Problems with 2004 Toyota Sienna EQUIPMENT

Tl* the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. while parked, the contact noticed a fracture on the driver's side of the dashboard. the manufacturer was made aware of the failure and a complaint was filed. additionally, the contact heard a grinding noise coming from the air conditioning unit. the vehicle was taken to the dealer for diagnostic testing. the technician advised the contact that the air conditioning compressor would have to be replaced. also, the contact stated there was rust on the rear driver and passenger side sliding doors. the vehicle was taken to the dealer where the hinge was replaced. the sliding door failure recurred. the vehicle was not further repaired. the approximate failure mileage was 60,000. ...updated 10/17/12 *bf updated 10/23/2012 *js

Description: front door check popping noise cause: spot weld in door check failed controls door when opening and closing safely. toyota has tsb nv003-07, but has limited warranty. expired for me. *tr

My 2004 toyota sienna xle limited power sliding door cable snapped and door wouldn't close, this is a serious safety issue and toyota should take responsibility of fixing this on going issue with these sienna vans. there countless number of people have the same issue. deal cost to fix this is over $2000. this is totally unfair for consumers to pay such high cost repair for what toyota is responsible for in first place. *tr

While i was trying to open my 2004 toyota sienna passenger powered sliding door the cord ripped. it is too costly for us to repair this item and i can not use the door with children as it is to hard to open for a minor.

I was accelerating away from a traffic light, making a left turn from 1300 east onto ft. union blvd, and the vehicle continued to accelerate rapidly even after i removed my foot from the accelerator. i promptly placed the transmission in neutral, braked rapidly, and narrowly avoided rear-ending the car in front of me. i could not tell if the gas pedal was stuck on the floor mats, but rearranged them quickly and the engine rpms quickly dropped to an idle speed. this was the only time this has occurred. several days later, i took the car to the local toyota dealer, larry miller of murray, ut. i spoke with the manager about the problem, he examined my car, informed me that it was not part of the recall, asserted that there had been no reports of issues with the 2004 sienna, and that the pedal on my car was not of the type implicated in the recalls. he had me take the car to their service department for further inspection and testing. they did not find any failure codes present and no check lights were on. they test drove the car 10 miles, but were unable to replicate the problem. no parts were repaired nor replaced. no further action was taken by them. *tr

Power sliding door cable snapped on a 2004 toyota sienna xle. due to this issue we can not open or close the driver side sliding door. in order to fix the problem, we are taking to the dealership and estimated cost to fix is $500.00 and $100.00 to identify the issue. *tr

The sliding doors on our toyota sienna are defective. they stick shut freeze if the temperature gets low enough or there is enough moisture. it's hard to predict the circumstance but the fact is, our kids cannot get in or out of the van and we have had to drive it anyway, three different beepers going off all the way. i have read that this is a common problem for the sienna and yet toyota continues to do nothing about it, denying it, in fact. if we were in an accident, and had to escape quickly, only the driver and passenger could escape. when side doors are frozen shut, kids have to exit through the back door which is also dangerous. i know my 2004 is past the warranty, but if this is a common a problem as i have read, shouldn't there be a recall? *tr

Tl* the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. he received recall notice number 09v234000 (equipment:other:labels) in early november. when he contacted the dealership, he was advised that they would not honor the recall. he speculated that the failure referenced in the recall causes the vehicle to vibrate when accelerating past 75 mph. the current and failure mileages were approximately 64,000.

The ac in our 2004 toyota sienna went out in august (very hot!); we took it to a repair shop. turns out the ac compressor and multiple related parts needed to be replaced due to a problem with this particular system. called around to ensure fair price- many shops reported having had this same problem on this make and model. had necessary repairs completed at a cost of over $1500. i was told the repair on a 2003 model was only $950 plus tax, but subsequent years had more problems and required more parts replaced because of design problems. having ac is not only comfort, but also safety- we bought this vehicle because we have young children and they would get quite hot, sweaty, red-faced, etc. without rear ac in our former vehicle. it seems this is a widespread problem with this make and model. i've read toyota knew about this problem and extended the warranty for ac (although owners weren't informed, and we are past that limit anyway); however, if this is such a huge problem there should be a recall with the a preventively fix rather than waiting for owners to incur such huge bills and not have the ability to keep their families cool while they drive. this may seem mostly comfort, but for those with young children, the elderly, and other at-risk populations, ac is also very much about safety. *tr

I have a 2004 toyota sienna that has manual sliding rear doors. i have replaced the handles on both doors within the last 6 months. the latest one i replaced was the rear passenger side door. the apparent reason for these breaking off is the fact that the doors are jamming and it is extremely difficult to open the door. even though i have replaced the rear passenger handle, it still will not open from the inside or outside...it does open on "occasion" but it is finicky.. i have gone on line and noticed thousands of other toyota sienna owners are experiencing identical problems which leads me to feel strongly that this should be a "recall" issue that should be covered by toyota!! i have 2 small children that travel in this vehicle and this could be a life threatening issue, god forbid! *tr

I have a 2004 toyota sienna van and i am very disturbed by the power door problems i have had since day 1 of owning this vehicle. the sliding doors freeze up all the time in the winter. after driving for approx. 30-45 minutes the door will unfreeze & come open! i have two children!!! this is a safety hazard as well as being a nuisance. also the power door cable snapped in two. i called hickory toyota & spoke with maintenance customer service, which informed me that this just does not happen. i said well, in my case it did! i want this fixed before one of my children get hurt & this becomes a law suit! this is my 2nd sienna van & had the same problem with it. i've had three camrys and they were almost perfect. what is up sienna??!! maybe i need to convert to honda after all. :( *ln

A/c failure, the whole system is sub-standard, valves, lines, compressor. have been in the shop for 2 years. noticed a lot of complaints on-line for this model. *tr

The cable of the right side passenger sliding door broke. the dealer crystal toyota at green brook, nj said they can't just replace the cable. instead, they have to replace the motor and cable unit altogether. the cost will be $2600. i checked online and found that many people are experiencing the same problem. also, a lot of people said the other side will have the same problem within weeks. that is, it will cost $5200 just to fix the 2 pieces of cable. since this defect is related to the doors which is basic safety issue, i think toyota should definitely issue recall on it and not ripping off people's money. *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. while driving under 40 mph, the air conditioner failed to work properly. the air conditioner stopped working and the temperature on the thermostat continued to rise the following day. the contact checked the coolant and noticed that there was no antifreeze; therefore, she refilled the radiator. this did not keep the vehicle from overheating. she took the vehicle to a local dealer and they stated that there was a leak in the radiator core. the vehicle has not been repaired. the vin was unknown. the failure and current mileages were 93,000.

My 2004 toyota sienna xle limited's alternator belt got cut and the vehicle immediately stopped on the road and had to be taken to a toyota dealer. the dealer says my vehicle had a "catastrophic ac failure" which caused the belt to break and says it will cost $2400 in parts and $1600 in labor. he then contacted toyota and said that toyota will pay for the parts. this problem seems to happen a lot on this model, i searched on the internet and could find a lot of people with the same issues and toyota has still not done any recall on the ac unit. since this seems to a total design flaw, i would like toyota to pick up the full tab for this repair. any help in this regard will be appreciated. *tr

My 2004 toyota sienna only has 29,000 miles and the air conditioning has been hardly used. the a/c system failed working about 3 month ago duo to the condenser o-ring failure. i checked online and found that many 2004 sienna users have the same problem. *tr

While driving 55 mph, my driverside vent window popped out. staying connected to the sienna 2004 by only a wire. i pulled over and taped the window (not broken) back onto the van. the window did not fail, nor did the mechanism that opens the window. the adhesive that secures the window to the mechanical part of the vent window gave up. no acid rain, vandalism, mechanical breakdown was involved with this incident. toyota will not replace the gluing to make this safe again. they want to replace the whole system at my cost. $500 later we are considering trading in to get a kia. thank goodness the window did not come off completely into oncoming traffic. *tr

Toyota ref #200711200190 (customer satisfaction reference #) my husband mini van sliding door cable shoot a very hard piece of plastic out and the cable dislodged from its hinge. luckily that we did not have any one sitting in the path of the hard plastic which has a lot of sharp angles, and a pointing corner. i see this is major safety issue. but the customer sat. rep (danner ??)is not taking this seriously. i talked w/ the dealer repair person that he said that he had saw a few of the same problem. i know my car is out of warranty, but i would feel very bad someone else is harm by this defect. i told toyota that i intend to report this to the consumer safety to make sure people aware of this design defect. *tr

Tire pressure monitoring system does not work. three times in the last 2 years i found zero tire pressure in one of the tires on our 2004 toyota sienna xle awd and the tire pressure monitoring system gave absolutely no warning. reporting it to 2 different toyota dealers, they said nothing is wrong.

The van was sitting in the garage. when the door was opened with the remote control device, the cable broke and jammed the door opened. it took 1 hour to get the door closed. it has been jammed shut every since. the cost to repair it is $1500. *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. while driving 40 mph, the contact depressed the brake pedal, but the vehicle did not stop. there were 30-40 yards between the contact's vehicle and the preceding vehicle. the brake pedal extended to the floorboard. the brakes grabbed momentarily, but then became "mushy." the contact crashed into the preceding vehicle and caused injuries to the occupant in the other vehicle. the passenger's seat belt did not engage properly, causing the passenger to strike the dashboard and sustain minor injuries. the vehicle was destroyed and towed from the scene. the failure and current mileages were less than 55,000.

In december, 2006, my tailgate closed on its own, injuring my wife. toyota replaced the rear stays (struts) under warranty, including the addition of some brackets. at first everything was fine. but when the weather turned colder (below 20f), the rear hatch would not open on its own unless opening under power. and then a couple of days ago (still very cold), the hatch closed on its own under power again. this time, my daughter and i were both in its path, but fortunately, so was a shopping cart. there were fortunately no injuries this time. i am frustrated that just 45 days after the problem was "repaired" it is already happening again.

I think my 2004 toyota sienna le has a problem, i can not control the temperature. it's either too too hot or too too cold. it does it by itself. in the morning when i start the car i usually set the temperature for both front and rear all the way to hot position. after 15 or 20 minutes when i start driving the hot air starts coming for front and in the back it stay too cold. then after i reach my distance and shut down the engine then after a couple of hour start the van heading home ( temperature controller still in the hot position) it starts to blow hot air by itself. even if i tried to put the temperature controller in the cold position it stay there blowing hot air until i park the car and shut down the car and leave it for a while. i went to the dealer and he told me everything looks okay and there is no problem. he did not even test anything) he just told me watch it and come back again. i check on line there a couple of people have the same problem. thanks. *nm

While driving on dry pavement, sometimes, but not always, after leaving snowy driveway, the 2004 awd toyota sienna's traction control light came on. this was accompanied by a very loud alarm. the traction control system then activated causing the engine to brake and the abs to continuously brake until the vehicle decelerated to appx. 9 miles per hour. the light and alarm would then go off. the whole scenario repeats when speed exceeds appx. 9 miles per hour. this puts the driver in a very dangerous situation. the vehicle is very difficult to steer when is it rapidly braking. this happened both at low speeds, start-up speeds, and on the highway when i was going 40-50 miles per hour, again, on dry pavement. the only safe option is to pull off to the side of the road. after driving for anywhere from 3 minutes to 15 minutes, the problem mysteriously disappears. the next time the vehicle starts, it may or may not malfunction in this way. the tires are in good condition and at appropriate inflation levels. there does not appear to be any snow or ice on or inside the wheels when this is happening. *nm

I bought 2004 toyota sienna minivan in dec. 2005 as a used vehicle with 28,000 mile and manufacturers warranty still in effect. right from day one we noticed that navigation system that costs nearly $2,000 didn't work as expected. it tends go off course by several and sometimes by as much 30-40 mile off course. we took it to two different toyota dealers at least 5 times. every time when we bring the car to dealer their first response is that there is nothing wrong with the car, but with further prodding they have put new software and changed gps receiver (antenna), but the navigation system , even though better than before, still gets off course by miles. my wife who drives the car most off the time is afraid to get lost in some bad section of city of phoenix, az. we have not been able to get proper repair or replacement of the system as should have been done a long time ago. we have had the with alexander's toyota once for almost one month and it still has not been fixed. *jb

Sienna 2004 xle with installed hitch, the height left from ground to the lower part of the hitch is not enough to safely load any cargo above 150-175 pounds on your rear without hitting the pavement everytime a bump is on the road, all is original equipment built to be used on a toyota sienna, appears that the only solution is to remove it or install a safe leveling air system rear shocks, is it available? well... more money on an already expensive vehicle... no thanks. *jb

I own a 2004 toyota sienna xle that includes a towing package. the trailer hitch for this vehicle is a safety hazard because it hits the ground going over any small bump when there is no trailer attached, and it is only inches off the ground when a trailer is attached, constantly scraping and causing sparks. this can be especially hazardous at gas stations where there are any flammable substances if it is necessary to go over any small bumps and there are sparks.*ak

This is regarding the 2004 toyota sienna minivan. it is not a failure, but a design flaw that can be corrected by replacing a component or adding new components. when the audio on dvds is played through the aux in-cabin speaker system, the volume must be set at about 50 to hear it. the sound system does not include a memory recall for the volume of each source. the result is that when the dvd is turned off, the sound system defaults to radio or cd, at a tremendous volume that hurts the eardrums and also presents serious danger because of the distraction to the driver from the sudden booming volume, and its effect on the driver and passengers, including infants. toyota should recall the van and install new components-- more specifically, memory components to control the volume of the various audio sources being routed to speakers (cd, radio, dvd). nothing as been done yet by the dealer to correct this, though an inquiry to toyota hq remains outstanding.*ak

Attention: safety problem / design flaw in order to listen to the stock toyota dvd player that comes factory installed through the van's cabin speakers, the volume of the stereo must be turned almost all the way up to a volume of over 53. the other audio source (cd, radio, tape) are normally listened to at a volume of about 34. when the dvd player is stopped and another audio source (cd, radio, tape) is played , the volume level in the van instantly becomes deafening and startling. this has happened several times in which the driver has been startled to the point of almost loosing control of the vehicle and temporary hearing damage of several occupants has also resulted. this design flaw has been brought to the attention of the local toyota dealership on two occasions. they have been in contact with the toyota factory engineers and they were told that this is "normal" operation and no corrective action by toyota has been indicated. this is definitely not "normal" as a vehicle collision or hearing damage should never be the direct result of changing the audio source. this is a serious problem t that should result in a expeditious recall that results in the equalization of the volume levels for all audio sources (dvd, cd, radio, tape) in the vehicle.*jb

Consumer noticed that while backing out the rear view navigator system failed to appear on the dashboard. the position of the camera failed to come on its own. consumer took vehicle to the dealer for inspection, and mechanic determined that the sensor needed to be replaced. consumer informed the mechanic that this problem had not been resolved and recurred. *ak

Mid-row passenger side seat belt guide/cover broken jamming the seat belt preventing it to retract. failure repeated three to four times after each separate repairs. i'm concern for my 7-year old daughter who may not be properly restrainted after she leans forward and the seat belt does not retract.

Radiator ruptured and the engine overheated; hose replaced in steering column recall; rust protective tape recall; dvd screen replaced and the entire dvd player replaced(screen still not easily visible in middle row); passenger seat belt replaced; middle passenger seat belt failing; gasoline smell inside of car with ac on recirculation; driver's window fell inside door in snow storm and was not considered a safety issue to get a loaner vehicle even though the vehicle could not be locked; tires completely bald and leaking under 30,000 miles, dvd player must be at a high db volume and when returned to radio/cd will almost deafen you; interior lights have to be manually over ridden or will drain battery; car hesitates 1-2 seconds when trying to quickly accelerate and then lurches forward alarmingly; cruise control is not functioning; waiting to have fuel mixture sensor replaced. i was not informed of first 2 recalls until i my engine overheated. i did get the rust recall and a sticker on my sliding door informing user of danger of having middle windows open while opening the middle door could catch a head or other extremity. toyota dealer service manager says mine is the only 04 sienna experiencing any problems except for the recalls on the radiator; the steering hose; the rust tape; and the middle seat belt. not so according to all i have read here. most of the problems have occurred between 22,000 and 34,000 miles; the dvd screen always failed to lock into a good position for the middle row viewers. *nm

The dvd player in the rear has been advertised to be for all passengers in the rear seats. it also clearly has two positions to the screen and appears to have both positions so that when children of legal size and age are sitting in the middle area they can see the screen vs it look like a negative (photo film). the dvd screen in our new sienna does not want to stay in the rear-most position. the screen can not be viewed from these middle seats unless a person is as tall as the head rests w/out the screen being in this rear-most position. hence i drive and constantly remove my hand from the wheel, change my stature and focus of driving to reposition the screen because with every bump or expansion joint my child requests, "put it back please." "put it back please." "put it back please". toyota totes quality but this is poor design and it will get worse as the car loosens from wear. i don't believe that this is what was intended for the design. the dealer states that it's operating normally. i asked for a technical bulletin describe the design of the entertainment system. this has not been provided to date. *nm

After 5 months of purchasing a 2004 toyota sienna the transmission went out and was replaced. the vehicle continues to lag and lurch.*ak

2004 toyota sienna le -- the air generated by the a/c cycles from cool/cold to warm when the compressor stops; the air returns to cool/cold when the compressor re-engages. dealer says this is normal; it may in fact be normal for this make and model but it is very different from any other air-conditioned vehicle i have ever owned. i have never had the air temperature vary as much during normal operation. the dealer suggested leaving the a/c set on "recirculated air", but this contradicts the instructions found in the owner's manual.*ak

I bought a 2004 toyota sienna van, put a hitch on it and it scrapes the ground going over speed bumps, steep driveways, etc without any load on the hitch mount. the vehicle should be equipped with air shocks if toyota wants to advertise that the van can tow trailers. this is a design flaw due to the trunk space required for stowing the rear folding seats. a hitch can not be mounted any higher or closer to the bumper because of the seat storage area. *jb

The design of the 2004 toyota sienna doesn't permit adequate ground clearance when a trailer hitch is installed. this is a safety hazard as connecting any trailer to the hitch will result in lost of proper suspension clearance and potential lost of steering control. toyota says this is not a problem and they have no solution to increase ground clearance when there is a load on the trailer hitch. *jb