2001 1.8 Vvti Celica High Oil Consumption

[Dom123]

If anyone who has any knowledge on this subject could help I would really appreciate it, it is a bit long but I have to put everything in here to give the full story.

Bought a 2001 Celica VVti 1.8 2 months ago from a garage. It had done 48,160 miles

One week after buying it (I had done 500 miles) I took it to Toyota for a service who told me the oil was almost gone and the engine would require a stripdown if the problem continued. The problem continued...almost 2000 miles later and I have had to put a total of 6 litres of oil in it.

It seems to be fine driving locally but on motorway journeys the oil seems to disappear - on one journey I topped up the oil before setting off and after driving 200 miles on the motorway the oil was almost empty.

There is no obvious smoke or any noises - the only things noticeable are that after long journeys the back of the car around the exhaust is black with smoke staining and occasionally when I rev the car a bit of oil spits out of the exhaust.

After reading other posts it seems there is a known problem with these engines but Toyota will only sort it if the car has full service history - mine has none.

I have contacted Trading Standards who advise me that as it is an "inherited problem" the garage that sold it to me must carry out any work free of charge. I have been back to them but they say my warranty only covers £150, Trading standards say that the warranty is irrelevent with inherited problems and the garage must carry out the work free of charge, the garage say some wear and tear is to be expected (to me this problem is not wear and tear!). They are avoiding paying for the work and keep putting me off by telling me to keep a log of oil consumption until the end of February even though the problem has been evident from the day I bought the car. :censor:

So far Toyota have told me that if they did the work it would most likely be 1 of 2 things and would cost £350+parts if they started to strip the engine down and found it was the valves or £1150+parts if they found it to be the piston rings, he didnt mention knowing of a problem with this model but he wasnt the engine specialist as he is on holiday at the moment.

I don't know if to chase the garage I bought it from or to pay for the work to be done by Toyota and hope its not too serious

So my questions are these:

Do I stand any chance of getting a discount from Toyota on the work even though I have no service history?

What actually is the known problem? (lots of posts on forums saying its a known fault but what is the fault? it would be good to know as I'm probably gonna have to pay for it myself)

Has anyone else noticed the problem occurs when motorway driving but not when driving locally?

Do these symptoms sound like a valve problem or a piston ring problem?

Apart from this problem the car is fine but I am now so stressed. Please help!

[T600]

I doubt you'll get anything off Toyota for goodwill; not on a 6 year old car with broken service history.

But it should be possible to get some Discount. Ron Brookes at Mansfield or Derby (neither that far from you) give 10% for cars over 3 years old if you join their discount scheme (which costs nothing to join) and I think Parts-King's dealership would give you similar. I know you're looking for more than that, but 10% of that money is still worth having.

You'll find lots of threads here on the subject of oil consumption with these cars. I had one for about 4 years and had no problems at all with mine, but maybe I was lucky. Sold it three years ago now, and maybe the subsequent owner has had problems with it since, I don't know.

[GarethT]

Dom,

Firstly, sorry to hear about the car!

I dont have a celica yet, but I'm researching this oil problem as much as I can before I get one.

From what I've gathered from these forums (and Honest John) The pre facelift Gen 7's suffer from rounding of the pistons over time and this causes lots of oil consumption, although toyota say it can use up to 1l per 1000miles people have reported usage in excess of this (like you).

There are stories of Toyota issuing a 7 year warranty replacement engine on models with a full service history but in any case that'd probably be out of date by now.

I know the facelifted (late 2002) model has an improved block, so if you can find an engine out of a later one then you should be able to swap them over without too much trouble. But by far the cheapest option seems to be pursuing this garage to get them to do the work as they knowingly sold you a duffer - technically its their problem.

Keep a record of all calls to them and trading standards, keep a record of all oil changes/top ups and dont ever give up on them - eventually they will cave in.

Hope you get it sorted, if you do get it repaired please let us know what the outcome was, the more we know about this issue - the easier it is for us to diagnose and hopefully fix.

HTH

G

[Norfolk n Chance]

Sounds like you have this issue

VVTI Engine Woes

Best query it with your dealer.

[fazzer]

Sounds like you have this issue

VVTI Engine Woes

Best query it with your dealer.

might be interested in buying the car if you have no luck with the garages or i could offer you a good deal on a strip and rebuild

[Boynxdoor]

If anyone who has any knowledge on this subject could help I would really appreciate it, it is a bit long but I have to put everything in here to give the full story.

Bought a 2001 Celica VVti 1.8 2 months ago from a garage. It had done 48,160 miles

One week after buying it (I had done 500 miles) I took it to Toyota for a service who told me the oil was almost gone and the engine would require a stripdown if the problem continued. The problem continued...almost 2000 miles later and I have had to put a total of 6 litres of oil in it.

It seems to be fine driving locally but on motorway journeys the oil seems to disappear - on one journey I topped up the oil before setting off and after driving 200 miles on the motorway the oil was almost empty.

There is no obvious smoke or any noises - the only things noticeable are that after long journeys the back of the car around the exhaust is black with smoke staining and occasionally when I rev the car a bit of oil spits out of the exhaust.

After reading other posts it seems there is a known problem with these engines but Toyota will only sort it if the car has full service history - mine has none.

I have contacted Trading Standards who advise me that as it is an "inherited problem" the garage that sold it to me must carry out any work free of charge. I have been back to them but they say my warranty only covers £150, Trading standards say that the warranty is irrelevent with inherited problems and the garage must carry out the work free of charge, the garage say some wear and tear is to be expected (to me this problem is not wear and tear!). They are avoiding paying for the work and keep putting me off by telling me to keep a log of oil consumption until the end of February even though the problem has been evident from the day I bought the car. :censor:

So far Toyota have told me that if they did the work it would most likely be 1 of 2 things and would cost £350+parts if they started to strip the engine down and found it was the valves or £1150+parts if they found it to be the piston rings, he didnt mention knowing of a problem with this model but he wasnt the engine specialist as he is on holiday at the moment.

I don't know if to chase the garage I bought it from or to pay for the work to be done by Toyota and hope its not too serious

So my questions are these:

Do I stand any chance of getting a discount from Toyota on the work even though I have no service history?

What actually is the known problem? (lots of posts on forums saying its a known fault but what is the fault? it would be good to know as I'm probably gonna have to pay for it myself)

Has anyone else noticed the problem occurs when motorway driving but not when driving locally?

Do these symptoms sound like a valve problem or a piston ring problem?

Apart from this problem the car is fine but I am now so stressed. Please help!

Hi mate,,,

so sad to hear that, but it is really either the valve or the piston rings, worse even the piston itself... if you want another options since you're almost close to engine change, i've seen some advertisement on eBay for engine replacement... costing you 750£ or more fitted.... most engine that runs with only bits of oil or almost none can damage more parts apart from your piston rings and valves... Hope your problem will be resolve soon.

[Fawbs]

Terrible news mate, that oil consumption is awful, you might aswell be owning an rx8 with that oil consumption. How common is this problem, maybe it seems more common than it is on here as it gets highlighted rather than hearing about it through word of mouth. I'm not a fan of the gen 7 styling isn't my cup of tea but that engine seems a bit pants to me. Considering toyota are on about using the engine out the imprezza to use in the new gen 8 i'm surprised they didnt use a civic type r engine in the gen 7 celica as i hear its quite a high revver to get in the power band.

I would definitely keep trading standards informed at every step, like someone said keep at the garage and they will cave in but if they don't im sure you will be able to get trading standards to write a letter and if that don't work i'd like to think they would go round there and threaten legal action. This is your money and its always a lot of more when u buy a decent car so do not take this lightly, don't hold back, don't threaten to kill them or anything but don't be afraid to go on the offensive just stay calm and keep it sweet. Keep us informed as there was a thread a while back where a lad had bought a gen 6 celica and found the mileage had been clocked, can't remember how that turned out though. Good luck

[Q2000]

Its nothing to do with rounding of the pistons its the oil runaways / oil control rings inside the piston. If you don't change oil regularly (Though blow by can cause this) the oil gets dirty and because their weren't enough runaways cut into the early pistons which meant different areas of piston ran hotter and colder than one and another under heat and pressure the oil goes under chemical change and runaways / rings become clogged meaning oil goes up into combustion chamber rather back into sump. Toyota knew about this problem and replaced under warranty engine blocks that had become faulty if they had full service history. Prefacelift 1zzfe celicas gen 7 had only 4 runaway holes cuts in each of the pistons the new design had 8 per piston and added slit to the ring groove to help cooling and stop carbon build up to stop this oil burning problem. This problem also effected other cars that used the 1zzfe engine.

That's why on the early 1zzfe engines oil changing regularly is vital to keep it running well. Changing at 10,000 is probably not best idea and probably half that for safety especially in Britain where many of us don't do long drives.

I have attached Toyota technical documentation.

gen7_oil_consumption.pdf

[Q2000]

Heres a comparisons between new and old piston design from pre facelift and facelift 1zzfe engines.

Also ToyotaOwnersClub Australia has already documented this

http://au.toyotaownersclub.com/forums/inde...showtopic=11848

Unfortunately their is supposedly a liquid you add to petrol / Oil tank and intake vales called seafoam that has been used on cars that burnt oil (Due to stuck oil control rings etc / carbon buildup) in the US with some good results that unsticks oil controls rings. Though it cant be bought in Britain though have heard its good.

[Q2000]

Oh and from what i have read on other forums this problem just didnt effect the 1zzfe engines but a also a few others as they used the same piston design as earlier 1zzfe engines.

[vvtli-love]

Sounds like you have this issue

VVTI Engine Woes

Best query it with your dealer.

might be interested in buying the car if you have no luck with the garages or i could offer you a good deal on a strip and rebuild

Hi i've got a celica vvtli with this dreaded problem of the oil burning, can you e-mail me jamesm0310@aol.com i'd like a good deal on a strip and rebuild.