Sometimes Mysteries Suck

In the past month, I’ve put in about $3K of repairs in Lola, my 2006 Yaris. That included a routine tune up, some minor fixes (wipers, headlights, etc.), some bigger fixes (bushings, shocks and struts), and four new tires. I also had to take the car into the dealership to address a recall for the passenger side airbag. Needless to say, I got a bit tired of Lola being in the shop.

In the week that followed the final round of repairs, I did a fair bit of driving including a trip over to Richmond and another up to Nanaimo. On my return from Nanaimo last week, the check engine light came on just north of Duncan. We pulled over in Duncan so I could double check it was nothing obvious (I couldn’t see anything) then I just drove home. I drove the car again on Friday to and from Brentwood Bay, and on the way back home picked up a cheap OBD2 reader (on sale for $35) from KMS tools, because I really didn’t want to take the car back to the shop without knowing what I might be up against. (OBD2 is the On Board Diagnostics — the link into all that juicy data that most cars contain)

In the past month, I’ve put in about $3K of repairs in Lola, my 2006 Yaris. That included a routine tune up, some minor fixes (wipers, headlights, etc.), some bigger fixes (bushings, shocks and struts), and four new tires. In between I also had to go to the dealership to replace the passenger air bag, which had been subject to a recall. Lola spent a LOT of time in repair bays.

Got home, found the OBD2 port, plugged in the reader (following the directions) and…. nothing. Wouldn’t power up. Wouldn’t read. First mystery, is it a problem with the reader or the car? Saturday, I plugged the reader into another car and it fired up immediately. OK, so it’s a Lola problem. Research what might cause the problem, most likely blown fuse. UGH.

Meanwhile the check engine light had gone out on its own but went on again as soon as I hit highway speeds. Since then I’ve driven as little as possible while I got on with life.

Tonight, I opted not to go out thanks to allergy-congestion-hell but decided I had enough energy to check for a blown fuse. Found the main fuse box, but it had no fuse for the OBD2 port. Dug out the user manual and found the secondary fuse box (conveniently, right behind the OBD2 port under the dash). After much twisting around I found the appropriate fuse and pulled it out. As it happened, I had spare 10A, 15A, and 20A fuses but the one I needed was 7.5A. A quick trip to Canadian Tire and $16 later I had a package of selected Toyota compatible fuses. Back home, I extracted the suspected blown fuse and replaced it, then plugged in the OBD2 reader — SUCCESS!

Next, I did the scan, and finally it came up with an error P0011. A web search revealed this to be a pretty generic error, “P0011 is a very common trouble code. It affects vehicles with variable valve timing (VVT). The list of VVT vehicles is growing, and the Toyota Yaris can have VVT, and is prone to developing this code.” [source] The same article also lists possible causes of it — everything from the timing chain to dirty oil to a damaged wire.

Fantastic. Since I very recently had work done, I will likely take it back to the mechanic in case it was something they changed during the tune up that triggered the issue (I know they mentioned something about timing, so it’s entirely likely). In the meantime, if the light goes on again, I could potentially clear it so I don’t have to stare at it on the dash. So while I still don’t have an answer, I am pretty happy that I got as far as I did in the diagnosis.