RECALL: Toyota FJ Cruiser

Well my opinion if it matters is this…. TOyota had a recall and recalled their vehicles. Good. GM has a recall and recalled their vehicles good. Cars are MACHINES BUILT BY PEOPLE! SOmetimes they will have problems, sometimes not! It cracks me up how many people wil defend one company about a recall and then turn and tear into another company. I agree with those of you who say, it is how they HANDLE the recall…. My Ford I had, the dealership would tell me I would not have to have my recalled item fixed since it was not broken….WHAT??? So then the whole time I drove and something went wrong, made a noise or whatever, I freaked out thinking oh there goes that part….if the Ford dealer would have just fixed it, I would not feel that way, needless to say I will not buy another Ford, because of HOW IT WAS HANDLED! Now I have a MINI and any little thing, anything that I have had a concern with has been fixed, no questions….and I fel alot better about my car. So as for this recall, it is just that, a recall, how it is handled by the dealership will give the reputation as to if it is a good recall or a sour one….

I agree with chewy. Its a product improvement that Toyota has taken the initiative to fix. It goes to show you which automakers are concerned about their reputation no matter what. No politics involved. Makes people feel good about their Toyotas.

Toyota is recalling 9.000 cars, while VW has to recall 34.000 cars which were built only in a 2 month period.

Chewy ur 1st post is stupid, dont u think Toyota (being one of the biggest companies in the world) will eventually make some mistakes.

And the same thing with VW.

You can look at it two ways.

In the Passat case they had a high percentage of issues during that two month period, or they QC people caught it early before is became several hundred thousand units.

Either way it is the way it is handled.

Yep it is a recall. A tire improperly mounted counts. But let me tell you this. I'm a Toyota Dealer and have had other franchises including GM, Ford, Hyundai, Mitsubishi, Isuzu.
Here is my view from 33 years sevicing vehicles and trying to keep customers satisfied. Toyota and Honda give the customer products with the lowest probabilty of major aggravating defects and problems. I love driving German cars including VW's. But my technicians life is a lot easier than their counterparts at VW. for a few significant reasons. In many cases VW denies problems and blames the tech. that pisses a lot of people off. How would you like to do a head gasket job over as a comeback and not get paid for it? I saw the exact same thing with Ford. Pressuring us not to exceed a certain level of warranty repairs, threatening us with full blown audits if our warranty repairs looked high. Telling us not to repair warranty coverable repairs that we would discover while repairing a customers car, unless it was safety related. That kind of corporate "Philosophy" is nothing more than CRAP. VW has great products with some problems but they do not support their technicians, stores and ultimately their customers. It is a shame. Read Automotive News, learn. BMW and M.B., are finally getting it and will continue to thrive. They changed their attitude. Toyota saw what happened to GM and knows it could happen to them if they they don't maintain quality, and thats why the odds are they will contnue to be successful. I can concentrate on running my business, taking care of my employees and of course satisfying customer. That is why a Toyota franchise is the most desireble in the Industry.

Do you think it is possible to screen out people who may be psychotic?

What a strange one eh?

OK, I will try: 'What were your issues Suhaimi?'

Ya...too many Toyota fans sucking on its teet. Toyota is a damn good car company, but come on...NOTHING IS PERFECT!

Just be happy that automakers are looking out for their customers before it escalates. ALL automanufacturers get screwed by faulty parts from 3rd party vendors/companies. Its part of the business. How they handle it is what makes the true difference.

... let's all just get drunk and have a party.

How does it say in black and white Recall and you Toyota fans can't seem to accept it. GM has more recalls in a year than VW has had in a decade. You wanna talk facts? Ok the fact is that Toyota is now trying to play in a market they never could. When you want to get into innovation you wind up with glitches. This is also why Lexus is no longer in the JD power top spot. They were dethroned after a 6 year run by Porsche on the IQS survey. I'm not here to bash Toyota nor praise VW. I only get tired of this blind talk as if Toyota was incapable of making mistakes. I'm also amazed at how this became a VW witch hunt. Fact is VW has been over contenting cars for years and now Nissan and Toyota have to because the game has been stepped up. The more technology you have in a car the more likely you are to have issues. It's just a fact. Now that Lexus/Toyota are trying to hang with the Germans they too now suffer from similar issues. Man it's not even worth my typing!

Good morning! Look I absolutely understand how pissed off you are, I would be as well. I enjoy sharing my experiences dealing with many different manufacturers, and if you own a group of dealerships foreign, domestic, Asian, German etc., You are likely to be happier with the Toyota Store. We look at the franchises the way someone looks at the car. Less problems...that's good. More problem's that's not so good....lots of problems, your out of business. If you are right, Toyota will fail or fall from grace. Based upon how they deal with their problems, their store owners, their customers and last but not least their suppliers, it is unlikely that they will fail.

Wow! You anti-Toyota guys will say anything to ignore the fact that we're talking about 9,000 vehicles affected by non-Toyota product and installation.

Spend more time cursing the VW/GM/D-C/Ford/BMW/et al recalls with more significant numbers and compelling design issues.

well its all so well for you guys out there. But for us consumers in Africa and who are interested in buying the 2007 Fj Cruiser how do we tell that we are not acquiring one of the recalled products whose defect has not been fixed. For instance I was in the process of purchasing one from a car dealer here in Nigeria when I got the news about the recall and beat a hasty retreat. The car's chasis number is JTEBU11F770013405 but I was at a loss on how to confirm that it was not one of the recalled products that had been brought to Nigeria by some dubious businessman. This is especially so when I also discovered that the ca had a bridgestone or dunlop tire (now i cannot recall exactly which one but surely one of the two).

The car is still very much on the stand as I see it every day I drive to work. I still hunger for it though. Kindly advise me on how to, or better still you can do so for me, confirm the true status of this car. If it is confirmed that the defect is been rectified I could go ahead and buy. But if its not then there is need to warn other innocent buyers.
Abiye