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Well the long wait has finally provided some fruit. I purchased my Tacoma DC short bed a few months ago and have been patiently, or perhaps impatiently, waiting for Toyota to get the parts, super charger, into their system. TRD completed all the approval processes for the emissions back in November and had started shipping the parts out. However, the dealers could not access the inventory until early January under a limited release program. Well… anyway I was able to get the dealer to order me the supercharger and fit kit for the 2009 model. The 2009 is different than the previous years as they moved some of the components around such as the intercooler pumps, etc. and in doing so it would seem that they had to have a new emissions map created and approved, thus the long wait.
The parts arrived to the dealer last week and I scheduled an appointment this week for the install. The service rep said that the install would take two days, which I could not believe, but what was I to do or argue against. I think it took two days because the tech did not start on it till mid day and it’s a full day install for an experienced tech.
Day 1 - After day one I drove to the dealer to see how it was looking. Thinking back I should have snapped a photo of the parts all over the place and manifold removed. To say the least, the tech had removed a lot of the top parts under the hood. The tech was diligently reading the install manual when I arrived so I did not want to distract him too much. Was not sure how many times he had done SC installs before but it was concerning me. Disappointed with the amount of work that I could see being completed for the day I left with anticipation of a great day tomorrow when it was all installed.
Day 2 – I returned to the dealer with a ride from a friend so that, with the install complete, I could pick up the truck. I gave it a quick look under the hood to check out the work and look for anything of concern. The new equipment looked really nice, the only thing that was a distraction was the fact that he made what use to be a very clean engine compartment, somewhat nasty with water spots and coolant all over the place. UGG! The truck only has 2000 miles on it. Come on man… keep it clean. Oh well I will have to spend some time on the weekend cleaning up his mess.
The new system requests the use of premium fuel vs. the regular as the truck started with. I knew about this before hand so on my last tank of unleaded regular I drained it down as much as possible before refueling with super.
With the system reading from fuel to engine I was ready for some test runs… Well to say the least the city streets make it more challenging for a fuel open throttle run up with speed limits littered throughout the city ranging from 35 – 55. The other challenge was not having other cars in front of me so that I had full open-street with which to "punch it". Eventually I found myself in the ideal street situation, strait and empty. The first run was 0-40 and it was quick. I tried to time it but it was too much to time and drive at the same time so I will have to follow up on that later. I managed to get quite a few small runs in ranging from 0 – 60 on the local streets.
The next morning I was able to get some freeway time and managed to get a 0 – 80. WOW! Ok the little runs were cool, but the full 0 – 80, OH YEA!!!!
The system was quick and the acceleration was fast. I will for sure need to have someone run with me and time it out.
Some things that I noticed about the overall system and experience were the following:
1. The automatic transmission is not the best for this type of application as sometime if I had any forward movement it would shift into 2nd gear which made punching it, down shift and go back to 1st. Once that happened it was a launch of power. In a manual you would still be in 1st and launch would be immediate.
2. The super charger whine. The documentation that came with the super charger describes the whine of the system as a normal function and not a mechanical issue. The whine is described as the systems blower component or otherwise described as the system that compresses the air prior to injection into the manifold system. The whine is not noticeable during normal passive driving and only manifests itself when higher engine demand is requested with more pedal pressed. IF you drive passively you may never actually use the power of the SC its only when you push the pedal down more does it kick it up several notches.
3. Gas mileage – I have no idea what all will happen with the gas mileage and super charger combo as my first few tanks of gas are set to burn at what ever rate the system will give me the most power possible. I plan on stepping on it as much as possible over the next few tanks, after all isn’t that what a super charger is for anyway, hauling a!
I'll follow up with some install pics for everyone and some gas mileage updates as the tanks burn through the system. In general the stock DC v6 provided just under 20 mpg under normal conditions for me which included city and hiway driving.
So to sum up this article, which ended up being much longer than I thought it would, the 2009 Tacoma super charger system is outstanding! The power is awesome and the system was well worth the wait.
Some descriptions on the photos
1st one shows an nice overall close up of the supercharger and its intake system along with belt layout
2nd photo shows one of the added radiators for intercooler fluid and some misc tubing
3rd is a shot of the actual intercooler and the tubes that are going to the radiator located in 2nd photo
4th is a misc shot of a part of the intercooler. Not sure what it all does...
5th is a misc shot of some of the wiring just below the SC on the right side of the motor
enjoy!
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