Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I don't think the Camrys will ever come close to the '92-'96 and '97-'02 Camry. Hands down some of the most reliable vehicles out there. My mom has a 2001 Camry XLE, 240k on it with absolutely no issues besides worn struts. My wife had a 1992 Camry LE that she gave to a friend. At the time, it had something like 215k on it. After a few years, her friend gave it to her brother and it had about 280k on it, still running strong.
A coworker of mine has a 50 mile roundtrip commute that he still makes with his 96 Camry. Last time we spoke it had something like 320k on it. Those cars are virtually bullet proof. Just make sure the timing belt gets changed, along with oil and tune-ups, and you're good. Its too bad the 2.4L 4 cylinders in the 2003-06 Camrys had issues with head bolts backing out. Otherwise, I think those could've also been bulletproof engines.
Well here's an example with just two Ford car owners that I know. One bought an 2011 Escape for business use. Absolutely anal about doing proper maintenance and never abusing a vehicle. At 16,000 miles, they are on their THIRD engine after the original engine and the its replacement catastrophically failed. The engine--the 2.5 liter 4, not exactly a monster of mechanical complexity. The vehicle was out of service for over 2 months each time waiting for Ford to deliver a replacement engine, to boot. Will they buy another Ford? Never. Second guy bought a new Focus about 3 years ago. Another guy who is anal about proper maintenance and drives almost 100% highway miles. He left his Focus engine in pieces along a highway hundreds of miles from home after it, too, catastrophically failed for no apparent reason. The dealer's comment where the vehicle was towed, "Yeah, we see a lot of this."
Am I a total Ford-hater? No, I drive a 3/4 ton 4WD 6.7 Ford pickup for my work that I love and that, so far, has been trouble free. But, Ford cars, from what I can see, are another story. Go look at what the READER surveys in Consumer Reports say about reliability. It pretty much confirms what I've seen with Ford's growing reliability problems in its car segment.
Oh, and I don't base my recommendation for a car on the radio/nav system. Ford's Sync is indeed pretty awful, but Toyota's isn't great, either. Nor Subaru's, nor a lot of other makers. Buying a vehicle for the stereo or nav system is like buying a house based on how the doorbell sounds.
Consumer Reports is extremely biased against American vehicles. That's why it was so strange that they recommended the 2014 Impala. Must be a real good car to sway them! The magazine is aimed at those who buy apple products "because they're better" and drive Honda Civics "because they are better" - not for those capable of analysis and making informed decisions.
I have been in a few vehicles with Sync and it seems to work well. My ideal car is a base model Nissan Versa, so I do find it extremely pointless.
Consumer Reports is extremely biased against American vehicles. That's why it was so strange that they recommended the 2014 Impala. Must be a real good car to sway them! The magazine is aimed at those who buy apple products "because they're better" and drive Honda Civics "because they are better" - not for those capable of analysis and making informed decisions.
I have been in a few vehicles with Sync and it seems to work well. My ideal car is a base model Nissan Versa, so I do find it extremely pointless.
Consumer Reports reliability statistics are compiled from the survey that they send to their subscribers every year (I fill out mine and send it back every year). I've found that those reader-supplied reliability statistics have been extremely accurate for every vehicle that I've owned over the last 30 years. CR isn't bashful about recommending vehicle models from the American Big Three if they are good, nor steering people away from import models that aren't good.
If there is any bias, it is in the minds of car buyers that just refuse to accept the fact that American manufacturers' car quality overall, though much better than in years past, still isn't up to the overall quality level of a number of the foreign manufacturers. The truth hurts, but, as the old saying goes, only if it's supposed to.
The problem with modern everything, not just cars, is that they engineer everything to be just "good enough" and nothing more... sheet metal and plastics continue to get thinner, etc. Saving 50 cents per part multiplied over millions of units.. this is how they think to maximize profit margins.
Honestly the Camry, even the XLE, comes across as feeling cheap compared to similar makes... they could have spent a bit more money on soundproofing and better materials. Can hear every raindrop hit the roof, and every pebble hit underneath the car's wheel wells, the noise transmitted from the wheels to the interior is relatively high. They seem to ignore spending money on stuff they know people are likely to miss on test drives... rain and gravel roads which I didn't think to drive on. I'm sure the car's reliable but some of the things I've noticed like letting an obvious defect in the sunroof go on for years, or having a defect in the torque converter in the I4's that causing shuttering and have that go on for years don't inspire confidence. When you discover a problem you should fix it immediately. To give them credit they extended the warranty on that torque converter issue to 8 years, but they won't cover the sunroof rattling, even with their extended warranty.. only the factory warranty.
It's not exclusive to Toyota though. For a long time GM used intake gaskets prone to leaking, and they probably still use inferior brake rotors prone to warping after 15 years. I actually noticed the typical rotor rub on the Impala I was driving though it was still quite mild. It's all about saving 10 bucks worth of sheet metal vs just charging 10 bucks more for the car... it's all about unit profit, and the bottom line. Jeep used paper gaskets prone to leak in many of their vehicles, and cheap plastic power window holders prone to breakage that cause the window to fall into their vehicles... honestly it would have cost 2 bucks per vehicle to use a part that didn't cause the windows to fall into the car doors... cheap engineering to maximize every last cent... I guess they figured it was "good enough" when they designed them...
Today's lawn mowers, vacuums, and other home appliances suffer the same fate.. engineered just good enough, and in many cases to be disposable.
The 2014/2015 Impala 2LT and 2LTE are probably the best car in that vehicle class... they blow away a Toyota Camry in every way except for the gas mileage of their flex fuel V6 vs. the gas mileage of Toyota's V6. Of course the Impala would be more appropriately compared to the Avalon. I did notice an annoying hum I could not pinpoint that was pretty loud at certain speeds though.. along with rotor unevenness obvious when trying to stop at higher speeds.
All this has really been going on forever though.. they've cut corners on home construction as well going back 50-100 years... saving money by sticking homes on tiny 50x90 lots... etc. In my father's house they used nails instead of screws for the floor/subfloor so the whole house squeaks...the drywall is cracking and separating in the corners along the ceiling... just idiocy... even if you want to pay for quality, you are not guaranteed to get quality unless you know what you are looking for. Home sellers, car dealers, etc. all prey on this. Car dealers have no qualms about selling a vehicle with known issues they try to hide... I've rarely met an honest one. They're all about getting you to sign on that line they sketch out and pressure you all the while hiding defects in used cars... parasites the whole lot of em.
toyota camry once a favorite car but has been plaque as the truth of its reliability is surfacing.
This forum is a good indicator as by searching this forum there has been many threads on issues.
Consumer reports listed the common problems drivers has had.
excessive oil consumption
defective exterior paint
transmission failure
vehicle speed control issues
unexpected air bag deployment
to avoid dealing with most common toyota camry issues, it is important you purchase your car from a reputable dealer. It is in their best interest to sell you a car without problems since their reputation may very well be on the line. As well, make sure to check out the history of your vehicle to see if any of these issues have occurred or if it has been in any accidents (this can usually done through the vin number).
Camrys were notorious at one time for the engine oil sludge issue, which Toyota tried unsuccessfully to on blame on owners. Most car manufacturers have troubled models, at least in certain years, in spite of their reputations.
Had a 1997 Camry that was vulnerable to the sludge issue. When I sold it in 2009, because I needed an AWD vehicle, it had 130K miles and hadn't had any issues...yet. But, sometimes it did have a strong oil smell. Great car.
The most common problems of a vehicle don't make them common. If one car out of a billion has engine failure, but it's the only problem the model ever had, engine failure is the most common problem, even though it occurred 1:1,000,000,000.
Had a 1997 Camry that was vulnerable to the sludge issue. When I sold it in 2009, because I needed an AWD vehicle, it had 130K miles and hadn't had any issues...yet. But, sometimes it did have a strong oil smell. Great car.
Probably an oil leak. I have a '99 and if yours was the 2.2L four cylinder, then it may have suffered from the typical oil leaks that the 5S-FE suffers from:
-valve cover gasket
-oil pressure switch
-oil pump o-ring
I had the latter two go on my car, but I only figured out that after doing the first. Which needed to be done anyhow, as the gasket disintegrated while I was doing it.
My 2011 Camry seems to be trooping along just fine though. At 135k it's needed very little.
Location: New Albany, Indiana (Greater Louisville)
11,974 posts, read 25,473,841 times
Reputation: 12187
The only reliability complaint I have about my 2005 Camry is the transmission sometimes has a mind of it's own, especially coming down hills. If I put it in N and back into drive it solves the problem. Other older Toyotas I've had in the past burned oil. I still think Camry is at the top for long term reliability. Every car will have problems at some point.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
