Another Dealer Service nightmare - stripped oil pan threads

UPDATE TIME: I have been trying to reach my old service advisor by phone for 3 days, left him a message, but he never called back. My goal was to agree ahead of time on the plan of action and prices, so I don't waste my time doing the tow if we don't agree. Anyway, was disappointed that he never called back - one more reason that I quit trusting dealers. Today, I just called AAA for the tow to the dealer, regardless - I need to get the car back in service!

Well, the advisor was out sick or something like that, so I worked directly the service manager, who confidently told me they can tap the old pan collar and replace with a larger diameter bolt, with the same 14mm head. This was in line with the "georgina-plan". I agreed and asked them to get me when they pushed the car to the lift, as I didn't trust they wouldn't try to start it. Well, I'm waiting in the lobby, and they never call me to allow me to watch them push it. So, I don't know if they tried to start or not. The main guy said it wasn't started, but my blood pressure was going up. the replacement service advisor guaranteed they would get me.

Anyway, the car was up on the lift, the pan verified stripped, and the manager stuck to his tap+new bolt proposal. I asked to see a new pan and compared the lisle replacement bolt to the inside thread collar on the pan. Take a look at the pics. the bolt diameter was at or near the O.D (outside diameter) of the collar! Manager couldn't explain how there would be any meat left after tapping the thing, except to say that the pan metal has held these things in on other cars - Wth - this guy is a manager of an engineering operation?!?. No way - for my car - was I going with that. In general, this flange is about 1-1.5mm thick on the threaded part of the collar. Based on my gut feeling and playing around with screws, bolts and metal for 30 years, I'm going to say, anyone in this situation, don't do it! It's too little metal. Toyota cheaped out on this part! You need to simply replace the pan.

So I asked for a pan replacement, with new drain plug and Oil filter cap. The service manager said he couldn't actually trust me that I didn't cause the damage. I told him, I didn't trust his staff's work anymore, several times after he tried to say trust us, we are professionals. I then interviewed the two techs in detail, who would supposedly do the work. The manager said the pan would cost me $180, that was his cost, and he would throw in the labor, new filter cap and drain plug. I knew I could get these pans on the internet, genuine OEM for $100 and asked him to lower his price. He mentioned he was throwing in free labor. In general, I was kind of stuck, but my time is worth more than the $80 savings at this point. I agreed to go forward with the work. Lesson learned, but I didn't need to learn anything today. I can afford the $80 or so extra bucks, but all told, I'm out about $200 for lame work by a legitimate Toyota dealer in Portland. Probably won't be going back to this dealer anymore, or any for that matter - unless the job is really complicated or time consuming.

Closing credits: I'm getting a drive back to my house (Toyota shuttle service) and the driver, who is a miscellaneous errands kind-of-guy, asks my story and lets me know around August 2021, they were having a lot of problems with "lub-techs", forgetting to put oil fill caps back on, and missing other major procedural steps. He also mentioned that the shop has had about 70% turnover since august; that's close to losing every employee and replacing them with another body - in the past 1/2 year!

So, the same general theme continues: Real labor and work quality in America get worse, prices get higher. Seems this country values lawyers and salesman, like we just want to buy crap from China, sell it to each other and when shit breaks, sue someone. Maybe we had our wakeup call this past week and can get back on the straight path.

Takeaways:

1. Don't trust people to do work: watch them, take pictures, use video cameras. Forget it!. Just do your own work - if you can.
2. If you get work done, and before you pay, verify its _ALL_ documented on your paperwork so you have some recourse later.
3. Ask for all your old parts back.
4. Interview the actual guys doing the work, write down their names, while talking with them.
5. If this problem happens to you, replace the oil pan, but buy one off the internet beforehand to save $100 - if you go to the dealer.
6. If you do your own oil changes, I think it's wise to try to clean out the inside thread of the pan collar with a paper towel before putting the plug in. Over time, I think small metal debris could build up in there and maybe cause a mis-thread or gradual decay of the threads.
7. Based on the other's inputs, I think lowering the Toyota-spec torque on both the filter CAP and drain plug are probably in order, maybe drop it by 10-15% on each value, which would put it at 15-16lbft on the cap and 24-25lbft on the plug. I'm probably going to try that going forward, just for the hell of it, even though I didn't strip this to begin the problem.
8. Be thankful that in America, Canada or other "free countries", we at least have these forums, and can speak freely, without worrying about being thrown in torture jail, bombed to kingdom-come, or secretly poisoned with plutonium.

If anyone wants various Portland Toyota dealers' info, contact me through chat or however that works on PC.

 

Here are some more pics, proving definitively, the pan is much more likely to strip than the bolt/plug. That is my old pan in the pic.

The pan thread collar is 2mm thick on the old 2010 pan. On the new replacement pan, it seemed a little thinner @ ~1.5mm.

Also, interesting to note about 2.5cm depth from bottom of hole to bottom of pan. this represents oil/sludge which can never drain. I always had a question about possible excessive sludge build up over time, which never drains during a regular OC, remains in engine forever, contributing to the demise (oil-burning issue) of the G3 engines. I wasn't able to inspect my pan immediately after it came off but the tech said it was pretty viscous liquid in there - i.e., no sludge.

 

im in agreement, the FIPG stuff has too much room for error. after inspecting my work today, I wasn't too happy; and you have to worry about too much: how thick fipg bead, how long before compress, how long before cure, how to seal around stud and bolt holes, what happens if you get the slop into a thread hole before the bolt goes on, if you have a thin spot, will that bottom out, leaving a gap; if it doesn't cure adequately because the bead is too thick, do you need to wait another 2 hours? seems great for a factory, fine-spec process, but not for the average tech, after the fact.

just to give another example, the cure time is 2 hours before fill oil and trans fluid - at least that's what I read. when I inspected my pan, I smeared uncured fipg on my finger and the block. this was probably 4+ hours after application. Now what if that slope is on the inside of the pan? how do I know that's not contaminating the oil? I have no trust in the system anymore! LOL

 

Even at $90 for the OEM pan, that's cheap enough for me. Good to know about options though. I have the old pan in hand, with the stripped stamped threaded collar. If anyone wants it to do some sort of experiment, let me know. I have been meaning to measure the total amount of residual oil (below the drain hole at level) and report back. it seems significant, like maybe 8-10 ounces. will update later.