2012 Wrangler cylinder head failure

[Jurfie]

Not to turn this into a Toyota bashing thread, but my co-worker has a Tacoma and had the engine fall out. Yes, fall out...the mounts on one side gave out. He said apparently this is a common issue. A quick google search "Tacoma engine mount failure" will bring it up. All manufacturers have issues occasionally; it doesn't mean they are crap.

As mentioned, FCA is standing up and fixing the issue, and so far it only seems to be 2012s that have it.

 

[kojackJKU]

Not to turn this into a Toyota bashing thread, but my co-worker has a Tacoma and had the engine fall out. Yes, fall out...the mounts on one side gave out. He said apparently this is a common issue. A quick google search "Tacoma engine mount failure" will bring it up. All manufacturers have issues occasionally; it doesn't mean they are crap.

As mentioned, FCA is standing up and fixing the issue, and so far it only seems to be 2012s that have it.

The swiss cheese factor im talking about. Toyota is all smoke and mirrors. They pride themselves on reliable engines, and let everything else fall to bits, and lets not forget the acceleration, braking and control issues. NAH...I will deal with a bit of noise in my motor thanks!

 

[calicamper]

Good luck when your Tacoma is swiss cheese in a couple of years and useless.

I'm not brand specific any more these days all the major builders have their pluses and minuses. A Toyota in CA will out last a Toyota in Michigan for obvious reasons. A jeep in CA will out last a Jeep in Michigan for the same reasons. I'm in CA even living with salt spray coming off the Pacific Ocean is nothing compared to the road salt in Michigan regarding vehicle life.

I like the new Jk's the designs were done pretty well and I hope Chrysler steps up their customer support efforts given if they do it right the Jeep brand will do OK. Toyota I've had a few only one had a terribly designed engine and toyota spent $8000 in two years trying to patch it up I dumped it after the second attempt. My other two Toyotas have been great primarily given I bought them used and sold them years later for nearly what I paid for them originally. My current 07 Sequoia is a nice machine but nothing special compared to the Yukon its a toss up as to which one would be a nicer machine.

 

[Yarjammer]

I'm supposed to get my Jeep back on Friday. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. The service writer told me that this is a casting defect with the LH cylinder head, which is why the RH side doesn't seem to be affected (RH and LH are totally different castings). He said they have 2012 3.6L's almost constantly coming in with this problem. It seems to be an almost 100% failure as others mentioned. At least Chrysler is standing behind them - certainly a very, very expensive quality screwup on someone's part in the manufacturing process.

My 2012 has ~42k on the clock and no problems with the engine yet. Fingers crossed since I dumped my H3 for the JKU after it went through two heads in 50k miles (I traded it in when the latest head gave up the ghost and it was in need of yet a third rebuild).

 

[GetOutThere]

My 2012 has ~42k on the clock and no problems with the engine yet. Fingers crossed since I dumped my H3 for the JKU after it went through two heads in 50k miles (I traded it in when the latest head gave up the ghost and it was in need of yet a third rebuild).

.
My 2012 also has never had engine problems.
.
A while back there was information available showing the exact build date timeline that was effected by the head issue, and mine did not fall into that time frame, thankfully.
.
As for the horn/button thing, I had some idiot pull out in front of me today... didn't seem physically possible to dodge him, but somehow I matrixed it and made it through unscathed. Hit the horn so hard my palm was stinging. Will have to see if my buttons are more reliable now lol.

 

[codesertrat]

I took delivery of my 2013 in September and had my water pump show the same symptoms by around November. Took it in to the dealership and they replaced it but not before the new tech got all worked up by the new color of the antifreeze. If I recall correctly, it was originally purple.

2012 and older use HOAT (Hybrid Orgnanic Acid Technology) coolant, and 2013 and up use OAT (Organic Acid Technology) coolant. Both are "long life" coolants, the HOAT is yellowish orange in color, and the OAT is purple for Chrysler products (color actually means NOTHING as far as the industry goes). They shouldn't be mixed. They are both ethylene glycol based coolant with different corrosion inhibitor packages.

 

[kojackJKU]

I'm not brand specific any more these days all the major builders have their pluses and minuses. A Toyota in CA will out last a Toyota in Michigan for obvious reasons. A jeep in CA will out last a Jeep in Michigan for the same reasons. I'm in CA even living with salt spray coming off the Pacific Ocean is nothing compared to the road salt in Michigan regarding vehicle life.

I like the new Jk's the designs were done pretty well and I hope Chrysler steps up their customer support efforts given if they do it right the Jeep brand will do OK. Toyota I've had a few only one had a terribly designed engine and toyota spent $8000 in two years trying to patch it up I dumped it after the second attempt. My other two Toyotas have been great primarily given I bought them used and sold them years later for nearly what I paid for them originally. My current 07 Sequoia is a nice machine but nothing special compared to the Yukon its a toss up as to which one would be a nicer machine.

I live in the salt belt, my Jeep 2011 has almost zero rust on the chasis or anything, meanwhile, there are always Toyotas of similar vintage over at the ole Toyota graveyard behind the dealership. They collect them up then after they get a bunch, the ship em out to get scrapped I guess. PURE JUNK.

 

[brianjwilson]

Good luck when your Tacoma is swiss cheese in a couple of years and useless.

Maybe true if I lived in a place where they salt relentlessly, but not here.

 

[kojackJKU]

Not so much no. Horrible up here.

 

[Jeep or Tacoma]

A friend of mine is a Chrysler Tech - they expect a 100% failure rate on the bad batch of heads.

how extensive is that issue does it extend to the 2015s or was just a a few runs?

 

[Jeep or Tacoma]

that was my thought too intact when I drove the 3.6 with 373 I couldn't hardly tell any difference MY 08 with 410 seemed pretty similar really not until I drove the 3.6 with 410 could I really tell big difference and even then, it wasn't overwhelming.

Nah, I always have a little bit of fun with the guys who come on the forums and say OMG the pentastar is mind blowing power. Its not. No hard feelings bro.

 

[Yuccahead]

how extensive is that issue does it extend to the 2015s or was just a a few runs?

It only covered 2012 model year production and I believe that the last 1-2 months of 2012 production had the new head design. 2013 model year JKs (which started production in late 2012) and later models should be fine.

 

[codesertrat]

They finished my Jeep in Friday, as promised.

I brought it in for 4 things, and they fixed two of them.
1. LH cylinder head was replaced due to the P0300 cylinder misfire fault code.
2. The water pump was replaced due to the squeaking noise at the front of the engine
3. The clutch makes a creaking noise upon clutch pedal engage/release when hot. They claim they were unable to duplicate the problem. Obviously they made no attempt to actually drive it, as the noise was present by the time I got home after a 15 minute drive.
4. The buttons on the LH side of the steering wheel are intermittently inoperative. They claim they were unable to duplicate the problem. I got into the Jeep after the porter brought my Jeep around and I had to punch the button about 6 times before it did anything. Whatever. I'll try the horn thing today.

I spent some time under the hood before leaving the dealer. Within 3 minutes I had found many issues pointing to shoddy workmanship.
1. All of the clips (I counted 8 of them) which retain the wiring harness on the LH side of the engine were broken and not replaced. The unretained harness was rubbing on the steering shaft, the O2 sensor wiring was within a quarter inch of the exhaust, and there were multiple rub interference points with other hoses, lines, and brackets.
2. The hose from the vacuum pump to the tee at the LH side of the engine was not routed correctly, creating a hard rub on one of the A/C lines.
3. The fuel lines at the RH side had been removed due to a bracket that mounted to the intake manifold, and the retaining clips for the fuel lines were broken allowing the lines to rub in several locations.
4. The negative battery cable was not fully installed on the post, and was so loose that I easily pulled it off by hand.
5. Old gaskets were left behind the battery.
6. The radiator hose spring clamps were not installed straight or in the right location on the upper and lower hose.
7. Puddles of oil residue were left on the firewall and oil was dripping off of the LH engine mount. It appears to be residue not a leak, but I will keep my eye on it.
8. The air intake hose was not fully installed onto the MAF sensor, although the clamp was tight.

I tried to go back in and talk to the service writer, but after waiting for 20 minutes (they were extremely busy), I elected to just fix a few things in their parking lot. I grabbed a couple of tools out of the back of my Xterra, and proceeded to temporarily tie wrap up the harness, tighten up the battery terminal and wipe down some of the oil. The salesmen all watched and stared closely, but no one asked what I was doing.

I then drove home, and fixed all the above issues in my garage last night. I am now happy with the harness and hose routing, and I did not find anything else that was left loose. At this point, I have no confidence in the critical work that was done - did they torque the head properly, did they install gaskets correctly, did they tighten up the intake bolts properly, etc? Unfortunately, some of these type of things don't show up right away. I'm glad I've got a month to drive it around and shake out any issues before my first big off road trip of the year in mid April (we are heading to the Kanab, Utah area for a week).

 

[Hilldweller]

Geoff,
I'm going to get this to the attention of a senior Customer Care rep.
That's really bad service and you don't deserve that.

 

[rbod]

You're serious about that? If they don't fix it, I'll have to give that a try.

All of the 'buttons' in the JK's aren't really 'buttons' in the normal sense. The horn, turn signal stalk, headlight switch, wiper switch, and steering wheel buttons are all electronic signal generators that create a LIN bus (single wire communication network) message to some type of a dash or steering column control module; the steering column control module then sends a CAN bus (two wire communication network) message to the TIPM (Totally Integrated Power Module) under the hood (TIPM is the fuse / relay box on the right side), which then receives the network message and activates the appropriate relay or circuit.

This is why I am trying to find information on the communication network architecture used in these Jeeps. When things don't operate, its usually some type of simple communication failure - the pulsing multiplex square wave message didn't send, was garbled, or wasn't received because of a resistive connection, interference, or other simple wiring problem. The advantage of using communication networks in modern vehicles is the simplification of wiring and connections (Two communication wires take the place of a whole harness) and ease of service (if you have the right tooling). The downside is the reliance on computer software programming for all functionality and a lack of serviceability (if you don't have specialized tooling which can 'talk' on the network to the other controllers). That specialized tooling is Jeep dealer only right now as far as I can tell.

My 2008 had a strange problem with the horn occasionally beeping on it's own, wipers turning on, windshield washers spraying by themselves. The dealer told me it was impossible over several visits. I did some research and found some article that the affected systems all connected to the TIPM and were on the same "segment" (or something, been awhile, I don't remember the nomenclature). I gave this to the dealer and they were dismissive again. I finally left it with them for a day and they took an extended drive... they call me all excited saying, "the tech said he just saw the craziest thing ever, the windshield sprayers activated on their own and then the horn beeped". Um, yes, that's what I said. They had no idea what to do. I emailed Chrysler and a customer care rep contacted me. They sent my story and questions on the TIPM to an engineer. The dealer calls back, said someone from corporate called them and told them to replace "a component" under warranty. Paperwork said it was the TIPM. Problem never came back.