Is anyone else having problems with rust on a 5th gen? My Limited is rust free except one door. I’m taking it into the dealer this week and will have them look but I don’t think they will repair it under warranty. I’m thinking there was a defect in the door seem. I’ve owned this thing since new and have always babied it and the miles are very low.

Yikes. That's really bad.

Do you drive a lot in snow/salted roads?

Checked your location and yep, I'd say it's almost impossible to keep cars over time in a rust free condition back east like you can in the southwest. I feel for everyone who watches their vehicles rust away over time. It's not the snow it's what they do to keep it in a liquid state. Most folks can't swing storing a nice newer car during the winters to avoid it. I've wondered why the tailgates don't rust at the bottom with the sliding rear window. Good luck with your dealer visit, let us know how it goes.

I do. Mine's a 2012 with 130k and I have nothing even close to that. In fact, no body rust at all from what I can tell.

Door ding damaged the paint?

The car has never been in any type of accident at all and has zero dents or scratches. I'm in PA so yes, I'm in the snow/salt beltway. But I also wash and wax my 4Runner throughout the winter and it's kept in a garage. The way the door seem has split open makes me think it's a defect in when the door was assembled or how else would have water gotten in and rotted it? There is no rust anywhere at all on the vehicle except the one door and it's not even the bottom of the door, it's along the side where it meets the front fender. If you saw this 4Runner in person, you would swear I just drove it off the showroom floor, never abused.

Things happen during transport that manufacturers don’t share. I had a car that was having paint issues on the hood and front fender, it didn’t make sense. After pushing hard on the dealer they drilled down on the situation and found out it was damaged at the dock and repaired on sight and repainted. They felt pretty bad about giving me a hard time and instead of repairing it again gave me way over book for it and cost on a replacement. On another car I had the complete suspension replaced free even though it was out of warranty. Then I had anew BMW with serious elec. issues. Very long story short, threatened a law suite, Corp got involved and I got a new replacement no charge. The first response from all of them was an automatic “NO”


So my advise, push hard and get a new door no charge. Elevate as needed past the dealer to Corp. if needed. One way or another it absolutely sounds like Toyota’s fault no matter how it happened.

Just a quick update to anyone who was curios. The dealer and some higher ups with Toyota examined the door and have found it to be a manufacturing defect and are taking care of replacing doors and are covering everything under warranty.

Glad Toyota is taking care of it.

Good to hear that. On a 2014, that is ridiculous. It takes twenty years in PA to do rust like that to a door.

Doesn't matter if you wash and wax when you live in the salt belt. I lived in Toronto all my life, they would pre salt or pre brine the roads to avoid having any bit of accumulation.

I'm still shocked that they can dump that much salt into the roads and no one has cried foul in the environmental impact.

Anyways, the only way I have found is you have to do oil spray (ziebart waxy oil or krown, or rust check) since the car was new.

After a while I just gave up keeping a nice daily driver and leased vehicles for everyday use. Who knows what will happen over time... Rust, some accident, etc... Bad lemon. With a lease you just politely give it back... Rusty or not and move on.