknown and, like any common-rail diesel, the Toyota’s engine can consume injectors at a frightening rate. The bottom line is that all these modern common-rail diesels are highly tuned and absolutely need their maintenance. Even then, they can fail, so it’s worth knowing.

For your purposes, Darren, I think the Ranger with its more powerful engine (147kW and 470Nm plays the Toyota’s 120kW and 343Nm) and much greater towing capacity (3500kg for the Ford, 2250kg for the Toyota) would be the smarter way to go.