2001 Toyota Celica 190 from UK and Ireland - Comments

1300 miles - CD player stops working. Replaced under warranty.

2500 miles - Rattle from underneath car combined with excessive (although not unpleasant) exhaust noise. Dealer diagnoses catalytic converter (over the phone, worryingly) and replaces it under warranty. Problem solved.

7000 miles - Repeat of catalyst problem. Dealer service manager lets on that it's happened to a few 190's they look after and thinks it's to do with the aggressive valve timing and lift over 6,000 RPM allowing unburnt fuel into the exhaust on the overrun. Great! Again, warranty pays up.

8000 miles - Notice the front tyres are worn unevenly. Dealer checks suspension geometry and finds several settings are massively out of kilter. Adjusts to spec. Promises to take up the case of a replacing a knackered set of P Zeros with Toyota.

9000 miles - First service and I ask for what sounds like a gearbox whine to be looked at, combined with some play in the gearchange. Change quality sorted by dealer, but noise is still there. Toyota won't budge on the tyres due to "excessive pre-damage wear".

14000 miles - Total gearbox failure on the M4. Leave the motorway slip and it refuses to shift out of 6th. Car is towed in. Gearbox dismantled and a retaining clip inside the gearbox is found to be missing. Toyota want to repair the 'box. I demand a replacement. After much arguing, a new style, stronger "T Sport" box is fitted under warranty.

16000 miles - Third catalyst goes pop. New firmware downloaded to ECU which should fix the problem. Car feels livelier "off cam" and pulls harder up top.

17000 miles - Vibration from steering at motorway speeds. Notice a front wheel rim is bent. Car has never been kerbed - no other damage to wheel. Smaller dink noticed on opposite side rear wheel. Dealer says the wheels are too soft and have been modified on new models. All four wheels replaced with new type under warranty (but not the tyres!)

23000 miles - Brake pedal goes to floor at a junction and then recovers. Dealer discovers a bulging hose and an iffy master cylinder. Replaced under warranty.

29000 miles - Engine management light comes on. Car runs normally, but starts drinking fuel. Dealer's diagnostic rig does not show a fault. I take a courtesy car until it is fixed. 6 weeks later, another "firmware upgrade" fixes the fault.

33000 miles - New gearbox has started whining just like the last one, and the engine is starting to sound rough, especially on cold. Lots of tappet noise and a hesitation when throttle is initially applied. Both are currently under investigation.

Very fast, gorgeous looking coupe with one of the best chassis around. But if mine is anything to go by, Toyota have regressed to reliability levels that Alfa Romeo would be crying over.

I love Celicas. My previous GT-Four was an absolute diamond and never let me down in 75,000 miles, but this one is a nightmare. The dealer has been the one good thing about owning this car, and they have literally bent over backwards to help, but the fact remains that my particular car is a liability. I can't believe it came from a manufacturer with such a reputation for quality.

In my heart of hearts, I know this is probably a one off, a "Friday" car, but that doesn't excuse it when you pay £24,000 for something which is this shoddily engineered. I would be lying if I said it hasn't made me think twice about buying Toyota again. Disappointing.

Sounds like you were very unlucky with your car. The Toyota Celica consistently tops the Coupe category in reliability and customer satisfaction surveys. (JD Power twice, What Car?) It's poor consolation, but a different Celica should be much more reliable. I've had mine since Feb 2001 and have only had two minor problems (unusual exhaust noise & under-performing a/c) both fixed very quickly under warranty. It's a great car!

Hi I'm commenting on the review of the problematic celica. that car you have is a rare thing. I have a 2001 with 60,000 miles on it and other than regular oil changes have had to do absolutley nothing to it. its without a doubt the best car I've ever owned. you should take the car back and demand a new one.

I have owned a celica 190 (2002 model) for over a year and have had numerous problems.

1. Alloys replaced under warranty due to cosmetic defect

2. Alternator and water pump replaced

3. Boot hinges changed as not opening properly

4. VERY loud creaking from clutch pedal

5. Uneven tyre wear from all wheels (Expensive computer check carried out without authorisation by me)

6. New wheel hubs (Replaced by dealer without permission)

The car has never actually broken down, but all of these problems are annoying.

The dealer had the car for seven days over five separate visits before fixing the clutch finally!

The car is great to drive, but I am unsure to it's build/design quality.

The dealers are pleasant, but so many problems with the servicing standard. Problems are never fixed or diagnosed in one visit. They even forgot to replace some screws on the panel which sits over the engine coolant.

But the car is so nice to drive and has excellent performance and I could not imagine parting with it for a long time yet.

Thank you for your comments.

After a strongly worded letter of complaint to Toyota GB, the dealership was authorised to take the car back in February 2004 and keep it for as long as it took to sort out all the problems. This they duly did, and provided me with a courtesy car for three weeks.

The car came back feeling much much better, with everything bar a couple of rattles ticked off the list. However, a fortnight to the day after I got it back, the car was stolen from a London car park. CCTV captured it being loaded onto a false-plated recovery truck in broad daylight by three fluorescent jacketed gorillas. Neither car, truck or gorillas have been seen since, although with the amount of interest shown by the police (none whatsoever), I can't say I'm shocked about that.

Put the insurance payout towards a Mazda RX-8 230PS and so far I'm well pleased. My first "non Toyota" for nearly 20 years, but I just wasn't prepared to risk it again. Fuel bills scary though, as I suspect will the insurance renewal be! Ah, the joys of British motoring in 2005!

Wow, too bad about the Celica.

I just bought a 2001 Celica. (trying Toyota for the first time) I traded in my beloved Mazda MX3 GS with the 6cyl (beautiful car) for a slightly used (in Japanese standards) Celica. The car had 97000 KM, or Just under 60000 Miles on it when I purchased it. I had the car for about 20 minutes when I noticed a ticking sound coming from the engine. I then, took it to a Toyota dealer the next day, and they tell me the engine is shot. So here I am a Toyota owner for a little over 12 hours and the engine is gone. Luckily I had 2000 kms left on the manufactures warranty and they are replacing it with a new one. I have now been waiting 4 days for this car and summer is almost over. I now find myself asking is I should I have just kept my old Mazda, or perhaps I should have gone with my fourth Civic SI. Anyway, like you said service is great, and who knows, maybe I'm getting a great deal- A new Celica (engine anyway) for the price of a used.

It sounds to me as if you have thrashed this machine to within an inch of it's life.

Thrashed it to within an inch of it's life? Not at all. Yes, I've driven it hard, but perhaps you know of another way to drive a car that produces peak power at a stratospheric 7,800 RPM and peak torque (of something limp like 138 lb/ft) at 6,800 RPM! This engine simply does not do "easy" unless you're just ambling through town, as it has no bottom end or midrange torque to speak of, and feels less lively than a 2.0 repmobile unless you're working it hard. That surely is how the engine was designed, and how it's supposed to be used. And anyway, apart from a slight coarseness, the engine never missed a beat.

All I can say is that my car had all fluid levels religiously checked every week, is always allowed to warm up fully before exceeding about 3,000 RPM, and has been serviced on the dot on a "no expense spared" basis. If that's abuse, I hate to see how it would stand up to someone who's really going to hammer it. I also remind you that the dealer service manager said many of the problems on my car were well known and documented.

Finally, I would also remind you that my last Celica (GT-Four) did 75,000 miles without so much as a bulb replacement needed. I'm not hard on cars, and this makes it even more galling that I had such problems.

My RX-8 has yet to put a foot wrong either. Toyota's loss as far as I am concerned.

I've owned a 2003 celica 190 for a period of 6 months and would say that it is a great drivers car.

Although the car has little low end grunt, it has impressive power once your moving and get into the right gear (similar to Honda VTEC). Please note that Cars that do not have traction control (190 in lieu of later T sport) can eat tyres.

The build quality does not seem to be what you would expect from Toyota. The interior plastic seems to scratch very easily, alloy wheels have been replaced on mine due to corrosion 6 months ago and a heat shield has recently become loose. Toyota dealerships have sorted the problems without argument under warranty, but the issues are annoying. The paintwork seems to scratch and mark very easily.

Running costs are quite reasonable. The car is economical and my insurance premium is less than the previous car (Honda Civic 1.6 VTI - which has less performance).

Despite the above, I would, but another one.

Hi!

My name is Anthony and I have a 2001 Toyota Celica that I bought at a dealership in Ontario, Canada. It had 25,000 km when I bought it. Its such a beautiful car, however, when I reached 60,000 km, I was driving home from work and my check engine oil light came on. I thought, this can't be right because I get it regularly serviced at Toyota so it must be a glitch. Not a chance! I checked the dipstick and it was BONE DRY!!! not a drop of oil in the engine. I had to fight with the dealership because it was 2,000 km over the 60,000 km bumper to bumper warranty. I don't know if you heard about Toyota engine sludging, but I believe this was the problem. After a lengthy battle with Toyota Canada, they rebuilt the short block engine cause of the damage caused by no oil. They had it for 5 days. The exhaust dose have a rattle also and they say that it's not a problem, but.. there's a rattle!! Now, I am at 119,000 km and just got serviced and was told that my transmission (manual) needs to be replaced at a cost of $6,000 cdn!!! I was wondering if anyone else has had transmission problems like a whining noise mentioned in one of the preceding emails.

I've had my Celica 5 years now and racked up 150000 miles. I've experienced most of the problems mentioned above. The engine ran dry of oil, without a warning light, just 2000 miles past it's service and about a month after the warranty had run out. New engine at my expense. Engine management light bitchin about the CAT being shot - ain't forkin out £1500 for new one when it still passes emissions. The rear N/S tyre deforms if you run a P-Zero. The front wheels are buckled again after being replaced my Toyota. Stereo packed in after excessive heat had weakened the solder on the speaker connections. Half the dash board dims intermittently. The service is second to none, but I've learnt not to buy a new model until somebody else irons out the bugs at their expense!

Hi I'd like to add my view on this model car as we have have a 2002 Celica 190 and would like to confirm that "typical" Toyota reliability is certainly not the case with this vehicle.

This is our 4th Celica, we have owned Celicas for the past 16 years, all these cars have been impeccably reliable, except this one. This will be our last Celica.

Here are the faults:

The A/c has packed in (the compressor seized - duelack of oil in refrigerant (manufacturing issue when new) car is out of warranty now - so will cost over £1000 to fix.

There is a very very slight big end knock (I mean that by you can only hear it if you put your ear right next to the sump with the plastic undertray removed. This is a 25,000 mile car, correctly maintained with recomended lubricants and genuine parts, and is not thrashed. As it is mainly used for daily comuting at rush hour.

2 sets of alloys corroded (1st was replaced under warranty) current set are corroding like the originals.

Farting (sorry, best word to describe it) noise when pulling away - suspect internally loose catalyst element or leaky olive joint gasket (dealer said they all do that - and is "normal").

Excessive corrosion of the inner brake disc surfaces on the front, (although car is used daily). New discs and pads now fitted and cleaned guides and slides etc. It is now doing it again (this car uses single pot sliding calipers.. but its happening on piston side, so it's impossible to be the calipers or piston sticking).

Uncooperative Gearbox - possible baulking problem on 3rd gear and also a possible linkage problem.. go from reverse to 1st..get reverse again, try again, still goes into reverse (dealer says they are all like that and it is "normal", sir)

Gearbox is now making a grating noise in 1st, 2nd and 3rd gear on overrun.

Low speed engine knock (detonation), if you're a bit heavy letting up the clutch without enough revs (possible cause of big end problems??). This type of high revving engine does not like being laboured.

Trim rattles galore - the interior quality is nowhere near as solid as older models.

Intermittent dimming of the headlights whilst driving at 30ish mph (we think it was linked to the cooling fans kicking onto high speed), although the CD player also skips at the same time, so possible electrical/charging system fault.

The Alarm with a mind of its own (fixed now... metal objects in the centre console screw up the sensor... why on earth they use a microwave sensor instead of ultrasonics is beyond me)

Paint is very thin, and soft so chips and scratches very easily.

All in all, the problems accompanied with the dealers fobbing us off on well documented faults they already know are particular to this model, have made this ownership of this car has been very unpleasant. And by looking at certain independent Toyota forums, I am not alone.

I have a Celica vvtl-i (import) and have just done 47,000 kilometres. This is my second celica and I was so impressed with my 2.0 GT I had no problem in knowing I was going to get a 190.

However, for the past few months I have had a loud "squeaking" noise in the engine area around the belt. It is at it's loudest when cold, but squeals away when driving.

I took it to my dealership who replaced the belt, but said there was still a slight tweeting noise which was a common problem with the engine. I took the car away only to find that the same loud noise came back from the belt area. Toyota replaced the belt again under warranty. The noise came back again! So, I took the car to an independent garage who had problems diagnosing the problem.

So far I have had the Alternator reconditioned a new alternator belt (again) and the alternator tensioner replaced - It's still making the same noise!!

The sound always goes away whenever something is replaced, but comes back after a day or so.

Has anyone heard or experienced this problem? I need help as I am running out of money and losing heart with this fine car.

You guys should check out www.celica-club.co.uk.

Great site for all Celica owners. Some of your faults are very simple to fix permanently if you don't use toyota parts like the squeeling fan belt (use a non toyota one, problem solved!). The head lights diming around 30mph is the air fan kicking in to your exhaust to reduce emmisions, you need the revised ECU. Rattly exaust could be the heat sheild which is renowned for coming loose and can be earily fixed. Pirelli tyres are known for being noisey and wear unevenly, get Goodyear Eagles F1s or Toyo Proxies T1-R (You'll also get better handling wet or dry!). Toyota brake discs are made of cheese, Get ADL blue print ones from a local motor factor and these will last longer. Finally, if you have a 190/T-Sport go to celica-club.co.uk and search the forums for "lift bolts" and hold your breath!!! I love my T Sport, but it does lack the build quality Toyota are known for.

Paul.

Paul.

You say for the headlights dimming you need a revised ECU.

Do you mean that the ECU has to be replaced altogether, or can it just be a download with the latest software jobbie?

I have a 2000 Toyota Celica GTS and I this is the first time I've had a huge problem. Currently my car is not picking up any speed and it won't pass the emissions. I've had the converter replaced, fuel pump, and so far one oxygen sensor. I am going to the Toyota dealership this weekend to have the other oxygen sensor put on. I don't know if this will help. Has anyone experienced this problem? If so, please let me know what to have fixed. I've spent a great deal of money trying to get my car fixed. So far this has been an ongoing problem for the past 1 1/2. I am not able to trade my car in right now. I have no choice, but to get it fixed. I just need to find out what is wrong with it. Please help me if you have a solution. Thanks.