'97 Camry engine exploded!!

There is no way to know unless someone examines the engine.

And of course it was always babied, never hard acceleration, always warmed up when real cold , and Everything was maintained and diagnosed properly and all work was done properly and always looked after. Obviously you missed something, Big.

Without seeing it, sounds like you threw a connecting rod. It means a bearing seized, and with all the torque on it, instead of going up and down in the cylinder, it went out the side, bottom or top, depending on where in the stroke it was at. Not unusual for any engine,. S**T happens. Can happen any time you turn on the key, New with no miles or 300,000+ miles. Unless it happens to a brand consistently I'd not be concerned about buying that particular brand again. I've 2 Toyotas and couldn't be happier. This is a one in a zillion occurrence, fix it and keep going or junk the car and find another. I'll reiterate the part about freak occurrences, if the 97 Camry threw rods in 3% of the vehicles off the line, HECK YES, THEN I'd be concerned about quality control, but since it's not a known reported problem, (and this would be) don't be overly concerned about it.

When my 84 5 speed tranny in the pickup started growling at 85k, replaced the input shaft bearing (was a known characteristic) and it's still going strong with just that single bearing replaced today.

Any car will need fixing, some just more than others, and some with amazing consistency of problems. You just had a freak occurrence happen.

Mark

--
Four boxes protect our freedom: the soap box, the
ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box.

When was the last time you personally checked the oil level on the dipstick?

Who performed the last oil change?

Sometimes mistakes are made that allow oil leaks to develop (especially at the base gasket of the oil filter, or at the drain plug gasket, or even at the oil fill cap).

Most engine explosion episodes are related to oil starvation where connecting rod bearings freeze - lock up - weld together moving parts from lack of lubrication.

Not saying this is what happened to you, just a first guess.

You could have a mechanic examine the engine to verify, and then perhaps work back to determine the cause.

Maybe an aftermarket low quality oil filter collapsed internally - another guess - the engine can be examined to determine the cause.

I concur. Check to see that the oil drain plug is still present and didn't fall out. Check to see that there aren't two gaskets present at the oil filter. Check to see that the correct oil was used for the car and that the oil filler cap is on.

YES - Engine oil gelling or sludge could starve the lower end of engine for oil resulting in exactly what happened to your engine! Toyota recently extended warranty (special customer satisfaction deal) on the 97-2001 V6 and

4 cylinder engines just because of this design problem. Problem is the gelling causes the oil not to drain back from the heads (passages are too small to start with) so no or little oil makes it where it is needed. Check it out at or do a google search for many more (Toyota Camry Sludge problem) . Contact Toyota immediately - you may be entitled to a NEW engine at no cost! At first Toyota denied there was a problem - blaming not frequent enough oil changes - they backed way off in 2002 by the special customer service effort.

Classic troll set up. Pulling pieces of your engine out, right.

mb

Alex wrote:

Ahhhh, the awaited troll response.

Wonder what the wicked witch of toyota is doing these days?

mb

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Wolfgang wrote:

It had that slight ring of falseness about it. The only time I have heard of any engine just exploding,..was a Ford 302 Windsor. The guy, a work colleague, said it just stopped, and when he investigated there was a rod thru the block,...however later, when I asked him what the mechanic found as the cause, he went quiet. So,..that means almost unequivocally it was not mis-adventure

Jason

From the original poster: No, I am not a troll, and no, I am not posting some BS story for sh**s and giggles. This really did happen to me (and yes, the AAA guy really did pull out little pieces of metal from my engine). I just got a call back from the mechanic today informing me that the engine was completely shot and it would cost alot of money to replace the engine, so I am either junking the car or buying a new one. I will, however, be checking up with Toyota in reference to the oil sludging issue that Wolfgang referenced. I am far from a car expert, but thanks to all of you who provided some guesses and clues. The mechanic told me it wasn't worth paying him to find out what the problem was b/c it would cost me unnecessary expenses (don't know if that's really true or not). And for those of you who thought I was making this all up...I'll show you the pieces I saved from the engine :)

OK,..sorry about the doubt,..its just that sudden failure is rare without loud noises before-hand. It does sound like your engine may have had sludged oil-galleries which starved oil to one of the piston-connecting rod bearings which may have then spun without making too much noise. The time left for failure after that can be in the seconds, especially under full-power.

These engines are quiet remarkable for their longevity normally,but, if they have had oil-changes at substantailly longer periods than specified, they will sludge up.

Jason

Not a problem. FYI, I did oil changes every 3000 miles, which I believe is less than what's specified (the manual said something like

5000 miles). I'm going to have it towed to a Toyota dealership today; I talked to them two days ago and they set up a case number for me and said they would exmine the engine and see if I'm covered. The only big problem is that I don't have all of my maintenance records going back to '97; I have a few from this year and last year, but my parents had the car before that and so far they can't find them. So, if that causes me to lose the warranty coverage, I've learned a valuable but pricey lesson about saving receipts...of course, I need to find out if it was sludge, but I would be surprised if it wasn't at this point.

I dont keep mechanical repair (for those jobs I no longer have the enthusiasm for) receipts either, plus I do my own basic servicing,..so I'd be in trouble also.

I think Toyota would listen if your mechy writes a report and is liscensed.

Jason

I feel your pain. This happened to me. I only had 68K miles on my camry and it is a 98. In short, after I took pictures of the destroyed engine to two dealerships, the second dealership agreed that the engine seized due to oil sludge. The oil had been changed on a regular basis, I only had a handful of receipts with me, but I was armed with information and told them I could get the other receipts for the oil changes. The book says 5K-7500 miles for oil change but I did mine somewhere between 3K and

5K. The mechanic tried to tell me it was poor maintenance but quieted down once he saw the oil receipts I did have.

They paid for towing, rental car and total costs to repair. The bill was $4916. The car is running like new again and my mpg is back up to where it used to be.

Don't give up yet...go talk to the service manager most familiar with Sludge issues and be firm.

Good luck.