Ptarmigan

Before attacking the suspension, have you checked the steering motor damper? The parts are £20 on eBay and fixed my clonking noise (especially bad at low speed, eg over cobbles). Mine had been changed at 73k km and needed doing again at 160k. Search YouTube for 'Alphard kok kok steering noise' for some examples. It took me a couple of hours to do, the main awkwardness was the column pivots on a single bolt and getting it lined up was annoying - and I needed a universal joint socket to get access to drive it.

Nippon Autospares in Derby has some: https://nipponautospares.com/search?q=deflector&at%5B0%5D%5Bname%5D=Make&at%5B0%5D%5Bvalue_name%5D=Toyota but looks like only the right rear and right front (I think, it's labelled as right rear but has a sloping part that I think is for the front RH door). You could ask if they might be getting any more in?

Now I'm at a computer, a few more links: Random Aliexpress seller of the dongle (or search for Tactrix and pick one with a clear plug with gold pins) Tactrix Openport v2.0 drivers Techstream v18 download (don't run the 'patch') VM with Techstream preinstalled, see IH8MUD forum posting above. When I installed Techstream I set the region to 'Japan' (you can keep it in English) so it can talk to Japanese vehicles.

I'm using a Tactrix Openport clone with Techstream, which is the tool Toyota dealers used before they switched to a fully online system. Cost about $20. Techstream is usually sold with a 'mini VCI' cable which is a knockoff of the XHorse Mini VCI cable. Trouble is the hardware isn't very stable and the hacked drivers cause problems. With Tactrix (who have stopped selling genuine cables so only the clones remain) there are good and bad clones: https://blog.obdii365.com/2022/03/23/how-to-choose-the-right-clone-tactrix-openport-2-0-j2534/ (that's a Chinese seller of OBD stuff, the articles are plagiarized from various forum posts across the internet. Also the HTTPS certificate has expired. Don't buy anything from there but the article is still useful. I bought mine secondhand on eBay but there are plenty of new clones on AliExpress in the $20 ballpark) I set up a dedicated old laptop running Windows 7 32-bit, although Windows 10 works fine and I think XP does too. It needs to be 32 bit as the J2534 passthrough API for apps to talk to the driver is only specified for 32 bit Windows. I disabled networking on this laptop to avoid any update troubles and copied all files via USB stick. I installed the Tactrix drivers, then a fresh copy of Techstream (various sites offer it for download, I'm using v18 which is the last offline version from ~2023), which needed an activation code. I found a way to generate those (message me if you want details). You also need to select the Tactrix J2534 driver in settings. You can get a pre-installed pre-activated virtual machine with Techstream: https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/how-to-techstream-in-5-minutes.1034923/ which might be easier - just add the Tactrix drivers. You also don't need a dedicated machine - any modern system should be able to run it. That's fine for reading and clearing trouble codes, but as I'm doing more complicated procedures I wanted it to be running natively. Now it's set up it's running very well.

This came up in my saved searches feed: https://www.i-bidder.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/anglia-car-auctions/catalogue-id-anglia1-10091/lot-8940b52d-996c-4956-a4e3-b4a600fe3efa Anglia Car Auctions are usually more of a 'budget' car auction (I'd guess average age about 10 years old) and imports don't tend to come up very often, so perhaps the usual dealers won't be interested? Recently there was an Estima that went through for £2800 which was good value, so this could be a bargain for someone?

I can't comment on this dealer, but I found a similar vibe from a northern 'car supermarket' type place. The business model seems to be that they buy a lot of stock from Japanese auction, stick it on the boat, then do almost no prep when they reach the UK. They clean the cars and put them in their giant car park showroom where they... sit. Then when people buy them they find the issues that were there all along, and the dealer brushes them off fixing them (even though they are legally obliged to address them). They were even convicted of this in court. It seems like this one has sat for a year (if the odometer on the ad is km, when converted to miles it's 200 higher than the April 2025 mileage on the MOT), which not good especially for the hybrid. It might have been fresh off the boat when the advert was written, but it's more of a stale import now. There may also be some reason why it's not sold - seems plausible that a few people test drove it and walked away. Always do a CarVX before you go to inspect the car and get Google to translate the auction sheet. I use autoref.eu to convert number plates to VINs/frame numbers (5 free searches on a free account) which you can then feed to CarVX. I'd be especially checking the grade on the auction sheet and the odometer records as it's quite low for something at this price point. Maybe it's good stock that's been sitting around and reduced to clear or... maybe there's something we don't know about it.

It looks aftermarket - if it was factory I'd have expected a Toyota part number on it. I wonder if it has a 'ghost' type immobiliser on it - with those there's typically something secret you need to do like a button to press or whatever, otherwise the car won't start. Do you have to do anything like that? This box would be the part that detects that button press. I've seen (on a Range Rover on YT) ones where there's a box in the cabin that talks to a receiver under the fusebox which surreptitiously disconnects the fuel relay - engine turns over but won't start without the secret handshake.

Generally the Toyota hybrids are very reliable - Priuses are good for 350k miles. The 10 series has an issue with the inverter cooling pump (inverter overheats which damages the IGBTs), but is that a problem with the 20 series? My Gen2 Prius has never had it changed and it's at 175k miles. The one issue with the hybrid batteries is they don't like heat. In the 20 series (and the Estima) the battery is cooped up in the centre console with only a small fan at the base of the rear. Especially in hot climates like southern Japan, Malaysia and Singapore the batteries can get hot, and the fan isn't that great at cooling them. Also, if that fan gets blocked or clogged then it can reduce its cooling ability and the battery can overheat. Another reason why you should always run the aircon in hot weather. Typically it's the cells in the middle that suffer as they are the least well cooled. I have 3 bad modules on the upper bank (each module is 12 NiMH cells in the upper bank and 8 cells on the lower) so I'm planning to replace them and refurbish the rest when I've sorted some other jobs. For now it's still drivable but with fuel economy about the same as the petrol 2.4. I only get the fault code showing if I let the battery become over discharged - just let the engine run for a minute before turning off and it'll leave some charge in it. If you can get to London there are quite a few garages who will refurbish batteries - the battery is very similar to the 2006-19 Estima, and the hybrids of those are popular as London minicabs. Search eBay for 'Estima hybrid battery' and you'll find them.

I tend to be a bit wary of these paid unlock services - they are often somebody who downloaded an unlock generator from the internet and is charging $20 a time just to type some numbers in. On that vein I went looking for the unlock generator and I found this: ERC Calculator - トヨタ純正ナビ ロック解除コード計算機トヨタ・レクサス純正カーナビのERCコードからロック解除コードを無料で計算。機種別（NHDT・NHDN・NHZT・NHZN・NSZT・NSZN）の操作手順付き。 which seems to do a number of stock radios - I think mine is a NHZN. Source code is also available: https://github.com/cyrus07424/ercCalculator Not tried it as my unlock code has already been set to 0000. Perhaps someone can give it a go?

Last time I went to a festival-in-a-field, the local mobile network had signal but was completely saturated because it wasn't designed for XX thousand people showing up at this rural location. That's a different use case from regular camping where there's few other people about. Might be worth looking at Starlink. They keep changing the prices and terms but I think on some of the packages you can switch it on and off - ie don't pay the monthly fee when you don't need it.

Looks like the eBay links my search found are sold out: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/116129329727 https://www.ebay.com/itm/205946045739 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/205815273768 But there are some 44510-58011: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/389707272592 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/256274497133

T just means Toyota on dealer invoices. If I search for 44050-58011 and 44510-58011 I find used ones. Amayama says they have stock of new 44050-58011 for $1341.10 but you'd need to request a shipping quote (I'd guess about £50), and pay 20% VAT on the total once that parcel lands in the UK. Put your chassis number into Amayama to confirm the right part, as there are three for the 10 series depending on production date. Can you OBD scan it and see if it's raising any brake related fault codes? They will likely indicate what problems the system is reporting.

Quick side note: the prefix 44050 is the order number for the new ABS pump filled with brake fluid. The number written on the part is actually 44510. For the 20 series hybrid the new part is 44050-30250 and the part fitted to the vehicle is marked 44510-30250. I haven't checked the 10 series version but assume it's similar. I'm currently looking for the 20 series one, main problem when ordering from Japan is that the hybrid versions include the brake accumulator, and as that contains pressurized nitrogen it can't be shipped by air. Surface freight (2-3 months) is possible but many shippers don't offer it. UK pricing is about £1700, Japan (Nengun) would be about £1200 after VAT and air freight, but they don't offer sea freight. On used parts, if the accumulator is failing the ABS pump runs often (about every 15 seconds on mine) which wears out the pump. The accumulators also lose gas over time. So a used part is a lottery. It is possible to replace the brushes in the motor (see AliExpress which also has new motors, if you trust them...) but that doesn't deal with the accumulator. It looks like it might be possible to swap the accumulator from another vehicle. The hybrid uses the MZ-135 accumulator made by NOK, which is the same as the Gen2 Prius. Accumulators for the ~2023/4 C-HR are fairly new and cheap - looks different but similar size and may be the same screw thread. I bought one but there are no manufacturer markings to look up the spec. I might try that swap but I'm not sure if it's a good idea. On the hybrids it's located on the firewall so you have to disconnect, move and possibly drain down the inverter, making a swap a more time consuming job. Looks like the non hybrid 10 series doesn't have the accumulator as it uses engine vacuum, so you don't have that to worry about. I might be tempted to get a used one and take it apart to see if the brushes can be replaced. Make sure you get it from someone who includes the crimped ends of the brake lines from the donor vehicle - it's supposed to come prefilled with brake fluid and if air gets into the passages inside I don't know how easy it is to bleed them out.

The same picture for the 20 series hybrid confirms the jack point is that black plate on the rear motor:

What is this battery used for? Is it an addon for the camper electrics? It says 'high performance AGM starting' (and CCA is 730 amps) but if it's just for your camper stuff then it may not need to be a 'starter' battery - another kind of leisure battery may suffice. I think the battery in the centre console is the one used to unlock the hybrid battery which then starts the car, and it sounds like that is all working. So if this is for your camper side of things, what kind of loads do you have (any hungry electric heating/cooking, inverter, etc)?