The latch switch on my 2007 Camry Hyrbid has gone all gooey in the hot Texas sun....

Anyone know if any replacement options exist, other than replacing the whole thing?

Haven't disassembled it yet. Anyone gone down this path?

Thanks!

Snedecor

 

well, my guess is, as it's on vertical panel, that some grease melted out of latch itself. Is there real need to replace it then, vs simply cleaning?

 

I'm sorry, I wasn't more clear. I thought everyone would know what I was talking about. The item in question is a rubber pad, about 1" x 3", located facing down on a horizontal surface of the trunk lid, just above the license plate. It covers a momentary contact switch. When you depress the switch, through this rubbery pad, the computer checks to see if there's a key in the vicinity. If there is, the automatic latch for the trunk is activated and the trunk opens. The rubber pad is "melting" and is soft and gooey.

 

snedecor, EVERYONE, including myself, knows that pad. I SERIOUSLY doubt it's melting though. Takes a little bit more than 120 degrees to melt rubber. You either have grease dripping down on it, or it's one of those rubbers that is oil sensitive and dissolves from oil, like some old tires used to. Or, it came in contact with a solvent or something else. By touch, it feels pretty much like what we call "silicone rubber" in my trade, and it's quite a resilient material.

let me ask you this. Touch sensors in door handles are covered with same material. It is dissolving too?

 

My '07 had the same problem. It was changed under warranty. The dealer said they had to replace the whole assembly as the rubber part itself was not available on its own. The cost with labor would have been about $300.

 

1) I didn't know if you knew about it or not, because it is not located on a vertical surface, as you first said.
2) There is no grease (or anything else) dripping down on it. The pad is above the license plate, and the latch mechanism is below the license plate. There is nothing located above the latch that has any oil or grease. I do not have oil or grease spraying onto it from the outside.
3) The touch sensors in the door handles are pristine. The materials are different.
4) This is happening all over the Toyota world. See:

http://www.google.com/search?q=toyot...ient=firefox-a

 

sorry. latch is on vertical surface, and it does have grease in it. should have explained myself better though. but that grease can easily soften and drip down on the horizontal cover surface from the inside.
I spent too much time today, as it's my drive Camry day, investigating that piece of rubber, on my car. snedecor, I am most respectful to your post and research, but I do work with foams and rubbers and resins daily. Rubber does not melt at temperatures as low as 120 degrees. It simply does not. Tires will melt if that was the case.
Natural rubber is a different story. But it's not used anywhere in automotive industry. Due to lack of elasticity and low resistance to temperatures.
But here's the thing. Rubber has 2 major enemies.
There are two main solvents for rubber: turpentine and naphtha (petroleum). The former has been in use since 1764 when François Fresnau made the discovery. Giovanni Fabbroni is credited with the discovery of naphtha as a rubber solvent in 1779. Because rubber does not dissolve easily, the material is finely divided by shredding prior to its immersion.
Also, like I said, "regular" rubbers are sensitive to machine oils, greases. I grew up taught never to park in an oily spot in a parking lot, as it will dissolve tires. Hence they came up with oil/gasoline resistant rubbers.
Unfortunately, oils and greases/gasoline are most common liquids around cars and households.
Now, let me also mention something that may sound offensive, yet, it is not. Human skin and perspiration are saturated in natural organic acids and oils. In my trade, we have all kinds of situations when otherwise bulletproof materials simply give due to a particular person's make up. I am not saying, your fingers dissolved that rubber. I am saying - we do have occasional situations like this in my professional field, and this is what it is, nothing personal to it.
There's something, somewhere on your car, or around it, that triggered deterioration process in that rubber. Yes, I understand that there are several end users that have this issue. Also, they are not numerous enough to say that Toyota is using substandard material as, comparing to the many and many hundreds of thousands of those latches sold, those meltdowns are probably more an oddity, than a rule.
Now, this is coming from a guy who *****es at Toyota all he could. But my 18 years of experience in the field where rubbers are daily item to use, with sometimes quite high temperatures applied, as we custom mold foams etc, I have never seen one melt even at 250 degrees. The melting point of rubber varies depending on the type of rubber in question. Vulcanized rubber has no melting point because it will decompose before it melts. Other rubbers will melt at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
What you experiencing, is more like a dissolving of rubber, not meltdown. Was higher than usual temperature a catalyst? Possibly. But then there has to be an agent that started the process. Did it melt from temperature? Most likely not.
This is what my response is about. Once again - all due respects, etc, etc.

 

I don't have that problem since it's not as hot here, so probably this issue is due to extreme heat. It feels like the rubber just covers metal or plastic handle. Now if it was me and the car was out of warranty I would either cut and clean the rubber out altogether, or glue piece of material on top of it, like piece of leather or something. Since the car has trunk release handle inside cabin and remote trunk opening on FOB, it shouldn't be a major problem, no?
I know some suntan lotions will totally destroy plastic of my sunglasses within weeks, could be some chemicals got from hands into rubber cover and worked it's magic or is it heat alone? I would think heat alone would make the same problem show up on every car owned South, I believe you're the first one bringing this issue on this forum, so could it be some chemicals like above mentioned suntan lotion?

 

Same thing happened to mine. It literally disintegrated around the edges and was hanging down so low you could see it drooping if you stood a few feet behind the car. I tried to get just that piece from the dealer but they would only sell me the entire latch assembly for about 80 or 90 bucks (don't remember). I've since just pull the remainder off and have had nothing over (or under if you want to be technical) the switch for a while. One day I may just replace the entire thing, but for now I'm leaving it as it is.

 

Can deterioration of silicone rubber result from cleaning? I'm thinking maybe it got sprayed with a vinyl cleaner/conditioner that contains some solvent that is incompatible with the particular rubber.

If the deterioration is caused by a cleaning product, and we can figure out what kind of product, then the rest of us might avoid the same problem.