Unlike a previous person who experienced this problem, I did not try to replace it myself. My hats off to that person. It looks pretty tight in there. The alternator that failed was the "extra duty" alternator that came with the Limited Edition. I simply had the local service station fix the problem. Toyota was quoting a very similar price to replace the alternator. I've not ever had an alternator fail in any of my other cars: one had 230,000 miles (1990 corolla) One had over 180,000 miles (Toyota Previa) and the last vehicle was a 1984 Ford Bronco II with about 170,000 miles. BTW........... I mentioned this to a coworker, whose spouse was a service manager for Toyota and when he heard that the car was 8 yrs old he said to his wife, :"the car is how old? wow that's really good (to have lasted that long)." A comment like that makes me worry. I wonder how may others have experienced this but have not complained.