Aurion Paint Issues

[HDT05]

Just wondering whether any members have experienced any paint finish issues on 2010 AURION's? Especially the NEW color LIQUID METAL. My AURION has over 30 imperfections on different parts of the body. Toyota tells me that they find this 'acceptable' as they aren't all in one spot! Go figure that out! So, needless to say I have been getting the royal run around. First they said that this type of problem could NEVER happen due to their stringent painting and clean environment. Now they admit it can happen, but it's OK to have these imperfections which are lumps on the surface. Very irratating when you peel of $45K+ plus for a car.

Cheers....

[Steven]

OEM paint quality is often the bare minimal to satisfy government regs all around the world, which is often along the lines of "will provide protection from rust/corrosion etc under normal operating conditions, and is of a reasonable quality."

BTW that wording is not from any source, as local laws are different everywhere - it's rather a summing up of what is required BASICALLY.

In other words, any defects in your paint is something that you could claim a reasonable person without any additional skills or training would complain about is generally all you could claim required fixing. Say for example every other Aurion out there is like yours, even though your opinion is that it's not good enough, as long as the majority of customers have no issues with it then you'd have a hard time requiring them to fix it by law.

I think I may have ventured off train a bit hehe, a few scotch n cokes will do that.

Could you provide more specific examples and perhaps pictures of these defects?

[Dave89]

imperfections happen....with everything...not a single thing could be made 100% the same everytime.

unlucky though :(

can you throw some photo's up?

Dave

[HDT05]

Yes, I have quite a few photos. However, it has been difficult to take given the color/light reflection etc. But the few clear ones I have attached are typical of what’s on the car. Some sort of contamination has been in the base coat. Then this contamination has been clear coated over. The only exception to this is the roof. Where I have some sort of 'pockets' in the base coat and then the clear coat has filled over the top. I have taken the vehicle to a paint shop and they also agree that contamination has been painted in. Front Bumper, Bonnet RH Side, LH Door, RH Sill, RH C Pillar. Things happen in production. We can all agree on this. But you would at least expect Toyota to stand by their product and actually do something about it! That’s the bit that really disappointed me. It took almost 2 months through the dealer, to get Toyota to even have a look at it! Not good enough in my books. After all, the Statutory Warranty, which protects all of us as part of a consumer protection. Says "Goods must be in merchantable quality - they must meet a level of quality and performance that would be reasonable to expect, given price and description. They should also be FREE from defects that were not obvious at the time of purchase" This is above and beyond any warranty offered by the manufacturer.

roof_drivers_Side.BMPLH DOOR HANDLE.BMP

[Dave89]

well it looks certainly arguable, are those three photos the only defects?

the LH rear door sill, is that viewable with the door closed?

I wouldn't be happy with the door handle one, that'd stand out like dogs balls.

Guess you could only keep trying with toyota... take it higher up?

tell them that you will contact fair trading if your dispute can not be resolved with toyota?

or even contact fair trading and get some advice off them?

Good luck!

Dave

[HDT05]

Dave,

NO these are not the only defects. About 30 in total all over the car. These were the ones that came up best in photos. This type of problem is on Front Bumper, Bonnet, Roof, LH Front Door, LH BA ck Door Sill & LH C Pillar. So whatever went wrong in the paint process, pretty much went wrong all over. At this stage it looks like legal action as Toyota just doesn’t want to know. The Toyota "customer" (and I use that word loosely) help line in Sydney basically said that whatever the inspecting Toyota rep. says, goes! If the rep. says it's acceptable, then that’s that! Just crazy stuff. So you might as well forget about the Toyota warranty for the paint! The rep. said to me "that even if we (Toyota) painted the problem areas, we (Toyota) would not cover the repairs or the cars paint job on warranty! Might make people think about how "safe" they feel with their Toyota Warranty I guess??

Cheers....

well it looks certainly arguable, are those three photos the only defects?

the LH rear door sill, is that viewable with the door closed?

I wouldn't be happy with the door handle one, that'd stand out like dogs balls.

Guess you could only keep trying with toyota... take it higher up?

tell them that you will contact fair trading if your dispute can not be resolved with toyota?

or even contact fair trading and get some advice off them?

Good luck!

Dave

[Dave89]

Dave,

NO these are not the only defects. About 30 in total all over the car. These were the ones that came up best in photos. This type of problem is on Front Bumper, Bonnet, Roof, LH Front Door, LH BA ck Door Sill & LH C Pillar. So whatever went wrong in the paint process, pretty much went wrong all over. At this stage it looks like legal action as Toyota just doesn’t want to know. The Toyota "customer" (and I use that word loosely) help line in Sydney basically said that whatever the inspecting Toyota rep. says, goes! If the rep. says it's acceptable, then that’s that! Just crazy stuff. So you might as well forget about the Toyota warranty for the paint! The rep. said to me "that even if we (Toyota) painted the problem areas, we (Toyota) would not cover the repairs or the cars paint job on warranty! Might make people think about how "safe" they feel with their Toyota Warranty I guess??

Cheers....

well it looks certainly arguable, are those three photos the only defects?

the LH rear door sill, is that viewable with the door closed?

I wouldn't be happy with the door handle one, that'd stand out like dogs balls.

Guess you could only keep trying with toyota... take it higher up?

tell them that you will contact fair trading if your dispute can not be resolved with toyota?

or even contact fair trading and get some advice off them?

Good luck!

Dave

Well i'd follow it up with fair trading. They have their own motor vehicle department, so they pretty much handle everything.

Let us know the outcome.

Good luck

Dave

[HDT05]

DAve,

Will do. I have a meeting with Toyota this Thursday.

Cheers....

[Cateh]

Just wondering whether any members have experienced any paint finish issues on 2010 AURION's? Especially the NEW color LIQUID METAL. My AURION has over 30 imperfections on different parts of the body. Toyota tells me that they find this 'acceptable' as they aren't all in one spot! Go figure that out! So, needless to say I have been getting the royal run around. First they said that this type of problem could NEVER happen due to their stringent painting and clean environment. Now they admit it can happen, but it's OK to have these imperfections which are lumps on the surface. Very irratating when you peel of $45K+ plus for a car.

Cheers....

YES YES YES! I have a Liquid Metal colour Aurion (late 2009), dealership resprayed the roof due to their words "contamination" of paint 4 months after I received it as there were weird shadows on the roof. Now 14 months on I have areas all over the bonnet now with wrinkled cracking patches and paint rubbing off down to bare metal - Toyota have so far refused to do anything about this as they say it's due to after market 'fallout' which the Toyota assessor says is anything from rain to animal dropping, sap, bugs etc.

My issue is that yes you can get what they term fallout on a car (who doesn't?) but the rapid and severe deterioration down to base metal would seem to suggest a poor quality finish in the first place.

I know your post was some time ago so I wanted to see what happened in your case dealing with Toyota?

Thanks for your time!

[450HP/tonne]

Your warranty and service book explains the general paint and corrosion warranty. It should explain what you are covered for.

[Cateh]

Your warranty and service book explains the general paint and corrosion warranty. It should explain what you are covered for.

Hi,

Yes, but my issue is that the roof was repainted under warranty previously due to a Toyota diagnosed and admitted paint defect but now (still under warranty) other areas have developed similar weird shadowing which has rapidly progressed to blistering, cracking and wrinkling. The finish also gets fine scratches and marks at the slightest touch.

At present, Toyota refuse to consider what contribution to the damage a factory issue with the paint may have on the problem. It's one thing to simply lump the blame on 'fallout' quite another to have paint unable to maintain reasonably expected durability in normal use conditions.

This is the third Toyota I have owned in a row and I can honestly say this new car's paint is simply not up to scratch.

This Aurion is my first ever NEW new car and has, like my others been carefully maintained. Where my previous two Toyota's were subject to extremes of heat, light, dust, remote area and environmental conditions in WA the paint NEVER deteriorated other than expected slight fading over the years. The previous car to the Aurion was even kept for months in the same place as the Aurion with no 'fallout' problems or damage so you may start to see why I am stunned by the paint's appalling failure.

Another thing I'd love to know more about is that I heard from a friend that in the late 90's/early 2000s Toyota and other manufacturers switched to water based paints, I have no idea but the thought did cross my mind to wonder if these are indeed as durable as the older (assuming solvent/oil based) ones?

[DJKOR]

I'm no expert on the subject, but wouldn't most of the issue lie in the clear coat and not the actual paint itself?

[Foss]

If it is fallout, I hardly think Toyota can be held responsible. They can't help what crap may get on your car during your day to day use. Especially after 14 months.

Even if its clearcoat failure, its not necessarily a manufacturer defect. It may well be that the finish was substandard. But even something as minor as stone chips can cause it. Once theres a broken spot its easier for the coat to peel away from that spot. Think of it like having a blister, or sunburn. Once the skin has started to break away, its not hard to peel away more skin outwards from that patch. On your car, once the base coat is exposed, it doesn't have the protection of the clearcoat, and can deteriorate quite rapidly.

[Cateh]

If it is fallout, I hardly think Toyota can be held responsible. They can't help what crap may get on your car during your day to day use. Especially after 14 months.

Even if its clearcoat failure, its not necessarily a manufacturer defect. It may well be that the finish was substandard. But even something as minor as stone chips can cause it. Once theres a broken spot its easier for the coat to peel away from that spot. Think of it like having a blister, or sunburn. Once the skin has started to break away, its not hard to peel away more skin outwards from that patch. On your car, once the base coat is exposed, it doesn't have the protection of the clearcoat, and can deteriorate quite rapidly.

Thanks all for your replies.

I'll defer to to experts and pro-sumers here but I thought 'clearcoat' WAS part of the paintwork? If there's a problem with it or between any of the following: the base metal prep or primer or colour or clear coat, please correct me if I'm wrong but I would assume that all these are still part of the factory paint job?

The 'fallout' (whether valid issue or not) is not my frustration, it's that Toyota have already admitted there was a 'contamination' fault in the paintwork and re-sprayed the roof panel under warranty when it was only 4 months old. Now when other panels have shown the same fault but have then progressed to rapid deterioration to expose the base metal they refuse to consider that a substandard paint issue could be a major contributing factor.

I understand your analogy with the sunburn and that if something breaks the 'shell' of the paint damage may occur but this is not like its a single instance, there are spots of different shapes and sizes appearing all over the bonnet and signs of the same initial 'watermark blooming' problems on the boot. Toyota are saying well it must be fallout damage if its on the flat surfaces but not doors etc. My response to this is give it time - the other surfaces obviously get direct heat and light exposure, the doors do not - the roof started at 4 months, the bonnet at 12, the boot now at 14...what's to say the doors won't start their deterioration after my 3 year warranty is up?

I (was) a loyal Toyota customer of 20 years and saved for nearly 10 years to buy this new car. I don't want something for nothing, I just want not to be fobbed off. As mentioned before, my other cars have been subject to the same and/or worse environmental conditions but with no paint defects. Despite admitting a warranty problem at 4 months, Toyota have now effectively washed their hands of any potential for the paint being substandard.

The reason I posted here is that the original poster had paint faults with the same make and colour car and as with me initially Toyota said couldn't possibly be a factory issue and I wondered what the outcome eventually was.

[DJKOR]

I'll defer to to experts and pro-sumers here but I thought 'clearcoat' WAS part of the paintwork? If there's a problem with it or between any of the following: the base metal prep or primer or colour or clear coat, please correct me if I'm wrong but I would assume that all these are still part of the factory paint job?

Sorry if I may have introduced some confusion with my statement earlier, but in terms of what you are saying, yes the clearcoat is part of the factory paintjob.

What I was trying to say what that the actually paint layer/s underneath may actually be quite good but the final clearcoat layer may be where the actual defect lies. Clearcoat is meant to be pretty good at protecting the paintwork underneath and if the quality of this layer is not up to scratch, it can result in an accelerated deterioration of the paint underneath.

I guess however that this is starting to probably make it a little too specific. I was only mentioning that since you did mention the following:

Another thing I'd love to know more about is that I heard from a friend that in the late 90's/early 2000s Toyota and other manufacturers switched to water based paints, I have no idea but the thought did cross my mind to wonder if these are indeed as durable as the older (assuming solvent/oil based) ones?

At the end of the day, if you are having issues with your paintwork, I would probably say that you may not be concerned about the finer detail of the issue, but rather the issue as a whole.