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I have a 2006 Toyota Corolla and not only is my paint chipping on my roof, I also have paint fading starting on my doors, the front hood, and the top of my trunk.
This does not add up. I see cars that are 10 + years old and their paint is not pealing or chipping. I truly think that if we get enough Toyota owners that have similar issues, that we can try to start a class action to resolve and put our issues to rest.
Now I see cars that are 10+ years old, and I dont see paint chipping nor fading on their cars. Not as bad as my 2006 Toyota Corolla.
Now we have invested and spent too much money on our Corolla's, for us to have to deal w/ Toyota's cheap paint jobs. I am not willing nor able to have more money come out of my pocket to re-paint my car!
That this does not add up! I see cars that are 10+ and they do not have paint defects near as bad as our Toyota issues.
As mentioned, that I have seen cars 10 + years old and they do not have paint defects near as bad as my paint defects.
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Personally, I have seen that newer cars of all brands do stone chip a bit more than 10 years ago, but it is not a big deal, even to a person like me!
Ocala, Fl
Is there anybody out there with similar Toyota Corolla 2011 complaints? What shall I do? I am really upset. I will appreciate any advice.
But mine was not painted individually, correct? I am not sure what their process is but the way I explain it to myself is that the cars are manufactured in batches and painted in batches by colors. For example, mine is magnetic gray and shoud be painted together with other Corollas of the same color. I know the painting is computer done. Maybe something went wrong in the computer settings for that batch? Yes, machines also make errors.
But, in your case I would not deal w/ dealers right now. I would escalate it to Corp HQ. Get them involved.
And I agree that luck has nothing to do with it. It is a fully automated process. It is also the most time intensive part of the manufacturing process as well. So, if a company were looking to cut corners (aka reduce costs) then this would probably be at the top of the list IMO.
My question to you is why would you not buy another Toyota? Do you think another car manufacturer would have just automatically given you a new car or repaint yours without even looking at it?
Jan
However, I am having major issues with exterior paint (a deep blue) and the dashboard (a beautiful burled material - probably plastic). Soon after I purchased the car, a door of one of the dashboard's storage bins came loose (it was not loose before I purchased it). I had been keeping CD's in it and it was not overloaded. About a year later, another storage door came off. Then in January (the car had approximately 60,000 miles on it), in quick succession the exterior paint became noticeably faded, rust appeared on the roof, the clock in the dashboard "died," the electric windows in the back seat began working erratically and a third storage door became loose and began popping open when the car hit a bump - all in one month! I have taken excellent care of the car and feel that this is unreasonable.
I inquired about replacing the first broken door and was told that it would cost over $500 to repair as the entire dashboard had to be replaced. Of course fixing the rust and the paint would cost approximately $2000. Frustrated, I never inquired about replacing the clock; maybe it is an easy fix. So, I will be either shelling out $2,500 for a car with 65,000 miles on non-engine repairs or replacing the car. I guess Toyota wins either way. Are these design flaws or planned obsolescence?
Toyota's advertising is aimed at reliability and running over 100,000 miles. That is true, it is a very reliable car and may very well run 200,000 miles, but the sad condition of the paint and interior are quite embarrassing. So, I guess it is good bye to Toyota. We had a good run but it is no longer worth my money.
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We're glad you've had a great experience and that you love Toyota sooooo much, but it's not constructive to the problem we have. YAY for you, you haven't had to deal with this frustrating experience.
Rest assured, we are taking our cars to the dealer, but as you may have been reading, many of them don't consider this covered under warranty OR in my case, I'm getting repetitive "touch-ups" that only repair the current damage and temporarily at that. So, I keep having to bring it back. Now to the point where they're tired of hearing from me and don't want to help any longer.
Since you keep rinse and repeating your responses for years now, please tell us how you're affiliated with Toyota.
Complaints - the interior scratches easily, & clock should be higher.
Depends on what you find so perfect about Toyota. Because of my not so positive experience with Toyota Corolla, I started looking at all Toyota cars that pass by me or at parking lots. What I notice is that only 2-3 year old Toyota cars have so many scratches and chips that no other make has! Why then Europeans do not buy Toyota cars? Europeans are very sensitive about the out-appearance of the car, they won't buy a car that scratches and chips from the wind!
And it is not only the paint that is problematic, mine had already so many parts replaced. And you are trying to persuade me that mine is the exception. Is it possible that mine was individually manufactured? Is it possible that they assembled all the defective parts in mine? No, it is ridiculous. I do not want to list here all the problems I had with the car so far because the topic is paint.
And one more thing: since you claim Toyota is so perfect, what about all the recalls then?
I thought Toyota has learnt the lesson after all the recalls but obviosly I was mislead and made the error to trust them and buy Toyota car. I am posting all this for the future buyers to read and make their right choice. It is up to them! I made mine for my next car make!
Recalls - that was mostly the accelerator thing, which the Toyota hate groups and the media wanted to be worse, but the fact is that if you did not use multiple floor mats and you used the clips as designed, you would have no problems. They had to make it more idiot-proof, which, yes, was a design fault. But the fact remains, even without the recall, if you used only one floor mat and used the clips, you would have NO problems. So this was not a huge problem, in my opinion. I am very concerned about safety, and watched this very carefully, but I was never concerned about my family's safety, because I used the clips and used only one mat.
We have zero paint problems. No scratches, a few stone chips in the bumper. I just waxed this car a week ago, so I know for sure. Take a look around the net - all makes' paint jobs have complaints. Understand that all manufacturers are using different paint due to EPA requirements. I have NOT noticed Toyotas having more scratches and chips than others. Your observation vs. mine.
European cars - much more reliablity problems than most cars, including Toyota, Honda, Ford, etc. Check Consumer Reports, True Delta, JD Power. Why do Europeans not buy Toyotas? They don't buy any? I will say that as a whole, they have different priorities (not reliability), and they also may purchase more cars built by their "home" countries.
I am not saying Toyota is perfect - no machine is. However, it is hard to debate Consumer Reports, JD Power, True Delta, etc. etc. If you have any real data sources to show that Toyota is not one of the most reliable brands, I'd love to see them.
Sorry about your luck, but one data point is not that meaningful. I listed my sources for my data that show Toyota as very reliable.
I am not interested in an attack, just stating some facts. And I am not employed in the auto industry, but I did buy Toyota stock at the height of the media blitz about the acceleration recalls. That was a real good move on my part!
I truly hope you get things resolved. Try a different dealer if yours is not helping you enough.
here's one simple thing you can do: collect some rain water from where you live and throw a litmus paper in it to check the acidity level.
do people power wash their cars?
Obviously, it depends on what your idea of quality is. You admit that your has chips, correct? Why will you get chips since the quality is so high? I am not jealous of your cars. I am happy about you. Just I know for myself that Toyota does not meet my quality expectations. My idea of quality is different. For me 1-2-3 year old car should not have chips.
About the European market, which you can verify yourself, Ford is second in sales. Since Ford can please the picky Europeans with the "out-appearance" and reliability of their cars, obviously will be able to please my taste as well and will be my next choice!
I try to by the highest quality car possible - that's why I use MANY sources of data, not just my own observations, which of course are much more limited than using CR, True Delta, JD Power, etc. etc.
Good luck with Ford - they have some positives, but also some negatives. I won't discuss the brand new (400 miles) Ford Focus I had recently on a business trip. Looked nice, but.... At first I thought the transmission may have been an anomaly, since my own experience is too limited. Except I looked at some other sources of data about the same car - my complaints were pretty common. But they are good, and getting better, hope yours is good.
What I don't like about European brands is the lower reliability. They are lower than most brands, per many sources. But they have their advantages.
I'll just leave it at that. Ford in Europe #2 in sales. Great. Toyota worldwide I think is #2, GM #1 in sales. Sales is a good indicator, but not the only one I look at.
Anyway, waxing a clear coated car four times a year sounds like overkill to me. Perhaps your using something too harsh that might be removing the clear coat. There are cheaper polishing compounds out there that if they over used they will damage the paint.