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Comments
How many miles on the car?
Rough roads or nice smooth roads?
My 2008 (Touring Edition) is 11 months old with 31,000 miles on it, and I'm wondering how long before I have these issues.
Skip
Most mileage is highway, with the usual suburban stuff on weekends. No rural roads or NYC grade potholes.
Yeah, the bulb price is outrageous. Might be something else, but suspect that too will be a ton of $$. Oh well, so much for "ultrareliable Toyota" (I've had my share of minor and somewhat more major issues).
Then a statement. Dealer's comment of "bulbs going bad" after random occurances of lights going off and then coming back on would prompt me to look for a dealer/service tech who could spell "find the real problem". You are obviously dealing with folks who don't have a clue about some of the new technology.
As for the headlights, I agree, it's absurd to suggest that random outages affecting either light could be the $800 bulbs going out. I may have to search Atlanta for a more competent service source.
Thanks ...
These ARE wonderful tires if you like quite (which I do), these ARE a great tire, if you want a smooth ride (which I do), but they don't work very good at all in deep snow.
Here is a great site for tire information:
- http://www.tirerack.com
HID headlights DO NOT like marginal supply voltages.
And, following another post, HID lights run off a ballast to control voltage. If the input voltage drops below a certain level the ballast will not work and the light cuts off to prevent damage. Given that most Avalons have high battery post corrosion levels, cleaning the battery posts is an excellent idea. Try it, maybe have the battery checked by a local auto parts store, post the results....
My wife is in Utah right now with our '98 Sienna and will be back Tuesday evening. I told her to get at least the middle grade when she gets gas.
My driving is in the southeast, mostly suburban or interstate, and may give different results than driving extensively in mountains. Just recorded a good 28+ mpg on a trip from GA to Nashville, TN and back in my '07 Limited. And we cruised at 75 to 80 mph for most of the trip along I-75 and I-24.
The answer of course is, "Do what works best for you."....
2023 Mercedes EQE 350 4Matic / 2022 Ram 1500 Bighorn, Built to Serve
2023 Mercedes EQE 350 4Matic / 2022 Ram 1500 Bighorn, Built to Serve
If folks are having oil changes at the quik-lube places, they might want to make sure about the 6.4 qts there, also.
Roland
Be careful what you use, and make sure it isn't alkaline or acid based, as this will lkely stain the plastic in such a way, it WON'T come out. It would actually burn the finish on the plastic (kind of turn it white).
Skip
I run mine until the fuel light comes on, and then about 50-75 miles more, and end up putting in 16+ gallons when I fill up. I've done this many times on trips and average around 480 - 520 miles (one trip I had 556 miles on it when I filled up) on the tripmeter at the time I fill up.
Skip
One hell of a noise coming from the front end. YES it worst when its cold, but its there all the time (When turning sharply, and under acceleration).
The car is 12 months old this month, and has 32,000 miles on it. But this is not the kind of wear I'd expect from a car like this.
This does cause me to think harding about waiting for the 2011 Avalon (or what ever they are going to call it, if anything), or start looking at something different.
Mercedes S600?
BMW?
Lexus LS 460L?
Cadillac?
My wife's 2003 Camry has had NOTHING replaced. It has 50,000 miles on it.
My 2008 Camry, all-be-it not as comfortable on long road trips, had no issues with it. I had that about 1 year and put on 30,000 miles on it.
Not sure I want to keep this car for another years or so,waiting for whatever might come from Toyota to replace the Avalon.
First off, is it going to be worth the wait?
Is it going to be priced at a point I can afford to trade in on?
Will this car with 40,000 miles on it, be worth as much or is it worth more now?
All things to think about I guess.
Skip
The owner's manual sections on the spare tire and the tire sensor did not mention a sensor on the spare.
Thanks and Happy Holidays
sorry--have been off-line for a while and missed your posts regarding my unreliable headlights. Problem is gradually getting worse: my poor daughter just drove home and realized that she was running only the fog lamps, not the headlights. We are getting intermittent loss of either one, or occasionally both headlights.
The possibility that it's voltage related is a great one, and I'll clean the battery posts and get the battery tested (though at less than 3 years old, that would be a pretty wimpy battery). Hope that is it, as I am expecting some ridiculously expensive electronic glitch.
Sucks to be us:(
Skip
That is one I could never understand. Why did the Touring and Limited models get the HIDs and not the XLS? Really disappointed me when I leased my '06. Same thing with my '09 Genesis, you can only get HIDs with NAV. What does one have to do with the other? Darn packages.
2023 Mercedes EQE 350 4Matic / 2022 Ram 1500 Bighorn, Built to Serve
New HID's are mostly of the "bi-xenon" type, a low beam position and a separate high beam position with the high beam position "enhanced" with a pair of halogen bulbs. Generally the high beam bulbs are also used for DRL functionality.
OEM forgetaboutit..
Aftermarket....
HID Bulbs are DR2R for '05-'07 and DR4R for '08-09
You may be able to find them even cheaper with some looking but expect to pay $50 a bulb minimum and $80 for a ballast
As for the lights that go off and on it has to be a bad ground wire. Nothing else makes sense. But just in case here is an HID troubleshooting guide...
http://www.stoncolighting.com/library/TechData/Troubleshooting.pdf
HID's really need to be adjusted as I posted earlier to gain maximum benefit. Also, uping the wattage of the driving lights might help too for filling in the abrupt cutoff of the HID's.
1) Do you not find it very strange that your bulb is burning out after only 18 months? I thought HID bulb life expectancy was much longer than that. Is there any chance you are having early signs of the same problem I am having? It started wtih just the left headlight periodically shutting down, but now it can be either, or occasionally (and with much amusement on my part :-o) both. I do not believe this is due to simultaneous premature burnout of both bulbs.
2) I had a problem previously with extremely short throw on the headlights which was caused by a misalignment of the autolevelling mechanism. You might want to check on this too.
3) I am not sure how much higher color temp bulbs would actually improve throw distance/brightness. I thought it was mostly a question of how blue vs yellow the light appeared.
4) Prompted by your post I looked online at D4R bulbs--&about $75-100 each. Got to love how my Toyota dealer quoted me $800 to replace them. So, Toyota can't make a profit selling cars? Let's just gouge our existing owners! Any idea how difficult it is to replace D4R bulbs yourself?
5) to others who responded to my initial post, have not yet had a chance to clean battery posts and get battery tested, as low voltage has been suggested as one possible cause of the headlight malfunction. Will post back with results.
This is a common misconception as HID lights are frequently compared to standard headlights and the HID's are much brighter, yes.
Toyota headlight problems with Pruis
Why my dealer did not put two and two together and mention this to me is, putting it mildly, frustrating. Their quote of $800 to replace bulbs also contradicts the factory's decision to lower the price of the Pruis HID bulb (also a D4R) from $300 to $150.
I will see what they say when confronted with this information.