2001 Toyota Highlander Engine cooling Problems

“Car began surging on three occasions. Car was parked, in park at the curb, and engine was surging from idle to aprox 2500 RPM. I plugged an obd into the car to look for error codes and there were none. I cycled the obd again and the surging stopped. ??”

“We bought our Highlander just over a year ago and we have to constantly put oil into vehicle. It only has 80,000 on it, and we have to put about a liter of oil into it every other week. The manufacturer of our area checked it twice, and determined that we need another engine, but the cost was around $7000 in canadian that engine would come from japan, and it would be a used one, and would only warranty that for 1 year. Then what am completely disgusted!! …”

“2001 Toyota Highlander purchased new. About once a year it accelerates on its own. Reported problem to Toyota dealer in 2002 or 2003 - have receipt. We can stop the car with firm pressure on the brake. In most cases when we put the transmission into park the engine continued to race at high RPM. I can't remember all incidents, but believe that in some cases was able to slow the engine down by keeping my foot on the brake and putting the car back into drive. Other times I turned off the ignition. When I restart the car it is fine. …”

“My Highlander had sludge in the engine. The engine was cleaned out. I was told that if I change my oil every 3,000 miles instead of 7,500.00 that would not happen. The Toyota manuel states every 7,500. Remember my car only has 18,202 miles on it. It's not even 2 yr old yet. The service advisor assured me that if I change my oil every 3,000 and not every 7,500 like the manual says that if this happen again they would cover the problem.”

“Oil sludge issue. The Toyota was in the shop for 1.5 weeks. The final bill did not include any totals, but the service manager indicated parts alone were close to $1600. We were very disturbed with Toyota's position that this problem was a maintenance issue and that they would only repair this issue once within the first eight years. They indicated that we followed the wrong maintenance schedule of normal rather than severe conditions for florida. …”