Vandergriff Toyota Nightmare 2007 Toyota Brake Actuator Assembly

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You should report your experience about this repair and the continued problems to toyota corporate. If you've paid to have the car diagnosed (did the dealer provide a printout with the OBD2 codes that point towards the recommended repairs?) and then you paid for these parts/repairs, the problem should be fixed until the codes (DTCs) are no longer present (or until the parts/labor warranty expires).

For the combination meter repair, contact Matt or Max @Texas Hybrid Batteries at : Prius Speedometer Replacement

They have a mobile service area that you fall within, and offer a lifetime warranty. Doubtful that they will break the plastic vents pieces.

Did you get a refund on the 12v battery?

 

Complete and total criminal behavior... Any honest mechanic could do all of this work at 10% the cost of what they're charging... They're trying to force you into buying a new car financed with them and if this country had better consumer protection laws the owner would of lost their business license long ago.

If you need to get your combo meter fixed, go here: Prius Speedometer Replacement

 

(I added the bold.) This is a case where the difference between an and the is crucial. A brake actuator is a complicated gadget with a lot more than one way to go sideways. At 13 years, some of them might just wear out. Nearly every way one could wear out could be described as an internal malfunction, but not every internal malfunction will be the one that led to the warranty extension. Nobody guarantees anything to never wear out.

Sometimes they will discover from field experience that a bunch of units are developing some particular internal malfunction, sooner or more often than you would expect from just wearing out. Then they will publish one of those campaigns, and there will be specific things in there they should check to see if an actuator has gone wrong in that way, as opposed to some other way. There will be actuators that wear out, but haven't failed for the reason that led to the campaign.

Now in this particular case, it doesn't seem like this dealership would have been able to tell the difference one way or the other, so I can understand being suspicious.

 

Hi Faith - I'm sorry you had such a bad experience. I also have a 2007 (with 248k miles) and from what I've researched the extended warranty on the brake actuator only covers 10 yrs or 150k miles in the US, and Toyota is absolutely immovable in terms of exceptions. This doesn't surprise me: I had a 2006 Tundra with a well-know secondary air injection pump failure which was also out of the extended warranty period, and Toyota wouldn't do a thing about it ($2000+ repair). Just a note from my own experience on the instrument panel and 12V battery. After I replaced a failing 12V, my instrument panel started going out in exact coincidence. The root cause of the failure is fully understood to be an insufficient capacitor (you'll find tons of threads on that), though again Toyota will not do a damn thing to make that right (they quoted me $2300 for that repair). There is also clear anecdotal evidence that the instrument panel issue sometimes doesn't manifest until a new 12V battery is installed - but I have never found a thread explaining the relationship. The capacitor was failing and something about the more robust battery pushed the problem to the point of being symptomatic. Anyway, I repaired it myself with a refurbished instrument panel from Texas Hybrid Batteries (for less than $200) and - just like your dealer warned you - some of the plastic trim was so old and brittle that I broke two pieces. In their defense, if this happened there is nothing at all they can do about it - it's a risk of the repair, and it's the owner's choice to proceed with the repair knowing this risk. So at least on that point, they were definitely not trying to swindle you. Other than the price. I replaced the trim I needed with used parts on eBay for less than $100 - the dealer quoted me $270 for new parts. Changing out the trim involves no tools, skill, or time so I can only assume $943 was a worst-case estimate of breaking all four ventilation covers. Best of luck to you, and I feel your pain.