Toyota bz4X

As I mentioned it here before 2 weeks ago. The German Toyota dealer Autoweber happened to know much more as they stated to me the delay can take well until September or beyond. At this stage I would recommend to pull the deposit for the first batch and get into an order for next year with the 11kW onboard charger.

Autoweber also said to me they have around 200 cars ready to go but cannot hand them over and no internal fix has been issued yet and he also mentioned its not the wheel nuts. There seems to be an issue with two wheel hub bolts that shearing off under force when turning etc. at least that's what their internal checkup revealed but there seems to be another issue with the suspension strut mounting as well, which was reported by a few German dealers to Toyota when cars arrived. They made cranky noises when offloading from the trucks etc.

Anyway, their sales guy was utterly pissed and annoyed about the lack of communication from Toyota as he faced multiple phone calls from customers that are waiting for their car. He also has barely any space for new car arrivals. They had to rent up additional space in the business estate to move the cars according to him.

Would have loved the car despite some small tech disadvantages but it is what it is.

Notwithstanding the fact that Toyota have communicated poorly.

There is nonetheless even if everything goes well a process they need to follow....

1) they find out there's an issue.

2) investigations into how widespread the issue is and wider implication.

3) establishing the exact fault and its causes.

4) developing and testing the solutions - this could take time because they need to ensure the fix actually works.

5) bring the fix to the production line and retrofit to already built cars.

Even if everything goes okay - this can take time.

Remember they possibly only found out about this a month ago

did Your dealer give you a delivery date HTC?

My dealer guy is away on hols and the person I spoke to say they'd still no update or details.

I was thinking the same.

How can they still not have a “remedy” for this? Is there something else going on that isn’t being talked about?

Well I posted it in the other discussion before.

Old dieselJul 29, 2022

Notwithstanding the fact that Toyota have communicated poorly.

There is nonetheless even if everything goes well a process they need to follow....

1) they find out there's an issue.

2) investigations into how widespread the issue is and wider implication.

3) establishing the exact fault and its causes.

4) developing and testing the solutions - this could take time because they need to ensure the fix actually works.

5) bring the fix to the production line and retrofit to already built cars.

Even if everything goes okay - this can take time.

Remember they possibly only found out about this a month ago

If it would be that easy.

to 1&2) this is actually a whole subject for itself and I am surprised that the fault went through all the instances in "Toyotas Quality Control" until to the point that they have to issue a recall.

The whole quality process involves not only the quality and safety of the product itself by running various tests, including the so called rattle and noise test over the intern test track. It also involves the manufacturing and production quality of all the processes involved as well as the quality of supplier products and their manufacturing process, which falls under a strict quality measurement in accordance to Toyotas Quality protocol. Also the fact that Toyotas manufacturing intelligence, that constantly monitors and gathers data from all aspects of the manufacturing processes, failed to highlight material issues is mind blowing. The data they gathered through Lexus and Rav4 builds throughout the years should have made all the manufacturing phases for the BZ pretty much bullet proof especially the suspension section inc. wheel hubs.

to 3&4) Its the first response within any manufacture plant. The cars get pulled after the QC line and get test driven and then put into the "Afterwork" section to investigate. The fact that an internal fix hasn't been found yet leads strongly to the suspicion that there is a material issue with one of the supplier parts like the mounting bolts, suspension strut or wheel hub itself. Investigating the issue on supplier site is a bit more tricky especially when we talk about material fatigue in early stages. Material science can be a bitch in that regard and finding out why the bolt is shearing off on this vehicle but not on other vehicles can be head wrecking. Just replacing the bolts and parts was probably tested but results were the same I assume. This could lead to a whole new production process of newly engineered parts and this will take time to commence.

to 5) Common procedure but supply in plants works with the inventory strategy JIT (Just in time). If a supply issue is detected for a particular car, production stops until the parts meet the quality measurements and until the new parts are delivered JIT, nothing is gonna move. Refitting the built cars only works in the "Afterwork" section and will take massive time if we talk about a couple of thousand cars. One of the biggest BMW plants in Greenville/Spartenburg has about 12 "Afterwork sections" with shift work in place. (Worked in that plant for 2 years and a few others around the world afterwards) Refitting built cars and replacing all wheel hubs and front suspensions takes an awful lot of time, resources and capacity and more testing in the end. Toyota might not have the resources so just scrapping the cars is a quicker solution and also very common.

Just as an example, about 97x 2006 Built BMW X5s back in 2006 when I worked in SC were just fully scrapped within 2 weeks because of a whining noise above 80miles coming from the drive train. Dozens of qualified Quality Engineers and Manufacturing Engineers inc. myself went through the cars and taking the gear boxes and drive trains apart and we couldn't identify where the noise was coming from. Still wondering until today what the issue was. However, replacing the gearbox and drive train wouldn't have been a problem but production was in full swing and it was quicker to built a 100 cars during a 12 hour shift then replacing 97 gearboxes and drive trains on an X5 which would have taken about 2-3 weeks. Imagine the time it would take to refit a couple of thousand suspensions or wheel hubs in Toyotas case.

Just as an example as how things can work out.

So in regards to the BZ. The couple of thousand undelivered BZs in Japan and China would take plenty of time to get refitted so they most likely considered to scrap them already to safe time and further damage of their reputation. They are just waiting for the internal fix by engineering and hoping its and easy one but that's usually not the case with suspension parts. They usually replace the whole section inc. the rectified parts so I guess scrapping will go ahead but the customer will never know whether his ordered car was scrapped, rebuilt or refitted. He will only know his recall issue was fixed in the end and the car is ready for delivery.

I am sure the closure of most Toyota plants in February due to Covid contributed to the recall as well.

Posted the official letter before. That's for the US only so far as cars have been delivered to customers unlike Europe.

Someone posted on FB they got an email from their dealer in the UK saying they were getting their car on the 19th sept…wonder will that mean the same for anyone else that ordered and will that apply to the Irish market ..

Anyone get a definite delivery date or is it still provisionally Nov/Dec?

Anyone offered one of these in November/December would be mad to take it as opposed to waiting a few months for a 231 reg but crucially for the 11kW onboard AC charger…..

y’all might be thinking the 7kW charger will be grand as you’ll mostly be charging at home anyway, and only DC charging while on the road…… but surely you all see how pants our DC charging network is here, and the benefit of 11kW AC charging over 7kW charging is not to be sniffed at….

11kW AC is the standard now (and soon it’ll probably be 22kW), and Ireland has plenty of 22kW AC chargers, so getting lumped with a 2022 car with only 7kW AC charging would be fairly detrimental to resale value down the road… (in my opinion anyway).

Say your away from home range and spending 3 hours on an AC22, would you be happy taking on 21kWh (29%) when you could of got 33kwh (46%)? That could be the difference in needing a fast charge (slow queue) on the way home or not…..

True, but I imagine if one refuses the car, they'll have to book a new one, which means God knows how many months of waiting and definitely an increased price..... its a bit of a two way street and Toyota controls the traffic.

For a new order with the 11kW onboard-charger next year they pretty much wont honor you the current trade in price they offered you. That was already confirmed to me by 2 dealers before I cancelled my order.

There’s rumours on Facebook that no fix has been found yet and the cars may have to be rebuilt ….it takes 10/11 weeks to transport them from Japan…I can’t see these being delivered until the new year….but who knows.._

If they do rebuild them, hopefully they'll rebuild them with the 11kw onboard chargers. 🤞