arthurj

No chance of being able to fix and respray, unfortunately.

I got rear-ended while waiting at a roundabout. The impact was minor but the rear bumper's a bit bent and has a crack.

Does anyone know roughly how much it would cost to source a replacement and get it replaced? 20-series Vellfire, black.

Toyota will do it of course, but it'll cost a fortune. Was hoping for a cheaper one from a breaker's yard in the UK or something, I just don't know where to look.

Yes it’s legal to only have one reversing light and for the other one to be replaced by a fog light. There has to be a separate switch on the dash, clearly marked. My 20-series has this setup.

Be careful with replacing the reflectors as you need to make sure you still have working reflectors to pass the MOT!

My Vellfire has one of the reversing lights replaced with a rear fog light, as you only need one reversing light.

On 3/13/2024 at 8:33 PM, MarkATH10W said:

to be precise. is there any reported issue with the 2AZ-FXE?

 

Not the same issue, but my ATH20 with the same engine did have a piston rebuild in Japan due to recall. I haven’t heard of any others that have gone through this process though, it think it may have only affected a small number of cars.

The hybrid works in quite a different way to the standard petrol. Similar engine but it uses a different cycle and pressure build up due to engine braking is not an issue because hybrids simply don’t do it.

I still have mine, mainly because the kids love watching dvds in the back and it’s great for that.

I think those 4 are for Japanese TV, either an aerial or decoder box.

9 hours ago, Steve81 said:

@arthurj I have the nhba-x62g, which appears to have many of the same connections on the back as yours. Do you have any information on what the different connections
are for please? l've never seen anything like the 4 individually numbered (1-4) single pin black sockets (top right of your photo) before.

 

As it happens…

On 2/13/2024 at 4:04 PM, Chrisalphard said:

Hi, does anyone know where i can find the megathread garage directory? Looking for some help with a 10 series Hybrid near Newcastle Upon Tyne. Thanks

Let me know if you find one. I can’t find anyone nearby who will look at the hybrid stuff. I’ve been looking for over a year now.

Britax Romer fit the middle row fine.

5 minutes ago, mathew binoj said:

Hi Arthur, just checking how is your new Yuasa battery performing? I replaced mine with Exide (Exide EL604 005L Efb Stop / Start Car Battery 12V 60Ah 520Cca), but dies eventually in 4 weeks time. Not sure if it is a battery issue or the car is not designed to charge an AGM battery. 

Absolutely no problem so far. We’ll see what happens over winter but I’ve had none of the symptoms I was getting before.

The hybrids need an AGM battery, they provide a solid 12-14V even when partially drained, unlike lead-acid batteries, which can drop much lower. The hybrid computer needs a minimum of 12V to boot up.

Well, sort of. The Alphard is closer to the size and weight as a T4 or T5, so it’s not fair to compare to a Golf or Passat. A T4 diesel gets around 35mpg in real life, and I hear a T5 averages around 40mpg, maybe slightly better on a long run.

My Yeti diesel doesn’t get close to 70mpg on a long run, ever. The brochure said it does, but I get at most 50 if I turn the air con off and have the wind behind me. I don’t even have a heavy foot.

The way to think about the hybrid in the Alphard is as a turbocharger with 4WD. Combined power puts it closer to the 3.5 than the 2.4 and fuel efficiency is better than both, certainly better than the 4WD model. Is it cost-efficient though? No.

55 minutes ago, kent said:

Hi all. I need some help please

Just got a 2013 Hybrid Alphard with NHZN-X62G head unit. 

Any idea how to change the language from japanese to english?

 

You can’t change the language on that model, sorry.

19 hours ago, Mikeg said:

I’ve just recently bought a 20 Hybrid and are a bit bemused that I only seem to get get around 24MPG and this after driving slowly, is this what I should expect or could something be wrong.

tia

I did a long drive in my hybrid recently and got 630km to a tank, which is 55l. So that’s about 33mpg on average.

Getting mine done tomorrow. Quoted over £800 by Toyota, £500 by a local garage that deal with imports.

20-series hybrid original is a Panasonic S55D23L AGM. The Yuasa HJ-S55D23L is a perfect replacement. Not sure if the same battery is used for non-hybrids.

I think ULEZ in cities requires Euro 4 status for petrol vehicles, and my 20-series hybrid is classed as Euro 5 in section D2 of the V5C, so it passes.

Well, I took it to the Toyota garage, showed them the squeak. They said that since they can’t connect their computer to the Japanese systems it’ll cost £120 of an engineer’s time to diagnose!

I got the Lockwood dials fitted. Very happy with them. Clock remains in km.

16 minutes ago, R4v3n said:

Usually, the long bip when you try to lock is telling you 2 things (in my experience) :

- You have a door open

- You have a key inside the car

That was it!

My wife lost her house keys a couple of days ago. I just found them under the passenger seat with her fob attached, so mystery solved! Actually two mysteries solved.

Recently the keyless entry on my key fob has stopped working. The car doesn’t unlock when I slip my hand behind the door handle and pressing the lock button results in a long ‘beep’ that sounds like an error. The courtesy light no longer comes on when I approach the car.

Weirdly I can use the buttons on the fob to unlock the car no problem, and the car starts when I sit in the drivers’ seat.

I thought it might be a flat battery in the fob so I switched it out, but the same problem happens.

Does anyone know what could be the problem?

On 9/3/2023 at 2:26 PM, pjpern said:

The button seems a waste of time and I don't think it should be turned on. You will see when it's working (and hear the engine) from the green EV light. I was told not to turn it on when the engine was cold. The engine levels itself out depending on speed and battery level.

It seems to work the same as other Toyota hybrids. It adjusts the throttle control response to make it easier to stay in the “Eco” range and puts the air conditioning into a low power mode. The AC is very noticeable on a hot day.

With Eco mode on, you need to push the accelerator quite some way in to start the engine, it tries to accelerate on battery power alone, and there’s a noticeable delay if you stamp on it. With Eco mode off it starts the engine almost immediately so you get full power.

22 minutes ago, Rojie said:

 

FYI This movie fails to download to my PC running Win 10.

Thanks. I’ll see if I can convert it to a different format.

On 8/17/2023 at 4:09 PM, Quimbasher said:

4520A-58010 steering column.  i got mine from amayama.   there are few youtube videos on similar toyotas/ lexus with the same rattle from steering coloumn.  if you replace the entire column i think it needs programed on techstream. so i removed and replaced the lower section that has the wear. I am now rattle free!

Did you find it an easy job? I want to try replacing the bushing, or at least seeing if it’s the problem, but I don’t know if it’s something that should be attempted by someone who isn’t a qualified engineer. I’m pretty handy, have some experience with motors and electrics and can do normal car maintenance, but I wouldn’t call myself a mechanic.

This is the squeak. Excuse the dirt, I’ve just come back from a trip.