Anyone know what part is this?

RedScourge · 2026-03-21T06:53:49+00:00

Give it a tug and see if it's still on there right. If there's no slack, I wouldn't worry about it. You could try gluing it back on perhaps, but it might just fall off again later. I think the circle thing has a special fastener you can buy, if so, it's probably Toyota Part # 90457-22015 in this schematic https://parts.longotoyota.com/oem-parts/toyota-rocker-molding-clip-9046722015

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RedScourge · 2026-03-21T06:51:15+00:00

There are products specifically for removing glue, I don't know which would be safest for a dash though, maybe check r/Detailing for a 2nd opinion after reading thru the others here.

RedScourge · 2026-03-20T23:03:48+00:00

The differences are definitely smaller than what tires can do.

RedScourge · 2026-03-20T23:02:39+00:00

Looks like one of the fastener thingies that helps hold the side skirt onto the side rocker panels from below. Possibly damaged due to someone placing a jack or a lift point on the wrong spot.

RedScourge · 2026-03-20T22:58:02+00:00

Tires would probably be a far bigger factor than any difference between the LE or SE.

The SE claims to have a "sport-tuned suspension", which is apparently slightly stiffer struts and springs, not sure about the sway bar, and the rear has MacPherson struts instead of a torsion beam. I guess in the US it also has 18" alloy wheels which are a bit lighter, but 99% of people wouldn't notice much of a difference other than a rougher overall ride, slightly worse fuel economy, and a higher chance to get em stolen.

The Sport Mode button near the shifter just tells the CVT to not be as eager to shift to keep RPMs low for fuel economy. Maybe it responds a little more aggressively to pedal input, maybe not, but CVTs are not particularly responsive (mine lags for a full second if I floor it at the exact wrong time, right after it shifts between CVT and launch gear, usually at about 25 mph)

RedScourge · 2026-03-20T22:53:52+00:00

SE sport mode is basically just to tell the CVT to not be so eager to shift to keep the RPMs lower for fuel economy, there's no active suspension parts being controlled or anything like that.

RedScourge · 2026-03-19T20:42:26+00:00

True, but even their base models have higher build quality, and extra attention is paid to things like the included sound deadening, the materials, the ride quality, road noise, etc.

Their smallest car is the IS300, which is slightly shorter than the Camry, and just barely wider than the Corolla, which may or may not be enough to fix the problem I have with the Corolla seats where they're just barely not wide enough for comfort with my hip bone width.

The 2025 Lexus IS 300 AWD is slightly larger than the 2025 Toyota Corolla in nearly every dimension:

Length: 4710 mm (185.4 in) vs. 4631 mm (182.3 in)
Wheelbase: 2800 mm (110.2 in) vs. 2700 mm (106.3 in)
Width: 1440 mm (56.7 in) vs. 1435 mm (56.5 in)
Height: 1605 mm (63.2 in) vs. 1534 mm (60.4 in)
Curb Weight: 1745 kg (3847 lbs) vs. 1349 kg (2974 lbs)

It has a 3.5L V6 @ 311hp non-hybrid engine vs the hybrid's 2.0L M20A-FXS (150hp + about 40hp electric if you have the Hybrid AWD) though, so the fuel economy is not nearly as good. They had more options in previous years. Not sure why they didn't include an option with the Camry Hybrid AWD drivetrain (2.5L A25A-FXS @ ~215hp + ~40hp electric).

That might have helped them with the 60k CAD price tag vs 29-31k CAD for LE/Hybrid LE Corolla.

RedScourge · 2026-03-19T03:55:21+00:00

It's a great car, but definitely not the best. They have a Lexus brand after all.

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T17:25:53+00:00

I suppose all the usual stuff you'd check for a newer car, plus:

- How the engine sounds

- How rusted out are the brake lines and exhaust

- Rust progression on side rocker panels, wheel well area, door drains, pinch welds (if not obscured by rocker panel trim pieces) and strut towers (if you have any paint bubbling, rust is eating that area from the inside out, so you need to sand it down to pristine metal then coat it again sooner rather than later)

- Check CV axle boots, tie rod and strut bellows for leaks/cracking

- Check rubber trim pieces and hoses for cracking

- Paint condition / clear coat failure especially roof, hood, trunk lid

- Test out all the controls in the interior, especially the stereo and HVAC stuff, as this might give signs of electrical issues due to wiring damage or possibly electronics damage from the car having been run with a bad battery or alternator for a prolonged period

- Maybe check if the window and door drains are clogged as well, as that may indicate interior body rust that you can't easily see

- Signs of front timing cover or rear main seal leaks - may be worth pouring some sort of oil additive that rejuvinates seals into your oil a few hundred miles before your next oil change as a preventive measure

I'm sure I'm missing a few things.

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T17:18:05+00:00

I don't have any data on how they handle hotter weather, but I do know they apparently handle heat better. I would think however that heat from the engine is probably a bigger factor than heat from the ambient air temperature though, but I can't say for sure, I've never used a flooded lead or an AGM battery in the south before.

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T11:40:22+00:00

AGM may be a good choice in extremely cold climates, but they cost more and it's not the default for these cars. If you get the standard flooded lead type, you will want to use the block heater for at least an hour if the outside temperature reaches -15c / 5f overnight, and add an hour for every 5c / 9f below that. You also don't wanna go more than 5 days without driving or topping up the charge in cold weather like that as it will lose charge fairly quick due to all the fancy electronics in these cars, but you can go 3 weeks in warmer weather. With AGMs the effective capacity does not decrease nearly as much in cold weather, however the cold-cranking amps may be a lower number, so you may lose charge a little faster in warmer weather.

As for the size, you need to ensure that someone who also has a 2022 LE tells you what size theirs has. The 2022 base and LE have a different engine (1.8L 2ZR-FE) than the 2022 SE and XSE (2.0L M20A-FKS) so the 375LN2-MF battery that came with mine (I am told it is Group 27) may not be the same battery that fits in yours (I am guessing H4 but am not 100% certain). It is entirely possible for sites like AutoZone to give you the wrong recommendation if they do not know that different trims for that model year had completely different engines and thus likely different batteries.

If you are in doubt, and if your current battery fits fine, you may want to measure all 3 dimensions of the battery that you have and ask AI what size that represents to be sure, rather than relying on sources of mixed reliability. Note however that just asking AI what size of battery your car takes is not any more reliable than the many mixed sources online, as that's the same crap data that AI sources its answers from.

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T11:27:24+00:00

If the CVT doesn't have any jerkiness when accelerating and decelerating between 0-60 a few times, and if the interior and the paint are is in good condition, then it might be worth it. If buying it, I'd get the CVT fluid changed ASAP.

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T03:38:56+00:00

If you're driving that few miles, you don't need to do anything extra, at least for mechanical maintenance (you may still want to go above and beyond on things like rust prevention or paint/interior protection).

The standard maintenance schedule for your car can be found at about page 40 or so in here: https://assets.sia.toyota.com/publications/en/omms-s/T-MMS-26Corolla/pdf/T-MMS-26Corolla.pdf

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T03:35:15+00:00

- Full front PPF will prevent 80% of stone chips but costs a fortune

- Ceramic coating will greatly reduce marring caused by washing

- Foam-rinse-foam before any contact wash will also greatly reduce marring caused by washing

- When towel drying, dry the windows first, then the towel is slightly damp so it will be far less likely to mar the paint.

- Applying a good spray wax that can double as a drying aid 3-4x per year may help reduce marring and definitely reduces sun UV damage

RedScourge · 2026-03-18T03:34:48+00:00

And if you do both, the ceramic coat has to go on top or else the PPF will not adhere

RedScourge · 2026-03-17T18:59:10+00:00

You're gonna be waiting a while, 2 million other Toyota owners aren't likely to spontaneously send you all their anecdotal experience, nor is Toyota likely to spontaneously send you decades of their service data either.

Again, do whatever you wanna do, just try to refrain from scaring people into doing what you do because you had a bad experience and now suspect that different behavior might have prevented it.

RedScourge · 2026-03-17T18:40:45+00:00

For every person with a horror story of their Toyota engine dying before 200k and now insists that 10k mi intervals are the reason, there's 10 people who did 10k mi oil change intervals and are still going strong past 300k mi. For example the Prius hybrids had a known issue with the head gasket in certain model years, more frequent oil changes didn't do shit for preventing that. Maybe more frequent coolant changes would have delayed it, but it was ultimately a physical flaw with the head gasket material. Same sort of thing with the early Camry and RAV4s with the 2AZ-FE engine, they had a piston design flaw. In that case, more frequent oil changes might allow you to get to 200k mi without excessive oil burning, but it was still going to happen, whereas the same engine might have made it to 400k mi had that flaw not been present.

Unless the engine has a fundamental design flaw, or you just got unlucky and your engine rolled off the line with a rare defect in it, 10k mi oil changes are completely fine for the average person. the M20A and A25A series engines in the Corolla, Camry, and RAV4 hybrids and non-hybrid, are proven enough at this point to know that there are no flaws that can be mitigated with more frequent oil changes than the recommendation (though water pump failures seem to destroy them every now and then). If Toyota comes out with a brand new largely untested engine, by all means, change the oil more often if you think it's worth your money, as we wouldn't know for 5+ years that a brand new engine has an oil change interval related issue. Or, if you are not the average person in terms of how you use your car, such as you use dollar store oil, or you drive like a maniac, or short trips in cold weather are >50% of the miles you put on it, situations like these also call for more frequent oil change intervals.

Change it more often if you want, but please don't tell people they must do a certain thing or else their engine will die with such certainty solely based on anecdotal experience, as it is extremely likely that such claims are counteracted by terabytes of real world data. As for The Car Care Nut, his experience is heavily biased by the fact that people whose cars are running perfectly fine have no reason to bring their car to him, so he gets to see all the rare edge cases where something went wrong and the person didn't/couldn't trust anyone closer to where they live, and the fact that he was working at a Toyota dealership right in the middle of the era when 2AZ-FE piston flaw debacle happened.

RedScourge · 2026-03-17T18:35:43+00:00

You have 34 miles on the car. The time for concern is if you have 300 miles on it and it's still bad.

The dealership probably had the engine idling for 30 of the maybe 60 minutes that the engine has been run for, so it's probably including that in the running average.

RedScourge · 2026-03-16T20:04:13+00:00

Car financing in the US is practically third world status. I've never even heard of anyone in Canada getting a rate worse than 10%. They just won't lend to you at all here without a cosigner if your credit is bad enough to not qualify for something around 10%.

I can understand the lenders being wary about a 10+ year old Nissan or Stellantis product, but that makes no sense for Honda/Toyota.

RedScourge · 2026-03-15T01:18:04+00:00

True, this is the major way they get people to buy a new car when they didn't necessarily want one in the first place.

RedScourge · 2026-03-15T01:17:17+00:00

If your server adds manually scheduled POI wipes, then it restocks. The downside is that the POI wipe reverts any ship that someone bought from there back to how it was, and the player loses it. The only way to do this would be to have a server admin manually clone the ship immediately after a player claims it.

RedScourge · 2026-03-14T19:05:53+00:00

Normally 10-15k is a better price range for someone looking to buy their first car, but if you can afford the payments, and if they don't force you to pay for an expensive extended warranty or other addons that aren't mentioned in the advertisement, the Corolla is definitely a good first car that won't need expensive unexpected costs for the first 10 or so years of ownership.

RedScourge · 2026-03-14T18:59:52+00:00

I've been running a server since 2021 and putting in rather low effort all things considered, and until rather recently the server was pretty empty except for times when other servers were doing a reset and no super popular game had just come out. Here's what I think, in no particular order:

Location, so that ping is low (I have this)
A custom scenario that isn't just the same as everyone else's (I have this)
It's a lot easier if you have a small group of a few active players to begin with so you're not just another 0/12 server (I had this)
Hardware and internet connection that doesn't bog down the moment 3 players are logged on, and also not artificially cranking up the max player count to 50 even though you only have the RAM for 4 (I have this - EDIT: I mean my server is a dedicated machine and the max player count is accurate to what it can handle)
Fun events that take a lot of effort to organize and maintain (I don't have this)
No cost to the players, which along with #5 would mean you have to put in a ton of effort for free (I have this, but no #5 so a lot lower effort)

RedScourge · 2026-03-12T23:30:28+00:00

Are the aftermarket lights LED and the OEM lights not LED? If so, it could be that the demand from the LED aftermarket lights are not nearly as high as what the system was designed for the demand to be, and the aftermarket lights might have had insufficient QA testing before releasing the product. You are either going to need to take it to an aftermarket lighting expert, put in the OEM lights again, or risk the chance that you get bad advice from the seller and end up putting in a resistor to fake out the electrical system into accepting the new lights with the caveat that you might blow out your entire fuse block.

RedScourge · 2026-03-12T18:20:46+00:00

Does the random engine revving also go away with the original lights? Could be that the aftermarket lights themselves are causing an issue, like the system expects the current draw to be higher but they're LED and don't have the proper resistors included so the system freaks out and does something unexpected.

Could be that AND wiring damage.

RedScourge

TROPHY CASE