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Your Toyota experience has been much different than mine. My Toyota Camry XLE has been nothing short of a pile of garbage. Poor panel fittment, paper thin body panels that vibrate at speed, poor ventilation system, **** poor acceleration, poorly made transmission, unexplained acceleration, intermittent AM/FM/XM radio operation, unable to pair with cell phone, dashboard coming apart at the seams, wheels studs badly rusting to name a few issues. I'd take a Corvette with 200,000 miles on it and with bent wheels and paint issues before I ever consider another Toyota. Toyota is way over rated.
Wow, you don't hear Toyota bashing very often.
My Toyota Tacoma 4x4 has 412,000 miles on it and has basically been trouble free except the normal brakes, batteries, alt, starter replacements. Has never been back to the dealer since I drove it off the lot 22 years ago.
So pleased with it I just bought a new one a couple months ago.
Wow, you don't hear Toyota bashing very often.
My Toyota Tacoma 4x4 has 412,000 miles on it and has basically been trouble free except the normal brakes, batteries, alt, starter replacements. Has never been back to the dealer since I drove it off the lot 22 years ago.
So pleased with it I just bought a new one a couple months ago.
Wow! That's impressive. I've got a 2011 Prius. Its only got 150,000 miles on it, and I haven't had anything other than requisite maintenance items and wear parts break. I beat the hell out of it too! I don't know if the hybrid system will last 400,000 miles, but I plan to keep it until it has about 200,000, then trade it for a new one. The guy on here with the defective Camry got a lemon or a flood car or something......Toyotas are some of the toughest cars on the road!
So this is the front wheel of my 1LT Z51. Same chipping....and it's the same on all four wheels. I noticed it at about 1500 miles. I'm not really happy about it, but wrote it off as a result of the design of these wheels.
I could let it bother me, but I choose not to. This car is so much fun to drive (which is what I bought it for). If you drive your car, it's going to get nicks and chips, no matter what you do. Eventually, even your special edition GS is going to get old and you're going to want the next best thing on the market. Just enjoy it!
So this is the front wheel of my 1LT Z51. Same chipping....and it's the same on all four wheels. I noticed it at about 1500 miles. I'm not really happy about it, but wrote it off as a result of the design of these wheels.
I could let it bother me, but I choose not to. This car is so much fun to drive (which is what I bought it for). If you drive your car, it's going to get nicks and chips, no matter what you do. Eventually, even your special edition GS is going to get old and you're going to want the next best thing on the market. Just enjoy it!
Bingo!
If you want to keep these cars pristine & without a scratch, save yourself the 50 plus grand and just buy a die cast model.
It's a car, it's going to get nicks and chips and dirty and used. If it's not then what is the point??
I don't have a dog in this fight over the black wheels pitting, scratching,etc., since I have chrome wheels on my C6; but how some your posters are calmly willing to pay additional money to have your "already-paid-extra-for-as-an-option" black wheels dismounted and then powder coated just amazes me! I've spent considerable money on after-market items for my car, but at the price points Corvettes sell for I think it's reasonable for a buyer to expect a high level of quality in the factory finish of ALL parts of the car, wheels included, so that they would not need to be refinished/repainted after only a few thousand miles of use. Hopefully the new "paint shop" in Bowling Green is putting out better paint jobs on the car bodies, but perhaps GM should get on their wheel suppliers' case(s) about the finish quality of their products.
I don't have a dog in this fight over the black wheels pitting, scratching,etc., since I have chrome wheels on my C6; but how some your posters are calmly willing to pay additional money to have your "already-paid-extra-for-as-an-option" black wheels dismounted and then powder coated just amazes me! I've spent considerable money on after-market items for my car, but at the price points Corvettes sell for I think it's reasonable for a buyer to expect a high level of quality in the factory finish of ALL parts of the car, wheels included, so that they would not need to be refinished/repainted after only a few thousand miles of use. Hopefully the new "paint shop" in Bowling Green is putting out better paint jobs on the car bodies, but perhaps GM should get on their wheel suppliers' case(s) about the finish quality of their products.
Yeah... otherwise, people will need to Xpel their wheels...
I have a 2017 Grand Sport with chrome wheels. The car has five track days on it, three thousand miles and the wheels still look brand new. Could be those mountain roads have lots of tiny pebbles that are hitting the wheels because of the brake cooling ducts. Mine is also a 3LT however the dash does not have the wrinkles like yours thank god. Looks very strange. Wonder if its the glue reacting to all that time in the sun when the car was at the dealership.
Yeah... that seems like weird logic. Had my 370Z 9 years and detailed it before selling it at the beginning of the month. My wheels didn't look like that at all ! (49,000 miles).
This was explained by Bill Dearborn and others in earlier posts. If you take the wheels off a Z51 and above equipped C7 and examine the brake cooling ducts, you'll see exactly how air is directed at the wheels/brakes from behind and understand how rocks and gravel could be directed through the wheels by the high velocity airflow.
Obviously, your 370Z was not similarly equipped with what is considered to be a superior design for brake cooling reasons. The C7 was built to be a handling performance car, not garage art.
Wow, you don't hear Toyota bashing very often.
My Toyota Tacoma 4x4 has 412,000 miles on it and has basically been trouble free except the normal brakes, batteries, alt, starter replacements. Has never been back to the dealer since I drove it off the lot 22 years ago.
So pleased with it I just bought a new one a couple months ago.
Was it ever reframed by Toyota ? I know a few of my friends Tacoma’s failed the Toyota “ hammer test “ since the frames fail from the inside and Toyota put new frames under them.
Sadly another friend with a Highlander wasn’t so lucky. His was out of warranty when his frame failed.
The damage your pictures show looks very similar to a Friend's Mustang after a Snow plow/ Sand truck turned on the sand release while the Mustang was behind the truck. He was over 200' behind the vehicle at 60+ mph yet the sand destroyed his windshield and Sand Blasted the two front wheels taking some of their finish right off.
After a winter there would be lots of this sand on the roads just waiting for a Z06 or a GS to come cruising along. Does the original poster drive his car all year long in North Carolina? They put a lot of sand down on the interstates to keep them open. Is the damage on all four wheels or JUST the front? The damage is going to be predominately on the two front wheels from road debris.
Riding a motorcycle makes one VERY aware of sand on the roads during the winter and in the early spring months.
I have had Chrome wheels and painted wheels and had issues with both of them. I bought a new Cadillac STS years ago and it came with Chrome wheels, they lasted less than 18 months before they really looked like poop with the de-laminating and bubbling of the chrome. GM said that the Chrome problems were not covered by their warranty. They did offer to replace them if I paid 50% of the cost of Cadillac Chrome wheels. They blamed it on corrosive brake dust that was not removed in time so therefore it was not their problem.
When driving hard some of the dust gets hot and can be corrosive on the wheels. My daughters Camaro had that warning regarding the 20" rims that were painted silver. The suggestion was to never leave brake dust on the rim for any period longer than two weeks....
I am now to the point that I will not buy any more Factory Chrome wheels. Powder coating a wheel makes little sense as it gets damaged by heat very easily. Aluminum gets eaten by Corrosive Brake Dust so what is left to use?
Epoxy coatings might be the answer as it is really hard and very tough to hurt, far tougher than ordinary powder coating. I guess we could try that new rubberized paint that peels right off when you want it to and try that on the wheels. If you get a scratch or chip you peel off the old coating and spray on a new fresh look anytime you want to.
CR is probably owned by the Japanese as according to them Japan can do no wrong with their cars, they certainly hate American and German cars or any option to a Japanese car. I would not trust their reviews on toilet paper let alone a car.
This was explained by Bill Dearborn and others in earlier posts. If you take the wheels off a Z51 and above equipped C7 and examine the brake cooling ducts, you'll see exactly how air is directed at the wheels/brakes from behind and understand how rocks and gravel could be directed through the wheels by the high velocity airflow.
Obviously, your 370Z was not similarly equipped with what is considered to be a superior design for brake cooling reasons. The C7 was built to be a handling performance car, not garage art.
Bill's statements explain how the ducting works, but don't explain why our silver painted wheels with ~25,000 miles over most of the US, sanded winter roads and desert roads, some gravel roads; still look better than Bill346. There's well over a dozen C7 Z51/GS/Z06 cars in our club, typically 10k-20k miles; I don't do concours inspections but don't notice any wheel issues and no one is complaining.
Small debris is damaging some of the wheels out there but not all of them.
Send documentation (with vulgar delete) to GM CEO Mary Barra. She won't read it but her staff will forward your complaint to the regional manager for your area. The regional manager speaks for GM, not the dealership. Drop a hint that this is a PR nightmare for you and that you are on the Corvette Forum, a loyal customer to-date blah blah blah. Be nice as possible but firm.
By documentation I mean Who, What, When, Where, How, and Why. Pics help. Approach this as good cop, bad cop.
Was it ever reframed by Toyota ? I know a few of my friends Tacoma’s failed the Toyota “ hammer test “ since the frames fail from the inside and Toyota put new frames under them.
Sadly another friend with a Highlander wasn’t so lucky. His was out of warranty when his frame failed.
Never re-framed, solid as a rock, like I said, it's never been back to the dealer since I drove it off their lot 22 years ago.
Mine's always been stored out in the weather. You must have some un-lucky friends or noticing you live Va Beach, some run their Tacomas on the beach and salt water which of course doesn't do the metal components any good.
Last edited by Kevin A Jones; 10-27-2018 at 08:35 PM.
Crap like this makes people not want to buy GM, especially when you start replacing the wheels anyway because they are damaged too easily.
The dash problem has been going on since 2008. Apparently when the replaced almost every part of the C6 to make the C7 one was not the adhesive that holds the dash on. However my friends 08 and my 13 both are in good shape now. I just wipe it off with a damp rag, no 303, armor all, etc.
My wife's 18 Equinox has a heated steering wheel that actually gets hotter in the sun then turning the heat on. GM says normal. She has Raynard's Syndrome where her fingers turn white when it is 60 degrees out or so. Since the GM cars are the same we'll be going with another manufacturer.
Then GM dropped the powertrain warranty down to 60k a few years ago. They don't have much confidence the powertrain will make 100k without a repair.
And when they stop making the C7 they'll stop making some C7 unique parts just like they did with the C6.
Last edited by phileaglesfan; 10-27-2018 at 07:29 PM.
10-27-2018, 06:39 AM
