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Fellow Corolland Members,
If you drive a 2010 Corolla with a VIN starting with 1, check the build date of your car ASAP. The build date is on the label above the tire inflation label found on the inside driver's door jam.
If your 2010 Corolla was built in 2/10 or 3/10, read on, if not disregard.
I'm a car nut. I maintain my car well. In fact I'm the only person I know who checks the functional status of their exterior lighting monthly. I check the oil and all fluids weekly as well as check the tire pressures. Additionally I keep the car as clean as I possibly can inside and out.
Upon a routine inspection of my cars belts and hoses on Tuesday, I found that the accessory drive belt, more commonly known as the serpentine belt was starting to fray along the edges. I was quite concerned by this for two reasons: Firstly the car has less than 10,000 miles on it and is only 10 months old. Secondly if that belt breaks, you have no charging system, no air conditioning and most importantly no water pump.
So when I took my car in for a previously scheduled 10,000 mile oil change and tire rotation, I mentioned the belt condition to the service writer. Knowing myself that there was a TSB on this very issue, I wanted to see what they would say. My car definitely had a defective belt as indicated by the TSB, I knew it. He simply said they would check it during the oil change.
He had the technician look at it, and that technician had the master mechanic look at it and they both agreed it needed replaced. They replaced it in about a half an hour just like the TSB notification letter I found online at NHTSA's website said it would. Funny thing is that my vehicle was built at NUMMI and was produced during the time frame of 2/10 to 3/10 like the TSB indicated and according to my VIN series I should have received the letter, yet I never received any letter from Toyota like the one I found online.
Not really pleased with Toyota at this point for failing to alert me to this possible and potentially serious issue with my car. I'm very pleased that the dealer was so willing to investigate the issue for me and work to resolve it without putting up any kind of fight. I'm also pleased that they handled it in a expedient manner. This dealer I use is good, and that's one thing I will say for Toyota is that so far I haven't run across a bad dealer.
Moral of the story: If you have a 2010 Corolla with a VIN starting with the number 1 and it was manufactured in February or March of 2010, have the dealer check the condition of the accessory drive belt as soon as possible. Toyota used two suppliers for this belt, one of the suppliers was shipping them faulty parts, so there's a 50/50 chance that yours is bad and with mine starting to fail at 10,000 miles yours might be closer to failure than you'd be comfortable with.
