2008 Toyota Highlander engine problems

Filed Mar 6, 2026 · Engine · 100,000 miles · NY · fire · 1 injury

The contact owned a 2008 Toyota Highlander. The contact stated that while driving at approximately 20 MPH, an abnormal, booming sound was emitted from the vehicle as heavy, black smoke entered her vehicle. Due to the smoke, the contact's vision became obstructed, and the contact immediately shifted into park and jumped out of her vehicle for safety. It was unknown if there were any warning lights. As a result, the contact injured her right hip and strained her vocal cords. The vehicle quickly became engulfed in flames as authorities were called to the scene. The fire department extinguished the flames as both a fire and a police report were filed. The vehicle was towed to an independent mechanic, where it was deemed a total loss. There was no property damage. The origin of the fire was unknown, and an investigation was opened by the insurance company. The contact sought medical attention the next day and was treated for the strain on her right hip. The manufacturer was notified of the failure, and the contact was given a case number. The contact was also informed that she would receive a response from them within 45 days. The vehicle was destroyed. The failure mileage was approximately 100,000.

Filed Mar 14, 2024 · Engine · AZ

The engine burns Coolant and yet doesn't overheat. The engine on cyl 4 misfires. Changing the head gasket didn't repair the issue, replacing all fuel Injectors and ignition parts didn't either. Heads inspected and passed. Compression testing passed. Always misfires on cyl 4. No repair aside from an ecu reflash or replacement seems to be possible. 4 shops looks at it and couldn't find any reason why it was misfiring and no traces of water were found in the interior, on the floor, in the oil or exhaust in the cooling system.

Filed Nov 12, 2021 · Engine, Fuel system · OR

On January 19, 2021, after driving for about two hours, I suddenly started to hear an unusual knocking noise from the engine. I slowed down, but I was unable to pull over immediately because I was driving on a very dark two lane highway, with no safe shoulder. After the same noise continued for about five to ten minutes, a light began to flash indicating extremely low oil pressure, and warning that the car should stop immediately. At that point, fortunately, I was able to pull over at a gas station, where I discovered that oil was gushing from my engine onto the ground. I checked my oil dipstick and noted that the car had no oil, and was thus inoperable. I was extremely concerned that the engine had been damaged while being driven with little to no oil. In 2014, Toyota issued a notice of a Warranty Enhancement Program – ZE2, related to extending warranty coverage for repairs related to a leaking or seeping engine oil cooler pipe. I never received any owner notification of this issue in 2014. Toyota refused to pay for the repair in 2021, and now in November 2021, the engine has quit due to the damage incurred in January 2021. The engine oil cooler pipe is defective and my family could have been seriously injured or killed by its catastrophic failure.

Filed Sep 29, 2021 · Engine · CA

On September 25, 2021, my husband was driving our 2008 Highlander locally to the store. The low pressure light came on and said pull over immediately. He pulled over and and checked the oil dip stick and our car was totally out of oil. He also notice oil under our car and a line of oil going up the street. The following day, I contacted Toyota Experience Center and was informed their were no service campaigns on my Highlander. I had the car towed to my local mechanic and he verified that the car had no oil and replaced the failed oil cooler hose. My concern is that the oil cooler hose failed, draining all of the oil in minutes. I feel this is a safety issue because of how rapidly it occurred and If we couldn't immediately stop the car our engine could have seized up and made the car stop.

Filed Dec 14, 2020 · Engine · 160,000 miles · TX

I was driving my vehicle on a short trip on the highway with my eight year old daughter when a hose on the engine oil cooling assembly burst. This resulted in all of the oil in the vehicle being drained in a very short amount of time. No warning light came on as a result of this. I didn't discover the issue until pulling back into my driveway in which there is an incline. Then the light indicating low oil pressure finally came on. I opened the hood and found the dipstick to be completely dry. I also found a slow drip of oil under the car (only slow since it was only a small amount of oil remaining). I then discovered that the entire undercarriage of the vehicle as well as the back hatch of the vehicle were covered with oil. My daughter and I are very fortunate that the oil that covered the vehicle did not catch fire and as far as I know the oil slick on the highway did not cause any accidents. I am now being told by toyota that this is a known issue, but it is not listed as a recall. Not only did their known engineering issue put my family and other families' lives in danger, they are also not willing to pay for the repairs of the damage to the vehicle that their known defect caused. There is a "warranty enhancement" that was issued by toyota for this defect. According to toyota the warranty enhancement notice was issued to the previous owner of my vehicle and I was not made aware of the issue. I have also had other work performed at the dealership since then and was never made aware of the defect or warranty enhancement. I am trying to understand how a manufacturer can know a defect exists that can potentially cause engine seizure, fire and accidents, but not issue a recall. Instead they limit the notice to a "warranty enhancement" which isn't caught by the dealership from a VIN check.

Filed Dec 3, 2020 · Engine · 146,000 miles · NM · fire

While driving on i40 near texas/nm state line, oil cooler line failed resulting in the highlander dumping oil on the roadway for over a mile before it was noticed. Pulled off immediately, saw oil pouring out from bottom passenger side of engine cover. Exterior lower passenger side and rear of vehicle were also covered in oil. No dash indicator lights ever warned of issue. This left us stranded on side of busy interstate with heavy semi traffic for hours while waiting for a tow to a shop for repairs, where we had to wait a day for the part. Completely unacceptable toyota knew of a defective design that could lead to accidents and death, and chose not to issue a recall! Will be seeking legal action.

Filed Nov 19, 2020 · Engine · 119,000 miles · TN

The incident happened while I was driving my family north on interstate 81 at 1:00 am. We were traveling at about 75 MPH. In my driver-side mirror, I noticed what looked like a mist getting kicked up behind the car and covering the rear window. In the dark, I couldn't tell if it was water or some other liquid. The road was dry so my wife and I planned to get off on the next exit and inspect the car, we had children in the car, and stopping on the side of the road did not seem safe. While we were looking for the next exit, I kept looking for indicator lights to come on and checking the temperature gauge to see if I could discern if there was anything wrong with the vehicle. No indicator lights came on and the temperature gauge stayed within normal levels. Then after a few minutes, about 5-6 minutes, the engine seized. All of the indicator lights came on and the display said there was a problem with the vsc system. Thankfully the car continued to roll and I was able to pull the car to the side of the road and turn on the emergency blinkers and called for assistance. When finally we got the car towed to the nearest toyota dealership we were informed that the oil coolant line had "blown" and our engine had seized from a loss of engine oil. Two weeks before this incident the car also displayed the vsc warning so we had the car towed to beaman toyota where we paid 1818.60 to have, among other things, the water pump and drive belt replaced. Knowing we were going on the above trip we had all the recommended repairs performed so we could be confident in the car during our trip.

Filed Sep 15, 2020 · Electrical, Engine · 151,000 miles · UT

2008 highlander hybrid limited check engine light came on and showed code p0a1b - drive motor 'a' control module, the code was cleared manually and the check engine light went off, the next day the light came back on after driving about 3 miles then parked. The next day the light went off on its own as we took it to the toyota dealership and has not been back on since driving it there and back, the dealership said they drove around a little and the light never came on, we brought it home and have driven about 7 miles without the light coming on. According to the local toyota dealership and corporate toyota there are no recalls for our VIN but it is showing all signs of the inverter assembly recall that affected 235,000 vehicles in the recall. Toyota quoted the repair at $9000+ and even though it has the symptoms of the recalled vehicles they will not fix it because it is not on the recall list and there is nothing they can do. The repair cost is more than the value of the car.

Filed Sep 9, 2020 · Engine · 131,000 miles · CT · fire

I had an engine oil cooler hose rupture at 131000 miles. I left an oil slick a mile long on the street causing a hazard in the road and a mess in my garage. Engine oil had sprayed all over the lower half of the engine and onto the catalytic converter which was heavily smoking and I noticed a small fire down in the lower half of the engine compartment so I had to pour water on the fire. Toyota has known about this issue for a good 7 years because I received a "warranty enhancement notice" (ze2) in 2014 stating that the oil cooler hose could spring a "leak" and they were extending the warranty for said part to 10 years or 150,000 miles. But toyota played down the severity of the issue stating that a majority of vehicles with this known defective part wouldn't fail. Toyota knew that the rubber hose will fail on all vehicles due to the heat/cool cycle by its close proximity to the catalytic converter (about 6 inches away) so they redesigned the oil cooler lines to be all metal. All toyota/lexus vehicles with the 2gr-fe engine (2007-2011) will experience this catastrophic failure of the rubber oil cooler hose(s) over time and I'm sure vehicle fires have already happened due to this known design flaw.

Filed Jul 20, 2020 · Engine · 82,652 miles · NY · fire

Tl* the contact owns a 2008 toyota highlander. The contact stated that while driving approximately 65 MPH, smoke was suddenly present coming from under the passenger side of the front hood before the engine stalled. After stopping and examining under the hood it was discovered no oil was present in the engine and oil had spilled onto the engine. The vehicle was towed to an independent mechanic who diagnosed that the engine oil cooler line had burst causing oil to leak from the engine. The vehicle was not yet repaired. The manufacturer was notified of the failure. The local dealer was not contacted. The failure mileage was 82,652.