1999 Toyota Camry CE from North America - Comments

I have a 1999 Camry purchased new. It has bad brakes. I have never had brake issues on any car I have owned. I have been through 3 sets of pads in less than 20,000 miles over 18 months. The dealer refuses to repair the brakes again for free even though the last set lasted only 11 months, two sets were replaced in the previous 18 months. The dealer has not been responsive. I had to start photographing the pads in the service bay to get them to repair the brakes under the original warranty the previous time.

The car has a smell like mildew if you run the vent with the Air Conditioning off.

It also gathers dings easily due to a very thin body.

The CD player has always skipped.

I usually run my cars for many years, my Caravan is 15 years old and I have done nearly all the maintenance. It runs like a top. I am seriously thinking of selling the Camry because it is faulty and the dealer will not cover any of the repairs.

I agree with this one.

I have same 1999 that I bought at 51000 miles.

I took to the dealer for the engine check light for which he charged me 91 dollars and found nothing wrong with it.

Instead, he said that, there was water pump leak, and required the seals for the engine must be done, as well as the motor belts and the timing belt since it has 90000 miles on it.

He gave the cost for all these four items about $700.00 and when I went to pick it up after repair was done, he charged me $868.14 for it.

When I asked him to explain it, his reply was that, others charges are computer calculated charges.

How can you trust a dealer such like this one?

Do you have any suggestions, please?

Thank You.

Govardhan.

I have a 1999 Camry CE and I only had the vehicle for only 6 months. The check engine soon light comes on ever so often and now my engine/car is make a clacking noise very loudly while in park. These hole in the wall mechanic shops want to charge me $1100-$2500 to correct the problem. Why do they want so much for a vehicle which I thought was the best car on the market?

And also I checked my radiator fluid and it seems to be coming out reddish color is this a problem or have they switched from green color to red?

Please help!

I also have a 1999 Camry and have had the Check Engine light go on (after two weeks of owning it) and it has gone on numerous times since I've had it. The brakes are not the best, and now my car rattles or will not start on a consistent basis. I'm seeing how long the car will last before I trade it in.

I'm willing to bet you that 9 times out of 10 your car was a victim of a flood or was probably driven into a river LOL. But no, I'm serious. Usually when you smell mildew like that the car was exposed to excess water. Most dealers are very good at hiding that and you everyone else should really get their cars histories checked out at carfax or autocheck to see if they have been in natural disasters. There was a warning out, and probably still is, about cars from New Orleans and the surrounding Gulf areas about buying cars from the areas that were hit by Hurricane Katrina. Although this doesn't pertain to you (since it happened prior to that), I wouldn't rule out the possibility that yours was exposed to a flood or some other type of body of water. Lots of dealers are really that shady. A lot of cars that you would usually not expect to have problems such as these may have been caused or accelerated by water.

Or the car once just simply had the window down during a rain and the interior got soaked... I had a Honda with a bad heater core similiar symptoms or perhaps just change the evaporator filter. Flood damage cars are usually plagued with electrical issues as well...