Toyota doesn't believe in door side mouldings anymore?

Although I would prefer door moldings, with repair outlets like Dent Wizard and the flexible metal and paint used in todays cars, fixing a ding is not as big a deal as it used to be. And moldings can cause problems if they let go or are dented themselves.

Maybe it's because door molding only protects against things that hit the molding. With the preponderance of SUVs & pickup trucks in this country, doors are at too many different heights to predict where they'll hit your car.

Side molding do not protect one from dings. What cause the digs are the parts of others doors that do not touch where the molding are located, like the dog leg portion of read doors. Open one of the doors on one of you other vehicles and see for yourself it even comes close to where you molding might be.

mike

Perhaps those with closer ties to Toyota can confirm what my omniscient dealer told me. The mouldings tend to be horizontal, whereas the airflow along the side panels is not. By interfering with the flow the mouldings add to air resistance.

I pass that along with some skepticism about the magnitude of the effect.

My '92 Corolla Wagon has body side moldings and I park as far away from a store.

I suggest you adopt my method of dent control. Your doctor will be happy, too...

Your dealer's excuse sounds just like something a dealer would say. I recall when Plymouths had huge, oversize fishtails on the rear end, and the claim was that they aided in horizontal stability at highway speed. Then some aeronautical engineer stated with some formulas that this effect of horizontal stability would indeed start to kick in....at approximately 170 mph. (only 70 mph or so more than a Plymouth could ever attain.)

If all side moldings on all vehicles were at a uniform height, or even if all vehicles' outermost points of their doors (that is phrased really poorly, but can't think of a better way to say it!) were at the same height, side moldings would work, & prevent a bunch of dings. But how may other car/SUV/truck/van doors would hit exactly where the side molding is on my car? IMO, it seems like a great idea at first, until one realizes that the all of the various moldings just don't match up with each other.

Cathy

Has anyone noticed that very few vehicles have them? Look at the '07 Tahoe, most Nissans, Volvos, etc...

Functional or not, side moldings are a slave to style.

Is everybody a Toyota apologist here? No, door mouldings don't have to line up to be effective. When a door is swung against the side of another car, you only need 1 car's moulding to make contact to avoid a damaging ding. The key is to avoid metal against metal. If a car has a door moulding at its widest point then (theoritically) it should prevent it from damaging another car. Now that I think about, the moulding protects other doors from dings just as much as it protects its own door. I just went to an auto show and was disappointed by the lack of door mouldings on Toyotas. But I was also disappointed with Toyota in general. Maybe I was expecting too much but I just wasn't impressed by their vehicles. I kind of liked the Highlander (which has mouldings!), but that was it.

The widest point of the door of the adjacent vehicle is VERY often enough to miss your molding completely. Otherwise, cars with molding wouldn't have dings in their doors.

The Prius (UK T4 model) has them as an option. I opted, having a long experience of how they improve (NB "improve" -- nothing will save you from totally reckless creeps) the odds of dodging bashes from other cars' doors in carparks. My car still gives good mpg.

Study the options, not the just vanilla spec.

Style and reduction of the coefficient of drag are the reasons.

Buy a Saturn with plastic doors.

ive got a scion xA, and it doesnt have the strips either. however, its available color-matched as a JDM import, for some rediculous price.

You don't need strips if you park at the far end of the parking lot.

Plus you get some exercise.

Plus you can remember where your car is every time....LOL

Have you ever seen people waiting for a front row spot at the gym?

I have.

ROFL.... yup I have....

I should not let out my secret about parking way the hell away from my destination. What would happen if we all did that?

Even when I park all by myself, when I come back there's usually a second car parked extremely close to one side or the other. I think single cars attract other cars for some unknown reason (Murphy's Law)?

You are not parking far enough away....

Just parking where there are three empty spots does not do the trick...