What type of Mods void warranty

[level76]

Hi all. I have 3 week old FJ with the 7 year extended warranty from Toyota. I was looking into getting an ARB bumper. Does that affect the coverage of my warranty? What other types of modifcations (i.e. lifts, suspension mods) would also affect my coverage?

Thanks in advance for your shared knowledge!

PS: If I there is a better thread that will answer my question, feel free to redirect me. My search attemps yielded few results.

[CO-Jeff]

Lots of threads on this, search, also really depends on your service department, mine is even going to warranty my gear upgrades as long as they do the installation.

[juniorbean]

By law, no dealer can deny a warranty claim unless they dealer can prove, without a doubt, that the aftermarket part actually CAUSED the problem. The law passed about this is called the Magnuson Moss Warranty Act, which protects consumers against dealers who deny warranty service due to aftermarket mods.

I sell aftermarket parts for certain cars from Acura, Nissan, and Infiniti, and in our 4 years of business, we haven't had a customer inform us of any issues. Granted we don't do the installs, we just sell and ship the parts, so that could be why.

Feel free to visit SEMA's page dedicated to this for more reading... Enjoy The Drive -- Your Car and The Law

However, in the end it comes down to your dealer like CO-Jeff said, so the best advice is to talk to the service manager and see what their opinion is on aftermarket mods. If they give you a hard time, find another dealer. If none of them are "mod" friendly, then you need to decide if you want to mod the car anyway, and bring up the Magnuson Moss Act when necessary.... but be advised you'll probably be fighting every warranty repair with your dealer...

[level76]

Thanks for the information. I will definitely read the SEMA page on this issue!

Thanks again.

[FJWALL]

realize that dealers will often try to make you prove the mod didnt cause the breakage. stand firm they will back down if you are right

[Rubicon]

I'm with Juniorbean, I used to install car stereo equipment and he beat me to the punch on the Magnuson Moss info.

FJwall: under the Magnuson Moss the burden of proof falls on the dealer to prove the mod caused the problem....not you.
That being said, you had better know something about the modification to defend yourself if the dealership comes up with a bogus excuse (like they are prone to do....)