My second 4th Gen! 2005 to 2008

[dwulffusa]

Well folks, I finally figured out what Carmax (of Irvine) did and why the car was not handling correctly.. between the intentional ommission of facts by Carmax and Toyota (of Long Beach) ommission to inform me of what they found when inspecting the car.

Upon refurbishment, Carmax removed the original front shocks/struts and replaced them with regular nonXREAS shocks from Carquest (dumb me, had not even inspected the front shocks prior to taking the car back and don't have a picture of them). They also removed the lines for the front shocks. The rear original shocks and lines were left in place..

Toyota technician confirmed today that they were non XREAS shocks up front and were new (but did not think they would inform me about that and charged me for balancing and allignment).

Service Manager at Carmax has skirted the issue saying the part originally fitted was "just a lower quality" and now they are fitting a better (i.e the OEM XREAS) shock.

My thoughts are this is completely unnacceptible business practice that jeoparized the ride and safety of the car and should be reported.

Your thoughts?

I just want my car back, with the correct shocks.

 

[dwulffusa]

After replacing the front struts the shimmying continued though body control did improve. I returned it to Carmax for good. :-(

 

[Mudyrunner]

Sad story that they didn't tell you. You may be able to use this as an advantage point on getting it back with proper shocks and they eat the cost completely just to keep you happy. If not then id defiantly report them as that unit will go to somebody else that may deal with same issue and may even end up on this side again ? Maybe the situation can help them find you a different unit to make peace.

 

[elykrunner]

The paint looks awesome on that. Mine looks like its been weathered for 40 years.