Tundra stops on highway “Trailer break error”

Ugh, long day on vacation, driving across panhandle, towing travel trailer. Around noon , after 3 hours of steady towing, engine started sputtering, wasn’t taking gas very well, would only go up to about 1500 rpm, hung around 45mph for about 20 minutes, then wouldn’t go at all. Dead. When I stopped the car, finally showed “trailer break error”. This cleared after sitting off engine for 20 minutes. Found an RV park, dropped off RV, went to Toyota dealer, everything working fine. Clean Bill of health. Re-hitched RV, 100 miles later, problems started again, tundra keeps stalling… back to trailer break error, any ideas?

 

There was a tsb about it.

https://www.tundras.com/threads/trailer-disconnect-tsb-solved.44324/

 

My first thought too but the TSB didn’t have any connection to a “sputtering” or stalling engine.

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2019/MC-10159681-9999.pdf

 

Yeah, it sounds like something else.

When it happens again, pull off the road, disconnect the trailer and see if it immediately goes away. Sitting for 20 min shouldn’t do much unless you unhooked the battery to reset the ecu.

 

Did you have any other lights or messages while the engine was sputtering? Any transmission warning messages?

How heavy of a trailer were you pulling?

 

I never unhooked the battery. Strange the problem went away for an hour or two and came back, much worse.

 

6000 lbs dry. The screen behind the steering wheel showed “trailer break error” then “pre-collision system malfunction” rotating errors. The main display showed an error that contained a generic engine, throttle, or transmission problem, contact your Toyota dealer.

 

Ok - I don’t think it’s your trailer. The studdering and those messages might be pointing to the fuel pump. Knowing the exact codes from the computer should have told the dealer.

Was your truck included in the fuel pump recall?

https://www.toyota.com/recall

 

Looked up my vin and only showing something about halogen headlamps.

 

Ok - might not be recalled but it still smells like a fuel pump to me.

Do you have an OBD scanner? If not, one that wirelessly connects to your smartphone with an app like OBD Fusion (iOS) or Torque Pro (Android) is money well spent.

 

Nope. Can I pick that up at an autozone (or have Amazon link?)

 

You can get one at Autozone that is a scanner with a screen but many people here choose to go the smartphone route. Personally I use the Veepeak OBD BLE+ but there are lots on there. Search OBD on this site and you will see some good threads on the subject.

 

This is what I have for my vehicles.

Carista OBD2 Bluetooth Adapter...

$40 Carista OBD2 - Bluetooth OBD2 Scanner and App - Car Scanner Diagnostic Tool and Code Reader with Access to Diagnostics, Customizations, Service Tools, and Live Data

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00YVHGTBM?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

 

^^This. I had an MR2 once that did very similar things when the fuel pump died.