Skidmarks lead up to the guard rail struck by the truck after the aftermarket hood popped up. Due to the limited visibility,
the technician who was test-driving the truck hit the guard rail while pulling over.
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The Certified Automotive Parts Association (CAPA) has decertified a non-OEM hood designed for the 1995-2000 Toyota Tacoma
after the secondary safety latch on one such hood failed during a shop test drive of a vehicle.
CAPA determined that the secondary safety catch on the hood was "sometimes improperly placed," not allowing it to extend sufficiently
into the latch to hold the hood securely.
The problem came to light in mid-March when a technician from a Toyota dealership was test-driving a repaired 1997 Tacoma
pickup after recharging the vehicle's air conditioning. It's unclear whether the primary hood latch, a new OEM part, was fully
engaged and failed, or if the hood had not been fully latched. But in either case, as the truck picked up speed, the secondary
latch failed, allowing the hood to open. No one sustained injuries as a result, but the truck hit a guard rail because of
the driver's limited visibility as he brought the vehicle to a stop.
Investigation by CAPA and the distributor found that the distance between the striker and the secondary hood latch was off
by about 1¼10th of an inch, enough to keep the latch from catching sufficiently to hold the hood.
Jack Gillis, executive director of CAPA, says his organization decertified the part (P/N JLH-13900), manufactured by Jui Li
Enterprise Co., within two weeks of the incident, and notified the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
Tacoma hood problems
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The hood was manufactured in January. Two other non-OEM parts manufacturers produce the hood using the same tooling, but Gillis
says checks of parts from these other manufacturers found no problems. The safety catch on the Jui Li hoods is a subcontracted
assembly, he says, and "the quality of that subcontracted part was inconsistent" resulting in the catch being "sometimes improperly
placed."
Gillis says after a part has been certified, CAPA continues to randomly pull three parts from between 70 percent and 80 percent
of certified part lots for quality checks. He says the Jui Li hoods for the Tacoma checked during these inspections "did not
evidence these problems." Two previous lots of the hood had been decertified: One in 1997 because of two missing weld points,
and one in late 1999 because of a complaint about poor fit and contour.
The investigation of the latest incident has been complicated somewhat by the lack of a CAPA seal on the hood that failed.
Each seal includes a unique number that allows the part to be tracked to the manufacturer.
The painter at the dealership shop reportedly removed the seal, a practice that shop generally follows but that CAPA advises
against.
"We know of no reason why a repair shop would have a need to remove the CAPA seal," says CAPA Program Manager Stephanie Ackerman."
Doing so would only eliminate the shop's ability to prove the use of a CAPA part or trace the part if necessary. If a repairer,
distributor, consumer or insurer removes a seal from a part, they are effectively voiding the certification of that part."
CAPA has maintained for years that if a part does not have a seal, the part should not be considered certified, regardless
of what is printed on electronic estimates, distributor catalogs or even CAPA listings.
And while CAPA agrees that the hood that failed is from a CAPA-certified lot, there is some question as to whether it ever
bore a CAPA seal. Gillis says one of the other Jui Li hoods for the Tacoma provided to CAPA by the part distributor did not
have a CAPA seal.
"We're in the process of trying to figure out why that part didn't have a seal," says Gillis. "We have a very rigid policy
that if a manufacturer has a part certified, they may only sell that part as CAPA certified. That's a very controversial policy
with the manufacturers. They would like to sell two versions of the part. We've just said no. Now it appears that the manufacturer
may not have put the seal on the part."
Gillis says too often a shop orders a CAPA certified part and doesn't confirm that's what the distributor delivers.
"You cannot assume that [will happen]," he says. "In fact, four out of five times you probably won't get a CAPA part. You
need to look to see if it's really certified and has the seal."
Gillis says he recognizes, however, that once the part arrives, returning it because it isn't certified can hurt the shop's
productivity.
"What we'd like to do is set up a mechanism so that if a part arrives and it's not the right part, then the shop should be
given license somehow to just go ahead and order the OEM part," he says. "That would hurt the distributor financially and
then he would say, 'Gee, maybe I better be more careful about delivering a CAPA part to this guy if he wants one.'"
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