Sludge smudges Toyota

Jeff Meckstroth's dispute with Toyota Motor Corp. might have ended quietly on March 1, 2001, when an arbitration panel unanimously agreed that Toyota was liable for the damage to the engine of his 2-year-old $37,000 Lexus RX300 sport utility vehicle.

Instead, it escalated. As the two Toyota representatives packed up their papers, they referred casually to other, similar cases they were handling. "Then we had our suspicions up that this isn't an unusual case, that Lexus knows about the problem, and has formed a response — just deny, deny, deny," said Meckstroth, a 47-year-old New Orleans stockbroker. "We decided to sue."

His case mushroomed into a class-action suit representing prior and current owners of nearly 4 million Toyota and Lexus vehicles that may have suffered engine damage due to thickening oil, or sludge. It can accumulate and deprive the engine of necessary lubrication. More at Detroit News