Clamping down on our Sienna
When you buy almost 90 cars a year, you're going to encounter some odd quality control issues. For example, we mentioned the Saturn Aura with the Chevrolet key in an earlier blog. That was a silly goof, but one that didn't really impact the car's operation. The Chrysler Sebring that didn't want to start on the first try was more serious, or at least seriously annoying.
Our latest weird sample defect was found on our 2007 Toyota Sienna XLE. While the van was up on our lift being fitted for our fuel metering equipment, we found that one of the hoses to the rear heater was clamped off near the firewall with a nicely modified set of vise-grips. (Like with the Sebring, it didn't happen here at the track.)
No one is quite sure what happened. Toyota says they don't use tools like that on the assembly line. Since technicians at the dealers own their own tools, they'd probably notice that one went missing. Plus why would the heater hose have to be clamped on a new van? After all, the heater works fine and there aren't any leaks.
Happily, there probably aren't enough custom-modified vise-grips for this to happen to many other Siennas...
--Tom Mutchler
