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2008 TOYOTA HIGHLANDER HYBRID — Complaint #997338

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NHTSA Complaint about HYBRID PROPULSION SYSTEM: INVERTER filed July 27, 2013

NHTSA complaint #997338 (ODI reference 10532153) concerns a 2008 TOYOTA HIGHLANDER HYBRID and was filed on July 27, 2013. The owner reports the failure occurred on July 23, 2013. The vehicle had 13,000 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to California based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as hybrid propulsion system: inverter, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.

The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.

Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same TOYOTA HIGHLANDER HYBRID cohort independently describe similar hybrid propulsion system: inverter failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2008 TOYOTA HIGHLANDER HYBRID shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.

Vehicle
2008 TOYOTA HIGHLANDER HYBRID
Component
HYBRID PROPULSION SYSTEM: INVERTER
State
California
Mileage
13,000 mi

Complaint Description

WHILE AT THE TOYOTA DEALER FOR SERVICE, THE DEALER TOOK THE CAR FOR A TEST DRIVE PRIOR TO THE SERVICE AND UPON RETURNING TO THE DEALER LOT THE CAR DIED - NO POWER. DEALER DIAGNOSED AS A BAD INVERTER, BALLPARK REPAIR COST IS $9500. BESIDES BEING A SERIOUS SAFETY ISSUE, I CANNOT UNDERSTAND HOW A MODERN CAR CAN CONTAIN A CRITICAL COMPONENT THAT COSTS $10K TO REPLACE THAT HAS NO MAINTENANCE IN THE MAINTENANCE SCHEDULE OR OTHER DIAGNOSTICS TO ALERT THE DRIVER OF PENDING CATASTROPHIC FAILURE THAT MAY STRAND THEM IN AN EXTREMELY UNSAFE LOCATION (I.E. MIDDLE OF THE FREEWAY). I HOPE THAT NHTSA INVESTIGATES THE 2008 HIGHLANDER HYBRID INVERTER FAILURES DOCUMENTED ON THIS SITE AND TOYOTA IS HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR THIS SERIOUS SAFETY HAZARD AND EXTREMELY COSTLY DEFECT. *TR

Complaint Details

NHTSA Complaint ID 997338
ODI Number 10532153
Date Filed July 27, 2013
Failure Date July 23, 2013
VIN JTEEW41A982

Similar HYBRID PROPULSION SYSTEM: INVERTER Complaints for 2008 TOYOTA HIGHLANDER HYBRID

Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.