Fern

Response from Lexus Customer service (case manager) today over the phone said, sorry but vehicle is almost 2 years past warranty deadline.

I advised rep that I had sent registered letter to her attention yesterday with supporting documentation and a request for written response within 15 days.

I will post reponse from Lexus.

I followed up with one of the Managers at the Toyota dealership that overhaued the trani and they confirmed that rep had called them and asked if problem was related to lack of maintenance... They said no. Rep also asked dealership if there was anything that customer did to create failure, dealership said no!..

Lexus still denied assistance.

Manager from dealership said that all a customer can do is maintain the vehicle as per the manufacturers recommendations, the moment that an internal component fails, that is beyond the customers control...

I await written response and will issue my reply to the next person up..

If there is one thing I have learned in dealing with complaints and presenting your own that is:

"never accept a NO from the person that never had the authority to provide a yes in the first place."

salimshah

Fern:

I am rooting for you
but
not holding my breath.

Salim

Lexmex

You also have my support 100%.

I don't doubt that people do the regularly scheduled maintenance, but my contention is that the schedule maintenance according to Lexus is not sufficient for these transmissions. That is why I am very religious about changing out the fluid more often than required.

JAB

I checked the maintenance schedule booklet for my 1999 RX300 last night. It NEVER required that the ATF be changed; perhaps thats why despite conscientious maintenance mine failed at 116K.

Lexmex

You are right.

What it says is this (relating all references to ATF fluid)

Inspect the following: Automatic Transmission Fluid and Differential Oil
Additional Maintenance Items for Special Operating Conditions): Replace Automatic Transmission and Differential Oil (go to p.53 in the owner's manual supplement to read about special operating conditions)

Now, where does it say what I just mentioned above?

15,000 miles or 12 months (1 year)
30,000 miles or 24 months (2 years)
45,000 miles or 36 months (3 years)
60,000 miles or 48 months (4 years)
75,000 miles or 60 months (5 years)
90,000 miles or 72 months (6 years)
105,000 miles or 84 months (7 years)
120,000 miles or 96 months (8 years)
135,000 miles or 108 months (9 years)
150,000 miles or 120 months (10 years)

Incidentally, I am at about 111,000 and about 8 years, 2 months since my little RX was built in Japan, so I am pretty much doing A-Ok in terms of miles/years comparison.

However, the point here is it looks like just once a year for the ATF fluid or every 15,000 miles.

As I and others have been pointing out, it is not just a drain and fill that I recommend, but multiple drain and fills (about 3) that need to be performed to cycle most of the old fluid out. That means draining both the front differential and the tranny pan. In addition, removing and cleaning the pan and replacing the filter...all once a year.

parula

Fern, good luck! Try to keep us updated.

Jab, yea and check out the dipstick - mine says something similar "No need to replace ATF under normal driving conditions" !

So what should one do?

salimshah

I think we are all probing in the dark. Failure analysis results have not been shared [not sure if it has been done]. Fern is the only person I know who has followed through with the repair. I would like to hear the root cause of the failure
Lack of lubrication or lubricant break-down and its root cause.
Mechanical failure of one or more parts and why (shorter than expected life, stress, improper assembly etc)*

Then there is the problem of collecting enough data from ALL repairs to see a trend. [Ferns problem may be a single event and not necessarily a representative of other failures].

The complication is because with reccomended maintainance, we have observed failures [I am avoiding the discussion about % failure, but ppl should keep an eye on that to reach conclosions about the whole RX family]

So as owners what do we do? What is in our control?
0. Operate properly not over stress the trans beyond its reccomended limits.
1. For sure monitor the state of the trans-fluid.
2. Do one better than the reccomended fluid change.
3. Be more agressive and flush and change filter.

Do steps 2 & 3 gaurantee no failure? Or step 2 is adequate? The honest answer is "Dont know, but it does not hurt". We may have to revisit it when we start observing failure(s) even when steps 2 and 3 were followed.

Salim

* thrust washer failure on surface looks like a component failure or assembly issue [maybe lubrication issue as well but seems unlikely]

Fern

For those interested, here are some pics of the thrust washers that failed and you will note the nipple type peice (circled in red) that broke off one of the washers causing them to missallign.

Fern

Here is a pic of a clutch plate still good- notice the writing on plate. Sorry about small pic

Fern

This is a shot of a clutch plate in early wear stage... no oem writing noticeable on plate

Fern

Here's a copy of the invoice.
Note: taxes of 14% are not shown on this page... The grand total is $3800 + CAD

salimshah

Ouch!

Fern, can you get an explanation of "contamination through out" does that mean crud carried by atf deposited through out?

Did the ATF have the suspended crud? [visible on the dipstick or as a sediment in the pan] [but then trans level is checked with engine running].

What was the constitution of crud? This would potentially lead to what disintigrated or wore out.

Another is what sort of filter came off, screen or paper?


Salim

xfirechief

Just a hint. I changed all the fluids, gear lubes, etc. at 50K- 36 months & put in AMSOIL SYNTHETICS. The tranny was flushed out till the fluid ran clean, took 12 qts. to do it butr with the new lubes it is good to go for 3 times longer then dino lubes.

Fern

I was concerned of the wording also, since it was going to be part of my fight with Lexus.

The Tech said he referred to contamination from the broken/ worn part and also to sludge found in the trani pan and screen.

I can assure you nothing was noticeable on the dipstick and if the darn T-IV was full synthetic, I'm sure there wouldn't be any sludge. With the advent of ease in accessability to synthetic fluids and with the rise in cost of dino based fluids, one would think that Toyota went to full Synthetic trani fluid.

I'm starting to side with those that used Amsoil Universal trani fluid instead of T-IV. If it wasn't for this costly repair and the warranty on it, I would have used Amsoil. A very reputable trani rebuild shop here in Toronto, said they also refill the Toyota and Lexus tranies with T-IV, despite knowing there are better alternate fluids on the market. There explanation is, " we don't engineer the transmissions, we just rebuild them... If the manufacturer calls for a certain fluid, thats what we use... No better, no worse."

Fern

I was out on appointments most of the day and notice there was a message at home from Lexus case manager regarding the fact they are still looking into matter.

They indicated they needed to obtain the "original invoice" for repairs to the transmission and wanted it to be submitted via a Lexus Dealer?

One of the Managers at the Toyota dealership who repaired the trani is an ex- Lexus corporate employee and he had already given me a heads up indicating they sometimes issue payment for the repairs via the Dealerships vs. directly to the customer...?

Can't understand the logic any ideas for the unusual protocal?

Going to send registered the original invoice for trani repairs tomorrow and talking to Toyota Dealership about getting a contact name at Lexus dealership which is owned by the same as where I got the repairs done.

Keeping my fingers crossed , but like Salim said, " not holding my breath".

The response by phone from Lexus corporate came within 12 days of my "written request for a favourable response from Lexus Canada within 15 days or receipt of my letter."