Expensive Way To Stop!

After over a week waiting the indy called to tell us that the company supposed to be rebuilding the transfer box had informed him that they could not open the case!! So.....new transfer case was duly ordered Tuesday afternoon for $2800 including taxes and delivery. FEDEX tracking shows it should be delivered today and we might see the 4Runner before the weekend. Looks like my quick guesstimate of $3K -$4K was right on. I hate it when I'm right.
One further point: As I was searching the WWW I noticed that this part is now discontinued so if you have any of the Toyota four wheelers that use this transfer case treat it gently.

If mine ever explodes like that I think I'll be doing a FJ case swap, maybe a twin stick conversion while I'm at it.

Just got the Toy back. $3270 total parts & labor.

I still boggles my mind that a panic stop did all that damage. I would like to know exactly what components gave up the ghost in there. Glad you got it rolling again though.
 
My indy got the t'case back from the rebuilder and told me he is intrigued as to why he was told it could not be opened. Some baloney about "special tools" etc was stated. I have searched the WWW but info is light on the subject. I examined the old unit and he turned one of the shafts by hand and you could hear the metal on metal grinding sound. If he reports back to me I'll post the info.
Is there anybody out there that has opened a Gen 4 V8 transfer case?
 
My indy got the t'case back from the rebuilder and told me he is intrigued as to why he was told it could not be opened. Some baloney about "special tools" etc was stated. I have searched the WWW but info is light on the subject. I examined the old unit and he turned one of the shafts by hand and you could hear the metal on metal grinding sound. If he reports back to me I'll post the info.
Is there anybody out there that has opened a Gen 4 V8 transfer case?

I have done two t cases now. If they cant figure out how to open it up im not sure I would even let them change my oil. No special tools needed and pretty straight forward.
 
The info passed to me was that the transmission/transfer case rebuild shop could not remove the shift motor so could not tear down the case. Both my indy and I thought this was baloney and they were just looking for an excuse because of some other unstated reason.
Can you please tell me what is involved with removal of the shift motor and then the general tear-down? Any special tools involved? I see that the parts kits are available online.
 
Where are you located? If you're anywhere near San Diego I know a guy . . .

Subscribed because I'mm really curious what happened here. Like BWI, I cannot for the life of me figure out how a panic stop could eat up a transfer case.

Have you interrogated the wife further? I wonder if she's not telling you something. More than once I have had to coax a confession out of my wife when she has damaged one of our vehicles.
 
Well over the mountains from you! The only way I can explain how it happened is her doing a two footed panic stop. Right foot full on accelerator, left foot on brake. Left foot braking has now been banned in our household. This is the first AWD vehicle she had managed to break in this way. We had a V8 Explorer Limited AWD for 15 years that she drove without a problem and she was the exclusive driver of our BMW X5 for a number of years after we bought it. Again never any problems!
 
The info passed to me was that the transmission/transfer case rebuild shop could not remove the shift motor so could not tear down the case. Both my indy and I thought this was baloney and they were just looking for an excuse because of some other unstated reason.
Can you please tell me what is involved with removal of the shift motor and then the general tear-down? Any special tools involved? I see that the parts kits are available online.

You have to split the case in order to remove the actuator. The actuator rods are secured to the shift forks inside with a bolt and C clips. Remove the front driveshaft flange bolt, use a puller to pull it off (any 2 or 3 jaw puller works) then all the 12mm bolts around the permitter and it will pop apart. Just be sure not to loose/drop the needle bearing when you split it. (Although since you not rebuilding it, just taking apart I suppose that does not matter)
 
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I'm with you Yeti.. Im not trying to be jerk or anything but Im a Fire/Arson Investigator and this doesnt add up in my mind. I think there is more to the story OR there was unnoticed previous damage to the case.
Where are you located? If you're anywhere near San Diego I know a guy . . .

Subscribed because I'mm really curious what happened here. Like BWI, I cannot for the life of me figure out how a panic stop could eat up a transfer case.

Have you interrogated the wife further? I wonder if she's not telling you something. More than once I have had to coax a confession out of my wife when she has damaged one of our vehicles.
 
Is it possible something knocked the shifter into reverse and caused all that damage? I only ask because I know I've had to do a quick stop before causing my dog to knock the car into reverse.
 
I'm with you Yeti.. Im not trying to be jerk or anything but Im a Fire/Arson Investigator and this doesnt add up in my mind. I think there is more to the story OR there was unnoticed previous damage to the case.

The facts are as I reported. I guess the only way to prove/disprove it is to replicate the incident. Take the vehicle up to 20 -30 MPH and stand on both the accelerator and brake at the same time. See what happens and report back. Given that my wife WAS a left foot "braker" that is the most likely scenario. There is no moral or legal reason to hide anything about the incident. The vehicle now has 51,000 miles on it. It has never shown any sign of a problem until this happened. I would say that a major defect in the driveline would have shown up when I was driving on the highway at highway speeds.
Thanks Brian for the info.
 
Regardless of why it happened, it happened.. There's no sense in arguing how. I replaced my t-case shortly after i bought my 4R. I bought a junkyard unit for $900 and replaced it myself. The only problem I had with it was the actuator seals leaking. I've replaced them twice because I cut the o'ring the first time and didn't noticed till I ran it for about a month.
 
Roddy, totally agree, it happened. The main reason I even posed the question is to make sure we don't repeat the process and, possibly, as a warning to others. As the only abnormal factor was the left foot braking that has been banned. So if there are any other LFB'ers out there be careful. As stated this is the third AWD vehicle we've owned and the first to break like this.
 
Did you ask Toyota about warranty coverage? I know the vehicle is over the warranty age limit, but it's still well within the power train mileage limit, I think. I'm pretty sure this isn't expected behavior as far as Toyota is concerned.
 
Given the age I did not think they would be interested. I have dealt with two car companies' US HQ. (BMW & Subaru) In each case I came away with nothing more than a bad taste in my mouth. I might try dropping Toyota an e-mail just to see what happens.
 
Did you ask Toyota about warranty coverage? I know the vehicle is over the warranty age limit, but it's still well within the power train mileage limit, I think. I'm pretty sure this isn't expected behavior as far as Toyota is concerned.

Warranty is specified in "Year/Mileage" from DOFU (Date of First Use). If it's outside of either one of those aspects it's not covered because they've met their contractual obligation in regards to warranty coverage.
 
Warranty is specified in "Year/Mileage" from DOFU (Date of First Use). If it's outside of either one of those aspects it's not covered because they've met their contractual obligation in regards to warranty coverage.

I'm well aware that Toyota has no contractual obligation to do anything in this case. However, given Toyota's general commitment to customer satisfaction and to quality and reliability, I think it could have been worth a shot to ask them about it, because I'm sure they wouldn't expect a tcase to blow at 50K miles due to a panic stop.

Over on yotatech.com, I still hear of people occasionally getting new head-gaskets for their 3.0 liter V6's 20 years after manufacturing date, even though the special service campaign expired years earlier.

A lot depends on whether or not you have a good relationship with your dealer. You certainly couldn't insist on action on their part, but politely asking never hurts. I blew a diff on a Chevy Astro van once that was out of warranty. My dealer and GM covered it 100% because I was a good customer, and covered parts costs when it blew up again a month later because of mismatched tires (which was the root cause of the original failure, caused by an independent tire shop).
 
I'm well aware that Toyota has no contractual obligation to do anything in this case. However, given Toyota's general commitment to customer satisfaction and to quality and reliability, I think it could have been worth a shot to ask them about it, because I'm sure they wouldn't expect a tcase to blow at 50K miles due to a panic stop.

Over on yotatech.com, I still hear of people occasionally getting new head-gaskets for their 3.0 liter V6's 20 years after manufacturing date, even though the special service campaign expired years earlier.

A lot depends on whether or not you have a good relationship with your dealer. You certainly couldn't insist on action on their part, but politely asking never hurts. I blew a diff on a Chevy Astro van once that was out of warranty. My dealer and GM covered it 100% because I was a good customer, and covered parts costs when it blew up again a month later because of mismatched tires (which was the root cause of the original failure, caused by an independent tire shop).

That's "Dealer GoodWill" which is an odd subset of the Toyota warranty coverage, I'm not entirely versed in the specifics of what goes behind closed doors on that. But from what I have seen, heard, and such it seems to be a sorta committee decision based upon how good/valuable/loyal a customer is whether or not to extend coverage despite expiration/exemptions (i.e. "this customer's a good customer we want to Goodwill his damaged steering wheel under warranty even though their jacket zipper tore it and it wasn't a factory defect).

I'm not entirely sure if that's how exactly it works, but it seems a Dealership gets an "X" number of "Goodwills" to exercise at their discretion and to be approved by the DSPM. This means that those out of warranty exceptions are at individual dealer discretion and do not technically fall under factory warranty; at least that how it seems to work in my limited experience.
 
I'm well aware that Toyota has no contractual obligation to do anything in this case. However, given Toyota's general commitment to customer satisfaction and to quality and reliability, I think it could have been worth a shot to ask them about it, because I'm sure they wouldn't expect a tcase to blow at 50K miles due to a panic stop.

Over on yotatech.com, I still hear of people occasionally getting new head-gaskets for their 3.0 liter V6's 20 years after manufacturing date, even though the special service campaign expired years earlier.

A lot depends on whether or not you have a good relationship with your dealer. You certainly couldn't insist on action on their part, but politely asking never hurts. I blew a diff on a Chevy Astro van once that was out of warranty. My dealer and GM covered it 100% because I was a good customer, and covered parts costs when it blew up again a month later because of mismatched tires (which was the root cause of the original failure, caused by an independent tire shop).

This is absolutely incorrect. People purchase Toyota because of their reliability and their reliability alone. Their customer service is just like any other auto manufacturer. This is because their dealerships are ran by private entities, who make no money repairing vehicles under warranty or on good will.
 
I agree, no sense arguing about whether or not a panic stop caused it but I'd still like to know which part(s) failed and if this is just an AWD issue or is it potentially bigger than that.

I'm still amazed you only have 51k on it.
 

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