It does look like Toyota used beefier rear liftgate hinges on the Gen 6. They appear unlike anything I have seen so far in their lineup. The Gen 5 shared a similar design as a CC or Highlander, these look more solid.
The rear hybrid cable issue appears to (at least potentially) be resolved in Gen 6. In several of the videos during the part where the reviewer is showing off the inclusion of a temporary spare tire, you can see an orange hybrid cable below the tire, similar to the way the Corolla Cross Hybrid handles it's rear drive cable.
It's not a full confirmation of the issue being fixed but it's next next best thing until someone climbs under one and acknowledges it for sure.
I am also looking forward to all the 0w-08 oil threads and arguments in the near future. 🍿
As soon as Ahmed (The Care Care Nut) gets his hands on one, we can look forward to a comprehensive review. You can bet that he will focus on the rear drive motor cable, since that's been a worrisome issue for the Hybrid and Prime/PHEV for several years now.
For myself, the biggest turn-off with this new Rav is moving the HVAC controls to the touch screen. I've never seen any commentary from someone who actually likes having HVAC controls on a touch screen, on any of the cars where they do this. If so many people dislike this, why do the car manufacturers keep doing it? Easy answer: it saves a few bucks on the production cost of the car at the factory, same reason that ever more cars are being sold with no spare tire, or a compact spare instead of a full-size spare.
"I am also looking forward to all the 0w-08 oil threads and arguments in the near future."
Get yourself a Super-size box of popcorn for this sh*t show! People are still starting flame wars over 0W16 motor oil, so you can bet that there will be some truly epic, screaming battles over 0W8.
I still feel uncomfortable about these water-thin motor oils every time the summer season rolls around and I'm having to drive in 110°F heat. It's especially disconcerting, when you realize that the Rav4 doesn't have either coolant temp or oil pressure gauges on the dashboard like cars usually did when I first started driving 50 years ago. My pickup truck uses 15W40 (it's a '98 Dodge with a 5.9 liter Cummins diesel engine), and it simply seems wrong to be putting oil into an engine that's barely thicker than WD-40. It seems to me that there has been a lot of news lately about truck engines from several manufacturers suffering bearing failures: the Toyota Tundra's new twin turbo V6, and the Chevy/GM 6.7 liter V8 have both been plagued with crank bearing failures that have no specific cause that can be pointed to, other than vague statements regarding "possible machining debris". I think the problem is likely that these water-thin oils simply can't maintain a thick enough film on the main and rod bearing journals to prevent metal-to-metal contact, and once the babbit metal coating on the bearing shell starts to wear off, the problem just accelerates until a bearing seizes up and the engine throws a rod.
There is one easy work-around that I know of for the "no oil pressure gauge" issue in the Rav4's: buy a $40 VeePeak OBD-II bluetooth scan tool, and install the Car Scanner Pro app on your cell phone or tablet. The Rav4 Prime profile in the most recent version of Car Scanner includes PID's for oil pressure, and oil temperatures for both the engine and transaxle. The oil pressure will surprise you: when the ICE engine first starts up, the oil pressure will be 85 to 90 PSI for several seconds - I'm guessing this is to squirt oil all over the engine as quickly as possible - then the pressure will drop to 30 psi. But it doesn't stay there! If you start down a slight incline, and the load on the engine slacks off, the oil pressure will ease off, to as little as 15 psi, until the road flattens out and the engine speed picks back up. The first time I saw the oil pressure drop like this, I freaked out, but later saw a video on YouTube (from Ahmed the Cat Care Nut), explaining that this was normal behavior. Anyway, the engine oil pump does seem capable of maintaining 30 psi oil pressure even with the oil being very thin 0W16, I just hope it's enough to maintain proper clearance in the main and rod bearings. Of course, this is a car and not a pickup truck that might be hauling a huge heavy trailer, so the Rav4 engine isn't being subjected to the kind of torture that some pickup trucks get.
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