Problems with 2004 Toyota Sienna STRUCTURE

My toyota sienna with power lift gate has become unreliable and will initiate closure without warning or initiation. replacing the hydraulic support struts has not corrected this problem. when i search the internet i found that this was a common complaint. it could cause injury or death if the door initiates closure when a person is not expecting it and vulnerable. *tr

2004 sienna's trunk hydraulics failed, causing serious injury risk. *tr

The lift supports on the rear lift gate of our 2004 toyota sienna has failed again during the middle of december 2007. the rear lift gate struck my wife on her head/shoulder but luckily did not cause her serious injury when it failed to remain open. we had the same problem in november 2005. at that time the repair/replacement was covered by warranty. this time, being that the mileage is now plus 46000, we thought that the extended "bumper to bumper" warranty offered by the auto dealer would cover the replacement again but was informed that the warranty did not covered struts, shocks etc. we purchased the vehicle new in august of 2004 and in november of 2005 the supports failed. after being replaced they failed again in december of 2007. the vehicle is used by my wife for transportation to and from work and other normal usage. obviously something is wrong with the design of the supports. *tr

I have a toyota sienna 2004 xle with power assist lift gate. the rear lift pate opened then immediately closed. it has hit me on the head several times. and my 18 month old daughter once. *tr

When the temperature drops below freezing both sliding doors on my sienna 2004 freeze shut. *tr

The lift gate struts on my 2004 toyota sienna without the power function failed unexpectedly and smacked my wife in the head. fortunately, she only had a little knob on her head and nothing more serious. thanks goodness one of my kids wasn't loading something at the time. they might have been crushed. i was looking for replacement parts online and saw that there's quite a few people having this same issue and thought i'd register a complaint. i'm 38 and have never had any sort of lift strut failure on any of my vehicles. this is particularly troubling given the weight of the gate and immediate failure of the part. *tr

After opening the power rear hatch on my sienna 2004 minivan the rear hatch closes automatically. when it starts to close you can not stop it from closing. luckily no one has been injured. *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. while attempting to open the rear door with lift gage button the door opens a few inches and will not stay open, it closed with force and without warning. the struts have failed when attempting to manually hold the door in the upright position. the power cycles automatically engaged while attempting to manually lift the door. the dealer advised the contact to disconnect the battery then reconnect it to reset the computer; however, that did not correct the failure. the current and failure mileages were 29,000. updated 01/17/08 *bf the consumer stated the defect is still affecting the vehicle to date. updated 01/17/08 *tr

Power rear hatch will not fully open and closes on its own. vehicle has 36100 miles and its warranty expired in aug 2007. could cause potential injury and or death. *tr

The car has a power liftgate. the gas struts that hold up the rear liftgate intermittently fail and the liftgate will not stay up. this will also cause the power liftgate to engage and it will attempt to shut the liftgate while you are standing under it. the door has closed on me several times and has caused injury. *tr

I have a sienna 04 van. the power slider door would not open completely. we took it to the dealer and found out the cable in the power door was bad, they want 2,000 to fix it. i can't afford that. we had them cut he cable so we could close the door. we have young kids who can not open the non power door creating a safety issue. reading the auto discussion sites it is obvious how much of a common failure this is. for me a couple months out of warranty. this should not be a regular occurrence but it most certainly is one. never mind how much toyota makes on this issue. you can not get an oem part and you have to buy the whole motor assembly with it for 1200 dollars. what a markup. they will make as much on redoing these doors as they do selling the van, maybe more. and i thought toyota was good, i have had many repairs and call backs on this van. somebody needs to get toyota to repair their doors and fix the design, which not a new issue. *tr

Power tailgate/rear hatch comes down without warning. it would only do it once and a while but now its everytime. my wife has been caught when it comes down. even when manually pulling the tailgate up it does not stay up. this is a very heavy tailgate and is dangerous if a child would get caught in between the opening and the tailgate. *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

Approximately 10 months to a year ago, complained of noise with front driver door. nothing was done by toyota dealership. most recently, door began making a popping sound upon opening and closing. learned from dealership that door weld needs replacing. contacted toyota company, however, they will not fix. researched web and learned other consumers are having the same problem in their 2004 - 2007 siennas. *tr

Out of the blue our tailgate no longer stays up. the trunk struts need replacing according to the dealer. our five year old told us of this problem when he was trying to get something out of the back. luckily he was not injured. we are going to get the problem fixed. i've read online that an investigation through you has been going on since dec. 2006. i'm concerned that we had never been told this is a potential problem in a relatively new car. i've read of other close calls for injuries and am surprised that there have been none considering the weight of the tailgate and the force with which it closes. *tr

Since i bought it, my 2004 sienna back door won't lift up easily. i need to lift it up. i need to pull hard to get it down and close. right after 3 years of struggle, one of the air strut failed. it won't go in and the rod was bent. *tr

2004 toyota sienna van auto sliding door cable failed and door was stuck open. cable can not be replaced by its self motor and cable need to be installed at a price of $1,000.99 in parts not including the 5 hours of labor. *tr

2004 toyota sienna with tailgate failure. consumer states that tailgate fell when it was opened. luckily the child was able to move quick enough so no injury occurred. consumer believes the hydraulic system failed. *kb the consumer was told the trunk struts and brackets needed to be replaced. *jb

Power lift gate on 2004 toyota sienna dropped down and struck driver on back of neck causing injury. as in past, there was no warning prior to liftgate coming down approx 1-2 feet. vehicle was repaired two week prior by dealer, with new liftgate struts and brackets for same reported problem. vehicle only had 31,000 miles and was 3 months past 36 month warranty period. had to repair under extended warranty. *tr

We have a sienna 2004 limited. but recently the rear door closed it itself and hurt my daughter and son. the problem is a serious threat to safety of kid and please make a record of this problem. we hope you may help to find a solution to this problem. btw, the card was not involved in any significant accidents. *tr

Power lift gate unexpectedly closes upon opening and has closed on the person standing there. and has on occasion not repelled back after making strong contact with the person standing there. as a result, the individual had to quickly squeeze their way out while the lift gate continued to close completely. *tr

Sliding side door cable snapped. i have had it in for repairs several times (the cable was replaced as well as many other parts costing $1,500). i am not at the point for the third time that the door will not open and toyota believes it is yet another part related to the door. *tr

Toyota sienna 2004 liftgate slipped down and hit car owner in the head while unloading groceries from trunk. now, it slips down every time we open it. this is dangerous. called toyota and they told us there was nothing they could do about it. contacted our toyota repair shop to schedule repair. is this defect still under investigation? please inform. thank you. *jb

While removing items from the rear section of the vehicle the lift gate dropped down and begin closing on me. as thought the locking device failed holding it up and open, it did not stop once gently touching me and i had to use force to stop it from closing further until i could get out from under it. the only thing i have noticed prior to this incident is that the gate seems to open/close slower than previously. now i do not use the rear storage unless absolutely necessary and even then, i do not allow anyone to work underneath it without a second person being there for support. *tr

We own a 2004 toyota sienna. it has 41,789 miles. at approximately 41,000 miles my drives side door started making a popping sound when opening and closing the door. it sounds as if it is catching on something when the door is opened and closed. i had taken the van in to the dealership in december 2005 because it was making a horrible grinding squeaking sound when the door was opened and closed. the dealer lubed and adjusted the hinges at that time. now 2 years later, i was told by the dealership that the whole door has to be replaced at the cost of over $3,000.00 and since i am outside of my warranty it is my responsibility. the man at the dealership said "this is a common problem, we see it on these siennas all the time". if this is the case why isn't toyota doing a recall on the door weld/hinge. toyota is aware of the problem because they sent out a technical service bulletin with the vin numbers of the vehicles that it affects, but only to fix it if the car is under 36,000 miles or 3 years. the service bulletin is for siennas year 04 - 06. i would be very surprised if there are still 04 out there that are still under the 36,000 mile warranty. this vehicle has already had 4 recalls, why aren't they recalling the door? *jb

No warning given. driver's door check (not sure if that is technical name- not the hinge) started making popping and clunking noise when operating door. tried lube, no improvement. took to dealer and they said the weld must be broke. they agreed to fix it under warranty even though we are just out of the warranty period. body shop called to tell us it cannot be fixed, broken too badly. they will have to replace the door! *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. the contact stated that the rear power liftgate closed without warning. the dealer stated that there was damage to the struts that support the liftgate. as of november 14, 2007, the dealer had not repaired the vehicle. the failure mileage was 46,000 and current mileage was 49,000.

Driver's door stop is defective and requires a welding procedure in order to fix the problem. warranties do not cover the repair and toyota has not issued a recall although their are numerous complaints regarding this manufacturers defect. the door will make a very loud banging sound when while it is being opened or closed. i have 2 other friends with the ame vehicle and the same problem. 2004 toyota sienna. *tr

2004 toyota sienna opened back door dropped unexpectedly causing minor head injury and property damage. *jb

Power rear gate did not stay open and closed after the gate reached opened position. because it did not stay open, rear cargo space was useless. in order to store some things, it needed to be held by another person. *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. the automatic driver side door began to have difficulty opening and closing on several occasions. approximately one month later, the top hinge from the driver side automatic door detached from the vehicle, but the lower hinge remained in tact. the dealer was notified after each failure and now they have replaced the hinge, motor, and door cable. the current mileage is 72,750 and failure mileage was 72,000. updated 01/08/08 *bf

The car has a power liftgate. the gas struts that hold up the rear liftgate intermittently fail and the liftgate will not stay up. this will also cause the power liftgate to engage and it will attempt to shut the liftgate while you are standing under it. the door has closed on me several times, but i have not been injured. *jb

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. the contact stated that the driver side door made a loud clunking noise when opened. he felt resistance when opening the door and it had to be pushed in order to open from the passenger compartment. the dealer stated that the door check part was unwelded. the current and failure mileages were 68,563.

Power liftgate failed and door came down on my back as i was retrieving items. had to have the leaking liftgate struts replaced at toyota. they charged an outrageous $450.00 to replace an obvious potentially dangerous part defect. *jb

I have a toyota sienna 2004 ce. when i try to open the lifegate, it failed to keep open the morning of sep 8 2007. and it hasn't worked since then. when i called the dealer, i was informed it will cost me about $640 to fix it since the van is out of warranty. i found out that the struts that raise the liftgate has a defect from internet.*jb

I was unloading my 2004 toyota sienna when the struts holding up the rear hatch failed. i was pinned between the bumper/stuff i was unloading and the door. luckily i was able to push myself up with the door on top of me and only had bruising on my left arm. had the door fallen on my pregnant wife more serious injuries could have occurred. also i am pretty sure she would not have had the strength to push her self up with the weight of the door and the angle that i was in. i have the extended warranty so the struts will be replaced along but i have a $50 deductible. if i did not have the extended warranty i would be looking at $350.00 plus labor. *jb update 12/12/2007 *bf updated 12/12/07

Power liftgate not supported by the gas struts. power liftgate opens and then begins to power close, knocking the person loading/unloading the car on the head or squeezing them between the liftgate and the rear bumper. has bumped me, squeezed my wife multiple times. i fear this could seriously injure the kids if they ever find themselves in the mouth of this hungry minivan! *jb

Problem with sliding doors without warning passenger side sliding power feature stopped working. there was a broken cable hanging from rear passenger window. when door was opened again by handle there were sounds of parts breaking inside door. took the van to toyota dealership they said they had never seen the problem before, we would have to pay for repair. approximately 1 year later the drivers side sliding door went, same problem. i now use both doors manually and have the power feature turned off i can't afford to have the doors power feature repaired, approximately $ 3600.00. i contacted toyota both times they said there was nothing they could do about it. i've seen many complaints about this on the internet and can't believe toyota will do nothing for us. *tr

Toyota sienna 2004 power rear door closed inexpectedly and quickly hiting my wife's head. problem can be reproduced every time that the door is powered open. door "drops" several inches as soon as it reaches the fully-open position.

The struts on the manual liftgate of my 2004 toyota sienna failed at around 65,000 miles. the replacement cost at the local toyota dealer where the vehicle was purchased, was $391.07. this appears to be a frequent complaint among sienna owners. it would seem that toyota should issue a recall for this problem. *jb

Toyota sienna le, rear hatch lift gate struts failed - struts do not support lift gate anymore, must be held or propped open to prevent closing on person. *tr

I have a 2004 toyota sienna xle with power liftgate. last month one of the two supporting strut is failing and i heard a leaking sound, then the door just automatically powering closing on me without my operation. i use a lot of strength to fight it back, almost hurt me. this is a serious safety problem with the defected strut. after this incident, the liftgate can power open it but not all the way, and very easily fall down to close with just a little touch of the pinky finger strength. i did some research and found out that toyota didn't recall for this safety issue with the defected strut, they only issue a technical service bulletin bo001-07 to address it. since my warranty just expired on april 07, i might not be able to replace it under warranty. for me, this is a very serious safety problem that it might result injury if a child is under the powered liftgate with this defected strut when it unexpected closing down with power lift. please investigate this safety issue. thank you! *tr updated 01-16-08. *kb updated *jb

In the past 5 months, i have been having problems with the automatic sliding doors on both sides of the van. after activating the close button on the side or with the remote, the doors close and then re-open by them selves repeatedly. on several occasions we had closed the door and driven off and the door would open by it self. this is dangerous, someone or something could have fallen out. when the doors will not stay closed, you have to physically using your body to push and hold the door in the close position to make it stay closed. i took it to the dealer and they charged me 2 hrs labor to look at it and they could not replicate the problem. they said if it keeps happening he suggested changing all the lock buttons and a new ecu for about $900 as i am out of warranty as of this past march. this is crazy and dangerous. *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. the contact stated that the rear hatch support struts failed and nearly caused severe injury to a passenger. the dealer has not inspected the vehicle. the contact noticed that the vehicle had not been operating correctly for a period of time prior to the failure. the purchase date was unknown. the current mileage was 62,000 and failure mileage was approximately 60,000.

The rear liftgate struts on our 2004 toyota sienna failed to hold up the back tailgate. it collapsed on my wife and bruised her neck. should this have happened to a small child i think with the weight of this door could severely injury. we have not replaced these shocks yet as they are very expensive. we do not use tailgate without someone to hold it up. toyota never mentioned that there was a problem with these liftgates or have even upgraded the replacements so this will not happen again. *tr

Tl*the contact owns a 2004 toyota sienna. the contact stated that the power liftgate would not remain open. the dealer stated that the rear hatch pistons failed and should be replaced. as of october 4, 2007, the dealer had not repaired the vehicle. there is a defect investigation for the structure: body: hatchback/liftgate (nhtsa action number ea06020). the failure mileage was 25,000 and current mileage is 26,500. *updated 12/12/07 *bf

(1) we were packing our car to return home from vacation. i used my key fob to remotely open the power hatch. we had no prior problems with the hatch. (2) the hatch rose to the top but did not catch. we attempted several times more using the key fob, depressing the inside power hatch button, and opening it manually, but the same thing happened each time. we obviously had to store things in the back so we held it open manually. upon returning home, we tried to hold it open using a lacrosse stick, but that stick slipped and the door began closing. it did not stop when it approached my wife and worse continued to close after she pushed back on it. luckily, we she was able to get out of the way. (3) we are taking it to a dealership this week. it does not open more than 1/2 way now. *tr

Liftgate struts on 2004 toyota sienna van do not hold the liftgate open. once the door is opened nothing supports the weight and the door slams shut. extemely dangerous for children or adults unloading the rear hatch. struts have failed. toyota refuses to acknowledge the problem. *jb

1) rear liftgate operated normally - no indication of potential issues. 2) rear liftgate struts failed, causing the door to close unexpectedly, hitting my wife while she was underneath the liftgate. liftgate will no longer stay in the open position. using the power assisted feature to open the liftgate works, but it will close immediately after the opening mechanism disengages. 3) no resolution from toyota america customer assistance since the vehicle is past 36,000 mile warranty (currently @ 42,000 miles). *jb

The power liftgate of my 2004 toyota sienna has failed. the liftgate has unexpectedly closed, but is now inoperable due to strut failure. the liftgate is very heavy and closes with much force. *tr