Crack In The Engines Body After Stalling Of Hybrid Malfunction

[nick the great]

I am an owner of a RX400h 2006 . One month ago while i was driving, the car stopped suddenly with a Huuuuge metallic sound like some one put a crowbar inside the engine and stop it Lights on the dash board of "check hybrid system" went on. I contacted the local dealer (in Greece) and they informed me that my car was on recall for the hybrid system , although they haven't informed previously on time before the stalling of the engine that could be fatal for me.Anyway after replacement of the system the car was doing well till few days ago when a peculiar sound was coming out of the petrol engine when it was starting up for one or two minutes and with vibration of the car. This phenomenon was going more and more worse and i decided to send it back to the dealer. The final "diagnosis" : crack in the engines body.!! I am wondering if any one has ever experienced a similar fault. I ll give more details. The engine has 145.000 Km , all services on time, the range of winter temperature in the place I live is 8 -20 degrees Celsius above zero. Finally an other question that I would like to address is how possible is the stalling of the engine ,due to hybrid malfunction, could cause the crack of the engine body considering the huge sound that was created and the instant immobilization of the vehicle. Thank you in advance. Any reply appreciated because the dealer asks for me to cover the cost on the engine replacement.

[lenore]

Sounds really strange to me, When they replaced the system, do you mean the inverter system or just the IPM recall board. The board should have had nothing to do with the engine failing. Now if the replaced the inverter, than they would have had to remove the transaxle from the car and maybe messed up something when putting it back on the Gas engine. I am not understanding exactly what they did.?

[RX400h]

I've been on this forum ever since we bought our RX (new) and have never seen mention of a cracked engine. Therefore, I agree with Lenore that your dealership's previous "fix" may have been done incorrectly. If possible, take or have your vehicle towed to a different dealership for diagnonis.

[nick the great]

Thank you for your reply. They said to me that because of the engine stall they had to replace the whole hybrid unit and not just the IPM. Today that I spoke to them they were not sure what is happening and that yesterday they would have put the water of the car under pressure for the whole night and they will remove an ignition plug to see if water comes in . I dont know if this makes any sense to you but I see them more sceptical , and that they will have to investigate more to see what's happening..

[nick the great]

Dear Rx 400h in Greece there is only one Lexus service authorised dealer in Athens. Actually I live in Patras 200 km west of Athens and I had to send the car to them.

[lenore]

Sorry to hear that, I think they messed up something when they replaced the hybrid transmission. Sounds to me they left something loose between the engine and transmission and it came loose and maybe took out the engine block or possibly a freeze plug.....

[RX400h]

Yes, over-tightening some structural hardware can result in stress cracks. This type of thing would almost never happen on its own unless it were a design defect.

[nick the great]

Anyway the thing is that I dont have a car anymore. The engine has a crack and is useless. The commercial value of the whole rx400h (2006) in Greece of economical crisis is about 9000 euros. A used engine is about 4500 euros placed in the car.Also I have to mention that I had to pay 2000 euros per year for an other 3 years which is the tax of "luxurius living " for the government. So what will you recommend to do ?. To take a same used car for 9000 and sell mine for parts maybe for 3000-4000? . To put on a used engine with warranty only for 2 mons? or to shift gears to an other car as being disappointed from Lexus?. To address your thoughts, the service guys deny any correlation of the previous "fix" and the crack in the engine. According to them it just happened. Do you suggest to send an email to European headquarters of Lexus asking their opinion about those things?. Is there available any email to help me out. Thank you again for your support

[lenore]

Your problem is the very first that I have ever heard of a cracked engine block. Something went wrong, and I still feel that the mechanics had something to do with it. I do not know what solutions you have in Europe, but would suggest contacting your regions lexus headquarters. Something is very wrong with this whole story.

[nick the great]

Dear Lenore Happy birtday!! Thankyou for your advice I ve just sent the firt of my posts to the email of the Paneuropean Lexus site. Its Friday afternoon in Europe but I hope till Monday or Tueday I will have a statement from them .

[RX400h]

I think a Lexus regional or national representative, along with a mechanic not associated with your dealership, should investigate the cracked engine. If it is fould to be a casting defect, a full (at no cost) replacement should be offered to you.

[nick the great]

I ve sent an email to the contact form of www.lexus.eu web site. It is the only one i managed to find that will accept an email . Anyway I ll like to ask for a favor . Would be kind enough to show me a European web site to ask for a Lexus regional or national representative, along with a mechanic not associated with my dealership, as RX400 nicely recommends?

[RX400h]

Sometimes the owner's manual lists contact information. I haven't checked ours, but you might want to check yours.

Also, the Lexus UK contact person may be able to refer you to the specific number:

http://www.lexus.co.uk/legal.tmex#/CTA/contact

[nick the great]

Hi an update is that the European Lexus contacted the service and they arranged to sent a "hitech" engineer to examine my car. I think that's a good progress in the whole story. We ll expect the results . I ll keep you informed .Thanks again

[nick the great]

Hi to everyone. The techinician who examined the car send a report that there was codes P0300, P0303, P0304 on the obd report consistent with misfire of the two cylinders. Then they examined the ingintion system of the car and nothing it was found to be wrong. Afterwards they noticed low level of the cooling fluid and press the system for half an hour.Using video recording they noticed cooling fluid to run into the 4th cylinder. The final report says that there is a crack on the "head" of the engine (I dont know how to translate that, it is the upper part of the engine , where the valves are) and it has nothing to do with the hybrid system replacement.Also they mention that the two "heads" of the engine have to be removed in order to find the reason of the cooling leakage . the cost will be around 3000 euros when a used engine costs around 4000 euros placed in. This means that I have to search for a used engine, a "heart donor" . Its wothtelling that they dont mention any possible explanation for what went wrong to this engine. Also they dont comment on my question if the stalling of the engine due to hybrid malfunction could be the cause of the crack Any comments?

[lenore]

If they only found coolant leakage in one head, why are they removing both heads. I would question that. Sometimes just a bad head gasket would be the problem and should be a quick resolution. As for the head being cracked they would have to take the cylinder head off and exam properly. Sounds like to me you just need a new head gasket and make the usual checks on the head to make sure it meets all specifications. While they are doing this off course the Timing belt etc would have to be removed. Good luck.

[nick the great]

Hi to anyone in the forum. Finally on Thursday April 10, 2014 I decided to get the car from the

service in Athens and drove it back to my city Patras 300 km. After those initial 20 seconds of
vibration and metallic sound the car worked fine with very good performance, as always, no sighs of overheating.

Since that day I have used the car regularly,as normal. I have done over 1500 km driving it in the city but also upsloping to mountains , one hour of vigorous driving up to 1300 meters high mountain. There is no coolant shortage, (it is on the max indication fixed over this period) no overheating, no oil shortage or change of color. The only problem, the same familiar sound and vibration only on start up for 20 sec, not all the times. I have noticed that
if after turning the ignition switch on to “ready”, you put the gear box to ( R) and with your left foot on the brake , you start the combustion engine by pressing the accelerator pedal there is no vibration heard but only a slight metallic
sound.(listen to the attached sound file)Voice00006.mp3Voice00009.mp3 If you wait for 30 seconds then you are free to go !.

During this initial period if you put the gear box from the ( R ) position to ( P ) or to ( D ) things
are very bad with the car to vibrate and the metallic sound to be loud - very-very
bad, like something is loose in the gear box and trying to find its place to
fit!. An other hint !. If you are stopped in the city with batteries level of
energy at the lower lever where the combustion engine automatically starts ,
the same vibration (no metallic sound) is evident and once I had to put the
gear box from ( P ) to ( R ) for 20 secs , with the brake pedal pressed in
order the system to work smoothly. Also yesterday I met a guy who replaced the hybrid to the same dealer for the recall and after some time the car had the same behaviour. The same ,one and only authorized service in Greece , informed him that there is a crack on the engine !!.Of course after this crack his has done 40000 km without any problem. I think that something is really wrong with those cracks!!!. Any solution to avoid the one and only service dealer issue and fix our cars? Thanks

[nick the great]

Dear members . It has been a long time since I ve posted something for this engine crack.All this time I have driven the car normally. The rattle noise at the staring of the engine was causing (my guess) from the ansyngronus engine movement due to water into the 4th cylinder for the first 3-4 minutes. After 1000 miles there was a loss of 250cc of coolant fluid.The service of lexus had done the correct "diagnosis". After thinking about the options I decided to put k-seal into the water. After 30 minutes of driving the engine worked more smoothly and there was no fluid loss , no rattle noise at the starting of the engine.So after a week I changed the coolant, removed the k-seal. Everything was ok for about 5000 miles. Recently during driving up on a hill there was some short bits of loss of power like chocking of the engine. There is no noise at the starting of the engine but this "chocking" when you drive on uphill or with more than 100-120 KW load.The toyota diagnostic showed misfire of the 4th cylinder. Talking with the local mechanic I decided to change the 6 ignition plugs and the ignition coil of the 4th cylinder.The car worked perfect for an other 1500 miles.After that gradually developed the same "chocking" on the load of 100 KW and more. There was also fluid loss. The other day as I was looking around the car I ve notice that there is some coolant spilled over in the front of the car. This was coming from a crack in the front plastic part of the radiator where the upper main tube coming from the engine is attached. I couldnt believe that there was an other crack , in the radiator this time. Although there might be a logical explanation for this event :perhaps the k-seal stuff blocked some parts of the radiator -although it has been removed - the pressure of the water rised and the crack caused because of this.I really dont known what went so wrong with this car but I realized that time has come to deal serioully with this issue.One of the options I have is to buy a used engine from the States. Are you aware of any incompatibility between USA sold combustion engines of RX400h 2006-2008 and the European ones? Any comments to the whole story?