Dubai: Toyota's local distributor is looking to recall nearly 2,000 Toyota and Lexus 2004 models in the UAE.
The models listed by Al-Futtaim Motors include 929 Toyota Avalon and Camry vehicles and 1,015 Lexus RX330 and ES300 vehicles all 2004 year models.
The voluntary service campaign will inspect the vehicles to check and possibly replace the crankshaft pulley on the V6 engine.
"We at Al-Futtaim Motors are working closely with Toyota Motor Corporation and are already starting the process of contacting all customers who may have potentially affected units in the coming few days so that their vehicles can be inspected," said Simon Frith, managing director of Al-Futtaim Motors, in a statement yesterday.
This comes as part of a worldwide recall by Toyota Motor of around 550,000 vehicles due to steering problems. In these cases, the outer ring of the engine's crankshaft pulley has become misaligned with the inner ring, causing noise or a warning signal to light up.
Steering difficulty
If the problem isn't corrected, the belt for the power steering pump may become detached from the pulley, making it suddenly more difficult to turn the steering wheel, the company said in a statement.
Around 447,000 vehicles are affected in North America, 38,000 in Japan, 25,000 in Australia and New Zealand, 14,000 in Europe, 14,000 in Asia outside Japan and 10,000 in the Middle East.
While so far there have been no reports of accidents due to the defect, Toyota has a received 79 reports about the defect since 2007.
This follows a series of global recalls made by Toyota over the last couple of years including its recall of two models; Avalon and Sequoia 2005-2010 in the UAE in February 2010 due to a faulty accelerator which caused sudden and unexpected acceleration.
In its latest results ending in March, Toyota posted an 18.5 per cent drop in profits as a result of supply disruption and component shortages from its manufacturing facilities in Japan.
Toyota has also had to stop production at its three plants in Thailand due to the extensive flooding in Bangkok which reduced its total output to only 70 to 80 per cent.
The company recently declined to give a forecast for resuslts in the full financial year ending March 2012 due to uncertainties following this latest supply disruption.
