I have a 2005 with 240K miles that I've only ever replaced the oil on, never the coolant or transaxle fluid. I've been reading that these should be replaced every 50K, so I'm planning to have the service done at my dealer. I've only ever taken the car to one dealer, and they've never recommended that these fluids be replaced. Are there any cautions or potential problems I should be aware of? Thanks.
if they don't properly bleed the air from the coolant, you may get gurgling or sloshing sounds. if you do, don't panic or give them a boatload of grief, calmly ask them to recheck their work and make sure they get all the air out. if they give you any bs or refuse to make it right, then give em hell. of course, if you diy you will save a bunch of $$
Your dealership should have told you that you needed to have your ice and inverter coolant replaced as per schedule. Maybe you haven't been taking your car there for all that long? As for the tranny fluid, I haven't heard of any problems with replacing it at high miles. I know for non cvt transmissions they recommend sometimes not changing the fluid if it has never been changed and it's at high milieage, but for the Pri's cvt I have heard nothing negative about it....
Perhaps they have changed the fluids but you just didn't realize it? I've heard of many people who take their cars in to the dealerships to have their regular maintenance done not realizing exactly what is being done. Maybe ask them to see if they have any records of these fluids being changed, and if not, ask them why not....
I'll check the service records, but my experience is that my dealership, which is Toyota of Kirkland in Washington, does only the labor that I request. They do recommend the scheduled maintenances, but they stopped that after 100K, and I don't ever remember them recommending coolant changes.
people in that service dept must prefer poverty... the service advisor doesn't have to beat the customer up over it but he should recommend anything which would be good for the car. as a tech I always put flushes and maintenance items on my estimate, unless I could see it had been done already.
I checked the service records, and the coolants had been changes around 140K when Toyota took care or a water pump recall.
I sincerely doubt they followed the official Toyota Service Procedure when the inverter pump was replaced. In the real world, it is easier to pinch off the hoses, resulting in very little coolant loss, when the inverter pump is replaced. The tech has a motivation to do this b/c he can finish this job faster, meaning he can get to the next job faster, which equals more money for him; I believe they are paid hourly and per repair procedure preformed. Furthermore, by pinching off the hoses, this means more profit for the dealership as Corporate Toyota is reimbursing the dealer for one gallon of SLLC (coolant). By pinching off the hoses, the tech only adds a few ounces of SLLC that was spilled when the inverter pump was removed. FYI, 1 gallon = 128 ounces. Lets say 10 ounces of SLLC is lost everytime. 1 gallon can cover 12.8 cars! 12 inverter pumps replaced under the recall, only 1 gallon was used between the 12 cars, leaving a profit of 11 gallons for the dealership. So what do you think the dealership/technician actually did? Drain/fill, OR, clamp the hoses and top off the lost SLLC? Here's a nicely made, high speed, Youtube video, of an inverter pump being replaced by a Toy Tech. Notice the hose clamps at 1:07.
