The Lexus especially is surprising.
Swapping Jetta update...
- Thread starter gregk24
- Start date
Was this a mid year change? What's electronic fuel vapor release?
The blemish is gone, the odo is reset to 0, you have 3 more months of warranty and you had the excitement of taking delivery of another new car. Not a bad deal for $600.
My thoughts.
I’ll have to read up on it. You pull the button on the driver door then a message pops up on the information screen saying “preparing for fueling” or something similar. Then you hear a whoosh noise, then silence, then an electric noise and the door pops open and the information screen says “ready for fueling”.
How did it fail and what did they fix?
Yeah. My 2007 LS460L had the best paint of any vehicle I’ve had but the GX is not an LS in the paint department. Big (like a grain of sand) chunk of dirt right in the center of the hood, under the paint and the clear. I was surprised it made it past QC as well but the GX isn’t hand sanded like I believe the LS was.
The fuel door lock solenoid itself failed. Chalk it up to infant mortality.
Part was a one day wait (loaner) but a quick swap.
My grandparents have an 18 year old black LS. The paint still looks amazing.
Please update us once you learn more. I'm intrigued...this is the first I am hearing of a vapor recovery system like this. Cool stuff.
I should have said reset to 0.0. What was I thinking? I've owned enough VW's with that button staring me in the face to know better.
wemay
Site Donor 2023
Congrats! Nice
Good to hear you had this resolved to your satisfaction. Congrats on the new car. 
Must be a common problem because we paint at least one fuel door a week for them. I am assuming the tech has to break the door to get it open or the dealer is just replacing them when someone has an issue.
As a glass half empty guy, he wasted several hours of his time, days anguishing about the paint blemish, $600 of cash and probably another hard pull on his credit report.
Taking delivery of a car was never exciting to me. I always want to get in and out asap. I hate dealers and I don't like salespeople or scummy finance managers(will procure own financing next time). I HATE making small talk and the patronizing BS when I tell them what I do for a living. It's most unpleasant.
I don't know how old the OP is. Maybe I would feel different if I was younger and didn't have other things to worry about. Something like this would be sooo low on my list of crap to worry about.
Well everyone is different, and thats fine. To me "waisting my time" at the dealer was worth it as we no longer have to stare at a paint blemish every time we get in the car. My salesman was easy going, so that was a non issue. The finance manager was the typical type, I dealt with him and took my time making sure he didn't add on any "packages" to the deal. He did try but I caught him.
Worth it to me, worth it to us. My wife gave me a big "thank you Honey" when I showed her the new car in the driveway.
I hope she gave you more than that.
It's somewhere between common and uncommon, I'd say. They either fail early or never.
The painted part of the fuel door is separate from the hinge that the lock mates with.
I'm sure ham-fisted mechanics go brute force and chew up the paint up all the time. My guy showed me how he went in from the fender liner.
My paint fortunately made it out unscathed.
I could give you details on how to open it from the flap but I’m sure you would rather I didn’t on an open forum
