Please Read: Trailer Brake Error/Pre-Collision System Malfunction Caused by Low Oil!

I am posting this hear because when this drama was unfolding a google search brought me to this website. Since the cause of the problem can be low oil - which can ruin an engine - I want to give visibility so others who face the same situation will find this through Google or something and be spared a potentially bad outcome.

Yesterday I went on a 1000 km round trip to pick up a snowblower (fantastic machine, nearly new, great price). I was towing a light trailer.

About 100 km into the return trip my dash went crazy and alternating messages Trailer Brake Error/Pre-Collision System Malfunction flashed. The messages advised that if I was towing a trailer I should pull over immediately.

This is a link to a video of the error messages https://imgur.com/SGMvuW4

At the time I was on the Ontario 401 highway where average speeds are 120 km per hour. There had been a major snowfall so the emergency lane was very narrow. I was able to pull over to investigate.

My experience with my wife's Rav4 (which a mouse had chewed a wire) is that Toyota's error messages are often not remotely relevant to the problem. Since my load was very light and the trailer has no brakes, I decided to continue to the next exit which was, 8 km away.

Before getting back in the car, I noticed a recent drop of oil on top of the snow near the hitch. This is not unusual on a busy highway but it was obviously fresh.

A few minutes after continuing the truck limited its speed to about 50 km/hr and RPM to about 2000 (from memory) I was now in a very dangerous situation: no place to pull over, going less than 1/2 the speed of traffic. Even with my hazards on it was pretty scary but I thought it was better to get off the road regardless. Eventually I got to the exit and pulled over. While driving I noticed the oil pressure was a bit lower than usual: just below 1/2 way. Usually it is never less than 1/2 way.

I thought I'd investigate some more. I got out again ... and noticed a drop of oil on the snow. I immediately checked the oil and discovered the stick had just enough to wet the tip. Although I would have expected an error such as "Low Oil" or something, whatever issue I had, I needed to add oil. Fortunately, a service station was only about 1 km away so I made it there and added 3 liters of very expensive service station oil. The stick was still dry, but truck would now go full speed so I decided to go to a nearby Walmart and buy a few 5 liter containers and fill it completely. I am not sure but I think I was down a total of 5 liters out of the 8 liter capacity.

After I replenished the oil the pandemonium on the dash went away. I still have a check engine light but when I look at the truck today I will reset that. I drove the remaining distance home with no issues and didn't have to add any more oil.

So the lesson is: if your Tundra shows any of these symptoms or shows Trailer Brake Error/Pre-Collision System Malfunction check the oil!

Since my pressure never dropped below slightly less than midway , the oil light did not come on, and the engine did not overheat I am hopeful there is no permanent damage.

As for the cause of the oil loss, I will investigate today. I had replaced the plastic filter canister with an aluminum after market unit and I an suspicious that is the cause of the problem. Since I use a torque wrench when replacing the filter and plug I know for a fact everything was done correctly.

 

Make sure you moved your internals from the plastic housing over to the new metal one, the taller tower is an important component

 

These lights will come on for a number of engine issues. I do know that they also come on if you lose fuel pressure and your engine runs lean. It's basically in limp mode when those lights come on

 

Thanks: yes I did that! When I got the aluminum unit it didn't come with the right mesh tube so I moved it over. I have to clean up the shop a bit to get the truck on the lift but my suspicion is that the drain plug in the aluminum unit came out or loosened up. I thought the thread were a bit loose when I put it in but I thought "how can that be". Anyhow, if it is the can I'll go back to the OEM.

 

Frankly I think that is bad design. There is an alphanumeric display of oil is low and it knows enough to throw error codes it should at least give relevant ones. My wife's Rav4 gave a bunch of code for VSC, etc., and the problem had nothing to do with it. Similarly, there is nothing remotely connected between the collision sensor and trailer brake other than perhaps a harness or the computer and definitely nothing to do with engine oil.

 

Hard to believe you lost 2/3 of your oil and never saw a drop before. How long since you switched the filter housing? Second thread I’ve read today about these housings failing in some way on a Tundra.

 

I use this truck for mostly hunting and occasionally for hauling stuff. I put less than 5,000 km per year and most of that is my annual hunting trip (about 3,000 km). Otherwise it is parked. I changed the oil before my hunting trip and we had a fair bit of snow since then. If it was leaking oil and there was snow I wouldn't have seen it.

Until I diagnose I can't be sure but the canister drain plug is the sort of thing that leaks very slowly unless you push up the spring loaded valve. I strongly suspect vibration and oil pressure (such as driving on a highway) would increase the rate of leakage. And if I am right about the plug coming loose/out, then that could have happened as recent as yesterday morning.

 

Glad you didn’t cook your engine, hope you find the problem and it’s an easy resolution.

 

Thanks!

 

I thought I'd give an update. The cap was indeed leaking via the drain plug.

This was an aftermarket unit I had bought from Amazon. I don't know the brand because I bought two at the same time, and one of those had no brand name associated with it. They only had 1 of each in stock so I got one of each. I am pretty sure it isn't Dorman because I had one of those new in box (for the next oil change on my Rav4) and the plug looks different.

The cause of the leak appears to be that it came "factory cross-threaded".


I am pretty sure I didn't cross thread it because I am old enough to "finger start" threads and I had no reason to remove the drain plug since it went in new last oil change. Likely the plug had been hanging on by whatever threads it had left and simply shook loose.

I replaced it with the Dorman I had (which I triple checked the threading on) and will keep an eye on my oil level.

 

Getcha a new oem one. Avoided a near disaster today, don’t set yourself up for the same again.

 

Aren't the OEM ones plastic? I had issues with the plastic ones in the past.

 

They are. Only issue with them is people over tightening them. I’ve had zero issues out of mine. I do my own oil changes so I can control how tight it is.

 

Glad you found the problem. Those threads DO look nasty....

Was there an o-ring? I'm fairly sure the drain cap has its own rubber o-ring to seal, as the threads will not do any of the sealing.

Also, there are OE Toyota filter housing caps available in aluminum. You will still probably need to switch over the center tube (I did), but the item is the quality one would expect of Toyota.

Anyway, gitcha some quality and don't look back

 

Yes, there was an O-ring. I will look into OEM aluminum caps. When I last looked - maybe 10 years ago, there were none.

 

So what diagnostic code did you have? Any MIL (diagnostic code) will also turn off the VSC and Trac control regardless if it’s related or not… Like you said this happens on any modern Toyota. So the low oil must have thrown a check engine code but not sure why you wouldn't get a low oil message to go with it. The truck knows you were pulling a trailer so it added that warning to the Christmas lights. Maybe that over-rides the low oil message or you can scroll down a list?

 

Here's what you want:

 

There was no low oil mode. Reading codes were P0015 and P0025 #07E8 B Camshaft Position Timing Over Retarded Bank 1 (first) and Bank 2 (second). There was no code or message regarding low oil. When I disconnected the trailer (I thought maybe there was a short in the harness) it still gave the Trailer Brake Message alternating with the Pre-Collision System message. To repeat, at no point was there any form of low oil message, and if there was it should have been priority: it is far more important to know that your engine may self-destruct than to be told your pre-collision system is off line, especially since there is an idiot light for that.

 

Thanks TundraMcGov.!

 

There’s some speculation on the other thread that had a replacement aluminum cap fail that the bypass valving in the cap is different from one engine to another.

 

I should have a look since I still have the plastic ones but the cap and the innards are pretty simple things.

 

from the other thread…..

https://www.tundras.com/threads/is-this-a-normal-amount-of-dirt-in-the-oil-filter.121308/

 

Hmmm. Good thing I kept the originals ...

 

Is the spring not part of the riser tube and not the cap itself? Been a while since I swapped mine (like 30k miles), but I do not recall ANY moving parts on the cap, which leads me to belive there is zero correlation between the cap and any pressure bypass.

So long as the original toyota riser tube is used with the corresponding aluminum cap, I don't see any reason it would function differently than the plastic cap.

Take my ramblings how you will.

 

I have been down this rabbit hole now too. Whatever replacement cap suggested in this forum (what I used) is not the same as the one in the linked video earlier in this thread.
Also, the TRD oil filter appears to have a built in metal tube. Anyone know if this takes the place of the original? I should start a new thread as now getting off topic but oh well.

 

I imagine the riser tube would still be used with any brand oil filter because that part is what allows spring tension (or compression) to seal the filter against the top side of the filter housing.

I've never used the TRD filter cartridge, but there would certainly be documentation in the box for the removal of the riser if it were necessary or recommended.

If it helps anyone, I used Toyota part #

$42 15620-31060 15643-31050

15620-31060 for the aluminum housing cap and have had no issues

As stated, I did transfer over the riser tube spring and all, from the original (and completely shredded) plastic housing.