1 year warrenty,- decat removal?

[Anonymous]

should I leave them in?  is it definitley these that are causing the engines to die ?- would you get an extended warrenty for £500 or take your chances? also how often do you guys check your oil?
and to save a hundred posts- how do you clean the engine cover- under the grill bit?  

man of a thousand questions i know.

[markiii]

£500 will buy a new engine, which if you oil level is consistently ok, and you take teh precaution of gutting the cats you shouldn't need.

personally I'd just gut them and not worry, chances of them covering it under an extended warranty (it's not the same as teh factory one anyway) will be slim.

[roger]

how do you clean the engine cover- under the grill bit?  

Assume you mean the drip tray? Do what I have done, take it off and leave it in the garage, that way it doesn't get dirty! Pros and Cons discussed ad infinitum if you use search for drip tray.

roger

[mrsmr2]

I think he means cleaning under the grill on the bonnet, not the drip tray under the engine.

I've no idea how to clean it either.

Jason

[Anonymous]

... also how often do you guys check your oil?

Once a week currently but with all this engine blown stuff who knows how often now  s:? :? s:?

[roger]

I think he means cleaning under the grill on the bonnet, not the drip tray under the engine.

I've no idea how to clean it either.

Jason

I was talking of the drip tray ABOVE the engine, as bolted to the engine lid. Lets see..........Dave?

[SimonC_Here]

Aren't the bonnet and the engine lid one and the same?
The thing at the back above the engine.

Get a GF with small hands! That's what I do.   s:D s:D  

Simon

[markiii]

And I alweays thought small hands were  disadvantage   s:oops: :oops: s:oops:

[roger]

Aren't the bonnet and the engine lid one and the same?
The thing at the back above the engine.   s:D s:D  

Simon

What do you call the thing at the front then? Our US cousins call it a Frunk (front trunk, I assume) perhaps we should call it a fronnet, or a froot??

roger

[GSB]

And I alweays thought small hands were  disadvantage   s:oops: :oops: s:oops:

Depends both on your point of view, and what they happen to be holding at the time...  s:wink: :wink: s:wink:

[Anonymous]

I'm also curious as to how the tray can be cleaned. Until I can find a mesh grill replacement, I'm leaving mine on, but I'd like to have detailing strategy for it. I've tried threading cloth in there, etc., without luck.

[filcee]

and to save a hundred posts- how do you clean the engine cover- under the grill bit?  

Patience, a j-cloth, and skinned knuckles if you are in a hurry  s:-( :-( s:-( .

Sorry that's nowhere near as exciting or interesting as the previous discussions  :-) :-) :-)

[darrenjuggins]

Back on Topic - As for extended warranty - I have got both the engine and full cat replaced under warranty (extended) and Via Toyota.

Extended Warranty covered the Cat

Toyota covered the engine Failure

Therefore with just them issues alone, the £540 two year warranty has paid for itself many times over....

In addition:

They have replace over the last year alone, discs all round - not sure how much these cost, A rear Bearing which cost £250 cos they needed a new hub for it, A Brake cable £120.

I still have a years left and I'm no machanic, so I've found it a really useful piece of mind.

But it all depends how handy you are and who you know to refit an engine....


As for the cover on the engine - there are four boths and a couple of clips, once in a while I carefully remove it and clean it off the car, looks a treat afterwards.

Hope these views and comments help.

Cheers

Darren J  s:) s:)

[SimonC_Here]

And I alweays thought small hands were  disadvantage   s:oops: :oops: s:oops:

Depends both on your point of view, and what they happen to be holding at the time...  s:wink: :wink: s:wink:

Behave, both of you   s:lol: :lol: s:lol:  

What do you call the thing at the front then? Our US cousins call it a Frunk (front trunk, I assume) perhaps we should call it a fronnet, or a froot??

roger

Never really thought about it. Just point and say that bit there, although I like the idea of calling it a fronnet   s:D s:D  

As to the warrenty, I'm with Darren. My new engine got paid for by MrT and the warrenty department, and a hand break cable come to think of it.

They wont do the disks though  s:( s:(

And you get RAC membership which may be worth a bit to you.


Simon

[Anonymous]

should I leave them in?  is it definitley these that are causing the engines to die ?- would you get an extended warrenty for £500 or take your chances? also how often do you guys check your oil?
and to save a hundred posts- how do you clean the engine cover- under the grill bit?  

man of a thousand questions i know.

1 - When my car is 3 years old and out of warranty the pre-cats will go.  Personally I am convinced they are a disaster waiting to happen, though most cars seem to get away without a problem.  

2 - I wouldn't rely on an extended warranty to cover engine replacement in the event of pre-cat failure.  And in any case, you'll suffer mucho invoncenience of blown engine, claims, chasing and no car until it gets fixed.  In my opinion, better to prevent the problem hapenning.  

3 - If you mean the flat horizontal sheet of body-colour metal under the grill of the engine cover, the salesman when we bought our car told us to wrap a cloth round a ruler or similar long thin stick.  To be honest though, I've never got round to trying.  

Cheers
Andy

[Anonymous]

Yes i meant the back bonnet/ boot engine cover thing with all the slits in it. I think we should call it the bonoot, much better.  i was thinking about wrapping a cloth around a stick, but then it could go wrong. I think ill leave the precats in for now.  on another note the teabag must have burst because ive got a mouthfull of tea bits. not very nice.

[Tem]

1 - When my car is 3 years old and out of warranty the pre-cats will go.  Personally I am convinced they are a disaster waiting to happen, though most cars seem to get away without a problem.

What if the issue starts to happen during the last months of your warranty and you only notice it after your warranty run out?  s:? :? s:?  Somehow I don't think this is an on/off issue, but starts to develop over time and most just notice it when the engine actually blows  s:? :? s:?

[darrenjuggins]

Hi,

Just to answer some of the comments:

1. Incovenience - None was really cause, the garage was excellent and gave me a car.... so can't complain.

2. Toyota are aware on the problem with the engine and are sorting them on a case by case, the extended warranty is a safeguard.

3. Pre-cat faliure - Yes extended warranty has been covering it.

4. Engine cover - has everyone missed that i've explained it can be removed for cleaning VERY easily with a socket set !


Err - right that all my replys....

I think it depends on your perspecitive about the warranty, I don't take them on things like kettles, etc - below £300 I'm happy for it to break and throw it if I've had my use....

But a car that you have spent between 17k - 22k new - then for £500, to get peice of mind, i personnal think it's worth it....

(note I was sceptical about the worth of the entended toyota warranty, but after having used it would whole heartly recommend it!)

Cheers

Darren J

[Liz]

Re the cats - gut them and be done, whilst they are there all you will do is worry about them and that is going to ruin your enjoyment of the car.

Re the bonnet tray - I think that there are 4 bolts - undo them, take off tray...clean - put mesh on, whatever - bolt up again..even a girl can do it, and she did and put mesh over them and painted the tray so it didn't show through...sorted

[heathstimpson]

Re the cats - gut them and be done, whilst they are there all you will do is worry about them and that is going to ruin your enjoyment of the car.

I think its about time we arranged another gut the cat meet with someone with axle stands etc  s:wink: :wink: s:wink:

[Anonymous]

Has anyone had an engine/cat failure which was NOT covered under extended warranty ??

If this has happened I would be extremely alarmed, and would probably put my car on autotrader this week to get rid !

My cat/engine started playing up within the original 3yr warranty, but Toyota dealer took 7 months to deal with it, by which time the original warranty had expired (I had extended 2 years first though) and ended up replacing the engine under the extended warranty (which is covered by AON insurance).

If I was a cynical bugger, I would wonder if they deliberately waited till the original warranty expired, as I am guessing Toyota pay a vastly reduced labour rate on warranty work, and I wonder if AON may be more generous, and might even pay the dealers normal full hourly rate !!!

Personally, I would not keep an MR2 roadster without either extended warranty, or gutted cats, I currently am sticking with the former.

Not sure if it has come to anything, but there was some mention I saw a while back that the engine failures may not be entirely caused by cat problems, as there may be a crankshaft resonance issue at our cruising speeds which causes the barrels to wear out of round, causing blow-by.

Obviously, a cat collapsing will cause increased back pressure which will increase engine wear, but similarly increased engine wear will cause oil blowby, which will knacker a cat in short order. Sadly I don't know how we can actually be sure which comes first - which is a real PITA!

As usual, things would be so much simpler if Toyota would actually do their job, and find and solve the problem, and reassure owners that they do actually know more about their cars than we do  s:-( :-( s:-(

[darrenjuggins]

Hi,

Talking to my Dealer - the Cats where covered by AON and the Engine Block and parts where covered by Toyota themselves.

The Block issue is one they have had in the old avenis 1800 and thus would suggest that the pre-cat falure is an additional problem and not inherent to the engine faluire.....

My engine started using loads oil prior to the cat faliure, then the cat collaspesed.....


and as for happening over a period of time - well mine went from Fine at 60,000 (and never any issues) to at 61,500 - Total oil loss, then soon after pre-cat faluire (ie left hand cat disigtigrated!)

The Bores in the engine are going oval seem to be the issue with the oil escaping into the conbustion chamber and with excessive oil useage comes cat issues as the cat isn't supposed to deal with oil deposits..... hmmmm possible why both fail at similar time !

Hope this is useful.

Cheers

Darren J

[Anonymous]

Its depressing is what it is.

[GSB]

I think its about time we arranged another gut the cat meet with someone with axle stands etc  s:wink: :wink: s:wink:

Is that right? It took me a week to wash all the MR2 out of my hair last time I did one, and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who doesn't fancy crawling under a car while its this cold!  Roll on summer!!!

An alternative method for those who want to get rid, and have the basic tools, would be to buy a spare manifold from a breakers yard, and then gut it and fit it with new studs and nuts if required... That way, if you shear the bolts on the main cat to manifold joint (this is the most likely problem to occur,and requires a delicate balance of precision, force, and swear words to rectify), it wont matter, as you can have them extracted at your leisure at a later date... This way you also have the chice of putting you original manifold back on if required...

Other than the sheared studs problem, the job itself is pretty easy.

[markiii]

Grant,

I have sitting a spare manifold in my garage, any idea ifit's yours? Martins? or Ians?

Either way it's gutted so we could use it as a swop out, and as my inspection pit is now in(should be a hell of a lot easier and warmer) , give me a month or so (seans turbo is booked in first) and I'm happy to provide the venue again:-)