Rotten egg smell??

[JLR]

Hi guys,

ive only had the ksx-s awd for a few months now, but occasionally with the fan on low during driving, i get a really bad rotten egg smell that enters the car. Im not sure if its coming in via the vents, or from under the car or something. It doesnt seem to matter if its on heat, fan, or air con?

Ive read somewhere that a rotten egg smell can indicate the that the catalyic converter may be buggered.

Any one else experience this, or have any suggestons?

[Hado]

I've noticed the occasional RE smell outside the car at the end of a drive - but never inside the car

[JLR]

I've noticed the occasional RE smell outside the car at the end of a drive - but never inside the car

Yeah, its really bad. It would make you dry reach its that pongy! :(

[Blind Kid Seeks]

you'll find it smells worse after you have been driving your car hard...

it will get better, as your cat, and the exhaust will get worn a little.

[fish475]

you'll find it smells worse after you have been driving your car hard...

it will get better, as your cat, and the exhaust will get worn a little.

Dido, but you don't have too drive hard.

I have a slightly up hill drive way for 7 metres until it flattens out, drive up it and stop at the front of the roller door which is flat.

Bugger me that 6 dozen rotten egg smell hits us 7 out of 10 times.

When picking up my daughters and there friends, they honestly think their friends old man is ferral.:(

38,000 ks on and nothing has changed

Edited November 24, 2009 by fish475

[feral1]

you'll find it smells worse after you have been driving your car hard...

it will get better, as your cat, and the exhaust will get worn a little.

Dido, but you don't have too drive hard.

I have a slightly up hill drive way for 7 metres until it flattens out, drive up it and stop at the front of the roller door which is flat.

Bugger me that 6 dozen rotten egg smell hits us 7 out of 10 times.

When picking up my daughters and there friends, they honestly think their friends old man is ferral.:(

38,000 ks on and nothing has changed

I have not yet picked up my Kluger, I will be next week. But on the Smell, I get it with my ford BA. I first noticed it after the very first service. that service was done at 1500 km. I was told it was the fuel we are using ???? so I changed to 95 octaine. there was a bit of a difference in the smell. Plus when the car was tuned correctly it was less evident as well.

So by the sound of it I have to get use to the Kluger having the same smell ahh well.

Peter

[JLR]

Hmm. Seems to be a pretty common issue arising. Cars shouldn't be like this. We've had Hondas and Holdens throughout the family, and neither of them have had an issue with rotten egg smell from brand new.

[kirby7777]

I was going to make this similar thread a few months ago.

I have a one year old Kluger Grande. Right from the beginning I have been experiencing this rotten egg smell permeating the cabin from time to time.

Initially I thought one of the kids has farted. Somehow no one admitted to it. Then I noticed that it seems to occur in certain area especially the on ram of the free way. There is some forest there so I initially thought it was related to some swamp gas or whatever.

Later I worked out that it is related to hard to moderately hard accelation. eg going up on ram, over taking, going up a hill etc etc

It is much worse if the vent is in "recycle" mode. With the vent opened it is not as bad but if you are going up a hill for a prolonged period you will still get the smell coming in.

The car is in the service department the second time now.

The first time they told me that the rotten smell is from the catalytic converter. The fume got through the tail gate. They took out the trimming and fixed some sort of plastic sheet in before reassembled the trimming. They were hoping that it would reduce the fume from coming in.

Well, it has helped a bit BUT the bloody smelly fume still coming in if you press the accelerator hard enough or long enough.

Been driving for 30 years and I have never experience this in any other cars. I told the service manager that leaving the vent opened is not an option. The air pollution and fume from other cars are bad on the road. It also make the air cond much less efficient.

I have a feeling that the fume is coming through not just from the tail gate.

[Blackkluger]

Our kxs awd doesnt have any RE smell, in fact, you could be hitching up the trailer with engine on and even though it is warm humid air coming out, no smell at all.

holdens arent free of this, dad bought a vn many yrs ago and this was the worst re smell i have ever seen, he had to roll down(luckily) into the garage otherwise you couldnt breathe inside the garage if the engine was on! this was new in 1990!

[feral1]

I was going to make this similar thread a few months ago.

I have a one year old Kluger Grande. Right from the beginning I have been experiencing this rotten egg smell permeating the cabin from time to time.

Initially I thought one of the kids has farted. Somehow no one admitted to it. Then I noticed that it seems to occur in certain area especially the on ram of the free way. There is some forest there so I initially thought it was related to some swamp gas or whatever.

Later I worked out that it is related to hard to moderately hard accelation. eg going up on ram, over taking, going up a hill etc etc

It is much worse if the vent is in "recycle" mode. With the vent opened it is not as bad but if you are going up a hill for a prolonged period you will still get the smell coming in.

The car is in the service department the second time now.

The first time they told me that the rotten smell is from the catalytic converter. The fume got through the tail gate. They took out the trimming and fixed some sort of plastic sheet in before reassembled the trimming. They were hoping that it would reduce the fume from coming in.

Well, it has helped a bit BUT the bloody smelly fume still coming in if you press the accelerator hard enough or long enough.

Been driving for 30 years and I have never experience this in any other cars. I told the service manager that leaving the vent opened is not an option. The air pollution and fume from other cars are bad on the road. It also make the air cond much less efficient.

I have a feeling that the fume is coming through not just from the tail gate.

I have been driving the BA for 51/2 years since brand new. I was told it maybe the Catalytic converter, but I noticed it only since the 1st service.

As for the air conditioning, if you have it on recycle it does smell, this is to do with the type of material used with the pads or something, if I use recycle I have to change it to normal 2 to 3 minutes before stopping and turning the car off.

If you do not the next time you start the car you get a real bad smell coming through the vents....

This is what the dealer told me,

Peter

[kirby7777]

if I use recycle I have to change it to normal 2 to 3 minutes before stopping and turning the car off.

If you do not the next time you start the car you get a real bad smell coming through the vents....

This is what the dealer told me,

Peter

In my case I don't have that problem described above that necessitate switching off the recycle mode of Air cond.

[PC XT]

Maybe its something to do with the first Kluger TV advertisement, where some one was blaming some one for the bad smell, when it may have been the car in the first place....

On a serious note ours use to stink all the time after a slightly hard hill work out, I thought it had gone away after nearly 2 and a half years and 37000Kms....

But I may have stopped counting my chickens prematurely, I was accelerating up a hill @110 yesterday and wow Im not sure if it was the car in front of me as we did not have the aircon on recirculate, but wow I think it (the car?) had been working on it for the last 6 months, my two boys blamed me... The smell was very strong its like some big chemical reactor letting loose, Im pretty sure e-10 may be the culperit or what ever the engine does to drink it as a reaction.

Edited January 5, 2010 by PC XT

[jaj]

Yep my kluger also gives off that f@#kng smell even if the car is sealed(all windows closed and vent in recycle mode). I keep on telling toyota service about it everytime i get the car serviced and they keep on telling me that everything is ok (their computer not indicating anything wrong). They said that they have resetted the computer for me. This did nothing still getting that smell and it seems to be getting worst and i think the airconditiong is being affected as well, because when i turn the airconditioning on there's a bad smell coming from it as well.

I rang toyota customer care about it and they said to put a higher octane petrol. I said to them why do i have to fork out extra dollars if the minimum requirement of kluger is the normal 91octane petrol. The lady i was talking to said, thats the only suggestion she can give me and could not comment anymore.

Anyone having the same issue can ring up toyota customer care so that they can be made aware or the problem and not just take it for granted we paid a lot of money for the car, they should be doing something about the it. phone. 1800 252 097 (Mon to Fri 8am - 6pm AEST).

[Freewuns]

I'm guessing if you can smell the "rotten egg gas" from the exhaust you are also inhaling carbon monoxide from the exhaust which is a greater concern.

Given that CO is odourless and potentially deadly, you may fix the rotten egg smell by going to a higher octane but the CO will still be present!!

[Shreks Donkey]

Well here`s a suggestion! How about slowing down?!? I don`t normally drive around flogging the guts out of mine, and I never have a problem. I only smell this smell if I am putting the foot down as if I am overtaking or entering a freeway. Then I smell it for about a minute, and then it`s all over. But the majority of the time, I never smell it.

[Kesawi]

Well here`s a suggestion! How about slowing down?!? I don`t normally drive around flogging the guts out of mine, and I never have a problem. I only smell this smell if I am putting the foot down as if I am overtaking or entering a freeway. Then I smell it for about a minute, and then it`s all over. But the majority of the time, I never smell it.

Luckily I've never had an issue with it, even when flogging it.

[Obe65]

I have a 2009 Kluger Altitude. Great car except, I first noticed an exhaust fume smell when accelerating reasonably hard. Didn't think much of it at the time as had some windows down and wife predominately drives it, with the kids. However have now focused on the issue due to when towing a trailer or accelerating hard it consistently occurs. Last week toyota changed the rear hatch rubber, but I have just realised they have placed it inside-out and hence a larger gap and more exhaust fumes. I have no doubt that the fumes are coming through the glass hatch and the tailgate, it appears to have a slight (very slight) different radius and hence doesn't seal fully. This then allows exhaust gases in the rear when accelerating. I will be like a plague to Toyota until this is fixed as we purchased the Kluger due to an increasing family size, the last thing I want is to poison them with exhaust fumes (what is the use of having u-beaut airconditioning filters if exhaust gas enters the car..... (I actually think it is a design fault but will hold out to see how they rectify it.)

[idisc]

May I ask what fuel you guys are using?

Would it be Shell 98 RON by any chance?

I'm not sure about the new VPower, but the old Optimax had a high sulphur content, as a result, under any hard driving, the exhaust gas would stink of rotten eggs... I was once following a friend who decided to give his car a boot, and the smell was so bad I almost felt sick.

I've never used Shell and have never had a rotten egg smell from my car. I really don't know if the new VPower is the same formula as the old Optimax but its something to consider.. If you guys are indeed using Shell V Power, maybe change to Caltex or BP for a few tanks and see if it still happens?

[Noodle Boy]

my aurion has the same engine as the klugers and ive tried shell vpower without any problems(including rotten egg smell), even with hard driving. however, i personally think that mobil 98 or bp ultimate would be the best fuels to go with due to its performance.

[PC XT]

my aurion has the same engine as the klugers and ive tried shell vpower without any problems(including rotten egg smell), even with hard driving. however, i personally think that mobil 98 or bp ultimate would be the best fuels to go with due to its performance.

V-Power is the winner

[Noodle Boy]

oh really?! <_<

[clugerno5]

oh really?! <_<

i must be lucky havent had any problems

mostly use bp or caltex if no bp,s handy

[anthony_ling]

oh really?! <_<

i must be lucky havent had any problems

mostly use bp or caltex if no bp,s handy

Its the rear vents, I have the same problem on a Rav4 09...

not sure how to fix, my dealer has taped them up..... still waiting for a solution from Toyota on this one...

its a bad design. One of the vents is Right above the exhaust tip !

[GKLUGER]

Hi,

I thought it was me but apparently not....

I never bothered to raise it with the service department because the only time it happens is when I press the accelerator really hard for aggressive overtaking or when cruise control is on at 100km/hr up a hill, then the stink bomb hits. But this might only happen once a month.

Otherwise, most of the time, it's a non-issue when driving conservatively.

My suspicion is that the smell finds it way through the spare wheel well since this is not fully sealed and exposed near the exhaust. I am going to seal it up a bit more if I can to see if that makes any difference.

My concern is that if you're smelling the RE, then all the other nasty stuff is also coming through such as CO2 & CO. Which is a concern because CO (carbon monoxide) is colourless and odourless and extremely toxic. I've heard stories of CO poisoning of passengers in back seats due to faulty seals and the front seat occupants are completely unaware of the tragedy until it was too late.

[LE0NARD]

I've had this rotten egg smell problem from when the car was purchased new. Sadly, after three attempts from Toyota service to try and fix or solve this issue they have failed. I've been told to try different fuel types, I've done this but again the rotten egg smell prevails. My main concern is how does the smell enter the cabin when all windows are up and A/C is on recirculate? So, rather than be concerned with a faulty catalytic converter as another poster might have suggested, shouldn't we be more concerned with the seals of the car?

After some research on the net it seems like a rather common problem, perhaps Toyota night consider a recall to resolve this issue once and for all.