Engine head bolts stripped causing antifreeze loss, head had to be resurfaced, new head gasket, and a special kit was need to re-thread the loose bolts repairs cost over $3000 . Which is better than a new engine but repairs aren't guaranteed because this is a factory defect with this particular engine. Had I known this I wouldn't have purchased this particular make of car.
2002 Toyota Camry engine complaints
Page 3 of 7: complaints 41 to 70 of 165, newest first, as owners wrote them.
Coolant leak due to apparent stripped head bolts due to manufacturer defect.
Began noticing gurgling/water sloshing noises at approximately 100k miles. Approximately one month later, car overheated. Noticed coolant was low, so had coolant refilled. Checked out by mechanic next day and was told that a stop-leak would fix problem. Completed this procedure at personal cost. Three days later, car overheated again. Took to different mechanic, and was advised to replace radiator. Replaced radiator at personal cost. Few days later, car overheated again. Took to four different mechanics and noticed coolant leaks. Was advised by all four mechanics that it was blown head gasket, that this was a common problem with this make/model, that replacing the engine would be safest solution. One mechanic also said that simply replacing head gasket might not work because the bolt threading in this particular model was known to be defective. Cannot afford $4000 to replace engine, especially if this same problem can possibly recur. Currently refilling coolant every other day.
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry. The contact stated that while driving approximately 65 MPH, the engine overheated as the temperature warning indicator. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic for diagnosis. The engine cylinder head blot was stripped and replaced with a new one however, the transmission failed. The vehicle was not repaired for the most recent failure. The manufacturer was not notified of the problem. The approximate failure mileage was 125,000.
The coolant started leaking from behind the motor. My mechanic looked at it and said that the foam insulation was saturated with coolant and it was leaking from there, between the head and the cylinder. When I researched about it online in many toyota forums, the common thing that I have come across is that there is a problem with the head bolts stripping and the coolant leaking from that area. My mechanic said that I either need a new engine or do a fix the stripped head bolts with a heli-coil or a time-sert. This is very disappointing with toyota, that they are not acknowledging the defect with there 5th gen 4 cyl 2az-fe engines and are refusing to do anything about. The solution that they are giving is a very expensive one of getting a new engine for $5000. This needs to be addressed by toyota or someone needs to make them take notice of this issue.
The is a service bulletin regarding the replacement of the catalytic converter and reprogramming the ecu. I don't think toyota notifies current owners of free work to be done that is not an actual recall. Instead they wait to see who finds out on their own. The service bulletin tsb 2404 dated 07-01-04 covers the replacement of the catalytic converter and reprogramming the ecu to resolve the problem. It mentions the smell of sulfur from the exhaust and was apparently the only reason most people had it checked out. My wife's car has had the smell of sulfur for a few years now, but since we don't make it a habit of making our car exhaust smell pleasant we never thought anything of it. Now, the check engine light is on and the catalytic converter needs to be replaced but her car is over the 8 year, 80,000 mile limit of the tsb. If we were notified of toyota's design error earlier and had the catalytic converter replaced and the ecu reprogrammed for free, we would not be looking at a $1000 repair bill in our future. We should not have to pay for toyota's error, we already paid for the car.
After taking my car to a local mechanic because of overheating, a coolant leak, and misfiring, I brought my camry to a certified toyota dealership. I explained to the toyota representative of the fore mentioned issues. After conducting an inspection, the toyota rep. Told me I had a bad coil in cylinder #2, and found pressure leaking into #2 and #3 cylinders. After a further tear down of the engine, it was discovered that the engine had loose head bolts in these cylinders, and that the threads on the engine for these bolts was stripped. They told me that there is no fix to this problem and quoted me a new engine with 90,000 miles with an estimate cost between $5000-$6000. Furthermore, I was told replacing the coil at $227, would fix the misfiring. However this did not fix the misfiring problem, as the misfire was due because of the loose head bolts which was explained to me by the dealership as well. This conflicting information LED me to believe it was safe to drive the vehicle as long as coolant was plentiful in the radiator and over flow reservoir. However, the overheating, leaking of coolant and misfiring continues. The misfiring creates dangerous random stalls.
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry. The contact stated while driving approximately 40 MPH the temperature gauge increased rapidly into the red zone. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic who stated that the radiator was leaking and the thermostat was defective. The vehicle was repaired. Smoke also emitted from the engine two hours after the vehicle was repaired. The vehicle was taken to both an independent mechanic and dealer for inspection. The dealer detected that the engine cylinder head bolts were striped and the engine needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The approximate failure mileage was 180,000. The VIN was unavailable.
Harsh/hard/delayed shifting between 2nd and 3rd or 2nd and 4th (overdrive) on 1mz-fe v6 engine due to faulty engine control module failing to regulate transmission solenoids properly. This issue occurred on the ECM on rav4 (same year, 2002) and resulted in settlement in which toyota agreed to repair all.
Cylinder head bolt stripped off from engine block thread and damaged the engine.
Blown head gasket on 2002 toyota camry le. Apparently this is a manufacturer defect as evidenced by all the blogs on the internet. Something should be done to compensate the consumer for this defect.
Vehicle was stopped and putting in drive, car accelerated and crashed through garage door and brick frame on 4/19/13 at approximately 11:50am for unknown reason.
Car was overheating and we didn't know why. The reservoir was full of coolant so we took it into a mechanic to see what the problem was with the cooling system. We were told we needed a new head gasket. We left the car with the mechanic and he found that 3 bolts for the engine block were loose (he could easily pull them out with his hands and the threading came with them). He had never seen this before so he looked online and found this was a common problem. The car had about 109k miles on it. Looking on this site shows that toyota has a service bulletin on it.
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry. The contact stated that the check engine warning lamp was illuminated. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic, who diagnosed that the head bolts were stripped. As a result, the engine had to be either replaced or rebuilt. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure but did not offer any assistance since the vehicle was not included in any recalls. The vehicle was repaired. The VIN was not available. The failure and current mileage was 137,000.
2002 toyota camry. Consumer writes to request a full investigation against a local dealer for fraudulent and deceptive business practices related to their vehicle not starting
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry le. The contact stated that while driving approximately 60 MPH, a clicking noise occurred when the accelerator pedal was depressed and the vehicle stalled. The vehicle was towed to an independent mechanic who diagnosed that the engine needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure who did not offer any assistance since the vehicle was no longer under warranty. The approximate failure was 110,000.
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry. The contact was driving 65 MPH when smoked was emitted from the engine compartment and the vehicle stalled. The vehicle was towed to the dealer who diagnosed that the cylinder head developed a cracked. The manufacturer was not contacted. The failure and the current mileage was 175,000.
I bought this car new in 2002 and have maintained it meticulously. The car overheated for the first time since I bought it on 7/9/12. When I took it to the shop on 7/11/12 for evaluation of the problem, I was told that the cylinder head bolts were defective, causing the car to lose coolant resulting in the overheating incident. The auto shop also told me that this is a design or manufacturing defect that is well known, but toyota refuses to recall these vehicles for repair. The cost of repair is approximately $2200.00 to $2400.00, if it can be repaired. If it cannot be repaired, the engine will have to be replaced at a much higher cost. I went on line to carcomplaints.com and found many other complaints of this same exact problem from other 2002 camry owners around the USA.
My 2002 camry had no issues until at about 211,000 miles when antifreeze started to leak from back of engine. After mechanic inspected, he said water had gotten into head gasket. When he tried to remove bolts we noticed three back bolts were loose already and thread was stripped. After having head gasket cleaned and "repaired" this repair guy said there wasn't anything wrong with head itself. All he did was inspect, clean, and sand it. He did say it is a common problem he encounters with toyota's. The only repair he says will work is to have engine block removed and he will rethread all the holes with different material to make sure it doesn't happen again. None of this is a sure fix because it could still fail, the only sure way is to buy a new engine, but if toyota makes defective head gaskets, this will happen again. I have always swore by toyota cars, that is all I have ever owned but I will never buy a vehicle from them again.
Bad threads on engine block. Engine leaking coolant. Mechanic determined head gasket bad. Toyota certified mechanic tore apart engine and on reassembly found the threads on the lower engine block were stripped and this was the cause of the head gasket failure. New engine/rebuild required at $5200. Failure caused by faulty threads/engine block at manufacturing end. Simply driving vehicle causes threads to disintegrate and catastrophic engine failure.
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry. The contact was driving 70 MPH when a burning smell emitted inside the vehicle. The vehicle was taken to a private mechanic where the mechanic confirmed that the head gasket needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not repaired. The failure and current mileages were 100,000.
Radiator/oil cooler copper nipple disintegrated causing loss of oil. Part that failed is original part of vehicle. The nut holding the nipple rusted and crumbled causing the oil cooler hose to separate from the oil cooler. Car has never had front end or any other damage.
I have a 2003 toyota camry and have major damage to cylinder block with stripped head bolts. Cost is approx $4700 to repair. I talked to executive offices at toyota they will not help. Also has caused coolant to leak into engine. Please see http://www.camryforums.com/forum/general-tech-8/2002-stripped-head-bolts-4585/ and check out the "technical service bulletin tsb2740.
Tl* the contact owns a 2002 toyota camry. The contact stated that the vehicle was overheating. The vehicle was taken to a private mechanic for diagnosis when the contact was informed that the engine was leaking coolant and needed to be replaced. The dealer did not offer any assistance and the manufacturer had not been notified of the failure. The vehicle had not been repaired. The current and the failure mileages were 135,000.
2002 toyota camry. Consumer writes in regards to engine problems *tgw the consumer stated his mechanic wanted to charge him an additional $3,450 to perform valve work and other repairs to the engine. The consumer stated when he started the vehicle in the morning time, a plume of exhaust smoke could visibly be seen.
Three head bolts in the engine have stripped and pulled out of the engine block. The largest consequence of this is a head gasket failure; this also caused coolant loss and overheating, which in turn ruined my radiator. When my mechanic opened up the engine to replace the head gaskets, these faulty bolts were loose and he was able to pull them out by hand without needing wrenches/tools. The total cost of the fix, which included drilling out and retapping the bolt holes, repairing/resurfacing heads, installing new head gaskets and installing a new radiator exceeded $3500; the only other option was buying a new/reconditioned engine for $7000+. Toyota refuses to admit that this line of cars has defective head bolts. My 2002 camry xle had about 98,000 miles on it at the time, which is not a lot by toyota standards. While searching internet forums, I have found many many other people with toyota vehicles (especially camrys from 2002 to 2005) that have had the same exact bolts fail on their engines, leading to blown head gaskets.
I was losing coolant in my system so I took it to my mechanic. He told me that the head bolts on my engine had become stripped and that I would need a new engine put in. I paid for that repair and now two years later I am having the same symptoms. I went on the internet and found that I am not alone with this problem. It seems that stripped threads are very common in 2002-2008 camrys. It is clearly a design defect. I cannot believe that a class action suit is not being arranged.
After waiting in line at a fast food outlet for about five minutes, my toyota camry's engine suddenly accelerated to very high rpms. Only my quick reaction to apply the brakes as hard as I could kept us from hitting the car ahead. The passenger reacted by pulling the emergency brake. Shutting off the ignition stopped the engine. It restarted normally and seemed to be fine.
2002 camry le with 153,000 suffered failure of catalyst and charcoal canister at time of state inspection. This is the third failure of the catalyst since purchase of the car. Dealer said that catalyst is only warrantied for one year from date of installation and gave an estimate of more than $1700 to complete repairs. Contact with toyota concerning this ongoing problem was a complete and total waste of time. Vehicle taken to private mechanic who performed repairs with conforming non oem parts carrying better warranties at half the price quoted by dealer.
It is 2002 toyota camry le with 2.4l 2az-fe engine. It happened while car was driven. Engine produced a loud bang and stalled. Did not started after cranking it. Before trip there was noticeable steam out of exhaust. After considering head gasket failure there was attempt to replace the gasket. During repair was found that several head bolts were loose due to striping from their sits. After digging in google it was found that was a common problem for this engines. It seems like it is a manufacturer design flow. All 2az-fe engines are prone to this because of inadequate heat dispersion at the back of the engine. Toyota customer service response is that they have nothing to do with it. This is a major design flow and there should be a recall. All engines from 2002 are prone to it.
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