general problems of the 2009 Toyota RAV4

The contact owns a 2009 Toyota Rav4. The contact stated that there was an abnormal grinding sound coming from the engine at startup. There was no warning light illuminated. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic, and the contact was informed that the engine was consuming an excessive amount of engine oil caused by a gasket failure inside a piston in the engine. Due to the failure, the contact was frequently adding oil to the engine. The vehicle was taken to a dealer, and an estimate was provided for the repair. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not made aware of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 230,000.

Four incidents of unintended acceleration , in all instances foot was on break petal not on gas petal, 3 instances vehicle was stopped at traffic light, last incident was pulling into a parking space foot on brake, in all instances braked hard and shifted vehicle into neutral and turned vehicle off to avoid collisions, personal injury and property damage.

Engine rattle on cold start ups.

While decelerating on a freeway off-ramp at approx. 25 mph, the brakes failed to stop the car. Going no more than 5 mph, I lifted off slightly then depressed them all the way to the floor; they didn't engage properly but finally slowed the car almost to a complete stop, but the engine revved and the car kept wanting to go forward. I threw the transmission into park and turned off the ignition.

All lights come on check engine,4wd,trac , come and goes, going 6 times already to dealer last 2 weeks. . Rav4 with low miles . . Toyota very dissatisfied.

Just over 100,000 miles on the 2009 rav 4. Without issue. Not original owner. This weekend it tried 3 times to accelerate us into the vehicles or people in front of is. After looking online I verified that our floormats are both secured and do not extend to the area of the pedal. Incident 1. While sitting at a complete stop at red light, heard and felt engine start to rev. Car lurched forward, and I applied left foot in addition to the right which was already on the brake in attempt to stop it. Had to hit shifter into neutral to regain control only a foot or 2 from the car in front. Mistakenly thought it was an isolated incident. Incident 2 today-- while slowing to a red light by application of brakes with right foot, engine revved up to approx. 3000 rpm and tried accelerating us into vehicles in front of us. Again- only shifting into neutral brought vehicle under control. . Incident 3 - approx 20 min after incident 2 on way home ( Sunday afternoon)while braking to a stop at red light. No vehicles in front by people entering the crosswalk. Heard and felt engine start to accelerate. Immediate addition of right foot to the brake pedal was able to stop the car and the acceleration stopped without shifting to neutral this time. Vehicle is parked awaiting reply from Toyota. Checked Toyota website and it says there are no open recalls or service campaigns for this VIN.

Engine has 164,000 miles and is burning 1 qt. Of oil per 1000 miles.

Cold start metallic rattle due to faulty vvti actuator(TSB-004-13 -a). Between $900 and $1700 to fix and is not the fault of the owner. Issue is occurring with many Toyota models and can be traced back to poor quality of engine components.

When car is at 1500 rpm at 40 mph, the transmission vibrates and thrusts. Noise goes away if above 2000 rpm or above 40 mph. It's Toyota of manchester nh has been able to reproduce. Waiting to see if Toyota will do anything.

While my wife was driving on the highway at 60 mph the engine lost power. Moving to the right lane to pull over, flames began coming out of the top of the hood, hitting the windshield. She tried stopping but brake pedal went to the floor, requiring her to put the car in park and slide on grass. She jumped out of the vehicle and within 8 minutes the car was completely destroyed.

Vehicle was parked overnight on our front driveway facing the garage. Where it always parked everyday. The weather was warm and clear my wife was in the vehicle and was preparing to buckle up and drive to church, I entered the vehicle into the passenger seat and buckled up. She started the vehicle and immediately accelerated through the roof. I yelled at her to get her foot off the accelerator and she yelled at me that she was no where near it. I then told her to pull the floor mat / carpet back and it was already back and locked down to the floor. I told her to turn it off. The car idled down to stop once key was turned off. We sat there for a few moments, I told her to depress the accelerator pedal once and try to start the vehicle. The car started normally we let it warm up for a moment and drove away. She told me she was glad I was in the car to see the event because it had happened 3 other times in the last 45 days. Fortunately she was not traveling at a high speed when it occurred or on a busy roadway or school zone.

I was driving and the air bag inadvertently went off, exploding in my face. The vehicle filled with smoke, dust, and debris. Because I could not see (airbag in my face and smoke/debris in the vehicle), I crashed into the vehicle in front of me.

The brake was engaged in traffic when the car started to accelerate. I applied the brake more firmly and put the car in park. The engine began to rev uncontrollably in a cloud of white smoke. I switched the car off and restarted the motor and it then ran normally.

While stopped at red light with right foot on brake, engine suddenly accelerated to very high rpm. Shifted to neutral and engine revved even higher. Turned off ignition. Signal turned green and since I was in traffic, decided to try to start engine again. Engine started and performed normally. Immediately drove to Toyota dealer who said they could find nothing wrong. We are now afraid to drive this vehicle! things could have been much worse had we been moving in traffic!.

I was coming to a stop at traffic light. As I slowed down with my foot on the brake the engine suddenly began to surge. Since my foot was already on the brake I was able to push down harder on it to stop it from hitting the car ahead of me. Within a second or two, as the engine continued to surge, I shifted the transmission into park. When I did this the engine surged even more. I then turned off the engine by turning the key which did shut everything down. I then restarted the engine and it ran normally. I was somewhat shaken up by the incident. Note that this had nothing to do with the floor mats or hitting the wrong pedal. My foot was on the brake pedal the whole time the incident occurred-if it hadn't been I would have crashed into the car in front of me.

While driving 25 mph, I started to brake for a light. The car suddenly accelerated and it took both feet applied to the brakes to stop and avoid hitting the car in front of me. Ten minutes later, another sudden acceleration occurred, followed in rapid succession by a third acceleration.

Had just pulled slowly into a parking space, I took my foot off the accelerator and applied the brake. As I was applying pressure to the brake, the engine sped up to more than 7,000 rpm. (my foot was not on the accelerator. It was on the brake only. ) I continued to press the brake which started to slip, and then I immediately put the transmission in neutral. As the engine reached maximum rpm's, it died back to an idle. This identical incident happened twice within 10 minutes. My parents and wife were in the car and can vouch for me. Note: two months prior, this identical incident occurred while I was stopping at a busy intersection while preparing to turn left. There was a stopped vehicle in front of me which I nearly hit. My wife was in the car and can vouch for me.

10 month old Toyota rav-4 caught fire under the hood while sitting in parking garage and burned.

As I drove into our parking lot at work after lunch, I was idling engine with foot on brake as I pulled into a parking spot. I was already making my turn into the parking spot with foot on brake and engine idling when my car began to rapidly accelerate. I responded by applying foot brake and grabbing and pulling the emergency brake but only had about 15 - 20 feet before hitting a concrete wall at the bake of the parking spot. I managed to not hit hard enough for the air bags to deploy but there is damage to my front bumper and hood. This is the only time my car has done this. I bought it new last Aug. 09 and it has approx 12,432 miles. Toyota took it to quality imports Toyota and "investigated" it and has found no defect. I talked to the inspector over the phone and he explained that he spent a few hours going through a series of tests attempting to find or reproduce a malfunction with no success. He told me that while my report is quite common he has never found a defect to explain sudden unexpected acceleration and that he thinks my car is safe and "he would let his daughter drive my car. " I attest to the fact that a sticking accelerator and/or a slowly returning accelerator cannot explain this experience and is no "fix" for my accident. My education is in mechanical engineering and I have been an equipment mechanic on machinery for 15 years. I do not believe that just because you cannot reproduce an electronic problem in a matter of hours that the conclusion should be that there is no defect. It does not excuse the fact that there is a major problem and nothing serious is being "investigated. ".

My wife was sitting at a signalized intersection in our 2009 Toyota rav 4 on Tuesday February 2, 2010 with her foot on the brake, when the vehicle suddenly lurched forward. She was able to keep the vehicle from traveling further by applying more pedal pressure on the brake and then shifting into neutral. While in neutral, the engine revved loudly for about 10 seconds before returning to normal idle. She brought the vehicle home but was visibly shaken up from this experience. I immediately called the Toyota dealership and was told to take the vehicle in for them to check. They could not replicate this condition and thus said there's nothing that can be done at this time. This is one of the vehicles that does not have the so-called faulty sticking accelerator pedal, and floor mats did not cause this issue, so this leads me to suspect that an electronics problem is the cause and that Toyota is refusing to come up with a viable fix for the situation. I called the Toyota main office this morning, but was not given any satisfaction regarding this issue. Meanwhile, we are stuck with a vehicle that we are both afraid to continue driving.