More recalls for Toyota, Honda

TOYOTA has issued its third safety recall notice in Australia this week, this time to fix flimsy rear propeller shaft guards on no fewer than 13,256 HiAce buses built between January 2005 and June this year.

According to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the rear prop shaft shield on Toyota’s popular HiAce Commuter Bus “does no meed (sic) the Australian Design Rule (ADR: 58.21) due to a lack of propeller shaft guard rigidity”.

Yesterday’s HiAce bus recall comes two days after Toyota Australia recalled more than 25,000 examples of the previous-generation Kluger SUV and superseded Lexus IS, GS and RX models to fix potentially leaking brake master-cylinders.

Left: Nissan X-Trail. Below: Toyota HiAce SLWB Commuter Bus.

This week’s other local Toyota recall – also part of a global recall affecting more than 1.5 million vehicles – was announced to fix fuel suction tube connectors on 674 Lexus GS300s.

While Honda Australia appears to have escaped a global recall to fix a similar brake master-cylinder seal problem on about 528,000 examples of the 2005-2007 Odyssey people-mover, it has now issued a safety recall notice to replace the brake master-cylinder on 482 2007 Legends.

“It is possible that the rubber seal portion at the rear end of the brake master-cylinder may turn and brake fluid may leak from the seal portion, causing the warning light to be illuminated,” said Honda on the ACCC website on October 28.

“In the worst case scenario, the defect may cause brake force reduction,” added Honda, which advises that affected models carry vehicle identification numbers ranging between JHMKB16507C200040 and JHMKB16507C204774.

Finally, in the latest round of Australian vehicle recalls, Nissan yesterday called back 68 of its current X-Trails due to a printing error that overstates the gross vehicle mass (GVM) on the compliance label of the vehicle.

Nissan said the print error occurred between August 16 and 18 this year and had the potential to lead to overloading of the vehicle. Affected X-Trails carry VINs within the ranges of JN1TANT31A0100176 to JN1TANT31A0100402 and JN1TCNT31A0100122 to JN1TCNT31A0100170.

In all three cases, the owners of affected vehicles will be contacted by phone or mail to arrange rectification.