DeMello's review of the 2016 Tacoma.

What Grille is that?

 

Agree, 14 stickies and counting.

Dear mods: Online forum rule #1, You shouldn't have to scroll halfway down the page just to see a non stickied thread.

 

They listened to you. Now that's customer service

 

Well, sorta kinda. They didn't really solve the issue of sticky-volume, they just found a way to hide them all.
This still shouldn't be a sticky. I appreciate that DeMello pays money to be on here, but this thread doesn't qualify as a sticky in any sense.

 

Actually I don't...lol But I do like to support the site and it's members in other ways.

DB custom grills, they make really nice ones!

Thanks. I don't know why it's a sticky? I was a little flattered but I don't think I was asked to make it one or not? I rarely scroll down the page so didn't know till everyone started complaining about it...haha. I just search key words and names in this forum to find what I'm looking for.

What other ones have you had? this is my 3rd Tacoma, 24th Toyota. I never actually owned, nor the shop a 2005-2015 but I've driven and worked on enough of them to tell you where ever nut and bolt is.

 

yes, they can come with a manual tranny. except for the Limited

 

The more wheel time we get in the Tacoma the more we wonder what the Hell was Toyota thinking? Just got back from FJ summit. The power on the road loaded down with bags and gears was as expected. Fairly poor and lack luster. Granted we are running 35's on this vehicle with out a re-gear yet (not available yet). But we've run this set up before on older toyota's and while there was loss it's no where near as bad as this one. We also had a few other 2016 Tacoma's there with 32's-33's and they expressed the same lack of power.

Now the one place that power loss or lack of lower gears can be somewhat over looked is the trail. You can always drop it into 4lo and the lack of power is less annoying in a pretty off road scenery. But we had the tacoma on trails all week and there were many times that not only ours but other 2016 Tacoma's in 4lo 1st gear litterly could barely climb a hill. Gas pedal mashed to the floor and there were a couple times we were afraid it wouldn't make it up. Not only that but several people with 2016 Tacoma's had oil lights come on while off camber followed by a little smoke in the tail pipe? WTF Toyota? did you forget people actually use your trucks. We haul, we off road them, we lift them, we use them like trucks. With out throwing some Toy Reps under the bus, I did have some conversations with them and they did say that I wasn't the first to complain and they are looking at options to fix it.

our friend that drove the truck most of the week described it as "the interior is the best apology for a shitty motor". I've driven a 22re off road with 35in tall tires and a 5speed that had more power than this new 3.5 engine. I certainly hope once the gears are done that this thing actually is tolerable.

 

Sounds like *someone* hasnt gotten the transmission TSB update.... JK... Although I haven't off roaded nearly as much as you have (not even a comparison), it's my perception that Toyota took a truck and made it more city friendly than off road friendly. The mere fact that the motor is Atkinson cycle should tip you off that Toyota wasn't aiming to make mini-Raptor. Your 35's don't help the case one bit, either. My 0.02.

 

They have tough confines to fit into with the cafe regulations. I was even told the 4runner may be canceled but they are waiting to see who is elected. A hilary presidency will result in more cafe restrictions and most likely that will lead to the canceling of the 4runner. I don't think they were trying to make it more city and less off road. With a "crawl mode" option and rear locker. They know that market is there. I think they were just trying to meet the cafe standards and did a lot of test on paper in very little real world test. The big tires don't help, but towing a trailer is well with in the "trucks realm of usability", I can't imagine this truck towing more than a jet ski. When I had my 1999 Tacoma I towed a small tent trailer all over the west coast to events. It actually did a good job of towing it.

I know the re-gear will help, I hope sprint booster comes out with one that works on the Tacoma soon. Once those two things are done, hopefully this thing will at least preform as good as a 3.4 engine

 

Agree to disagree I guess... my TRD OR drives very tamely around town (by design). I'm not saying they didn't have off-roading in mind or are turning a blind eye to the market. I'm simply saying that they've done a good job of keeping the normal every day driver in mind in addition to adding off road goodies at a certain price point. I hate to contest you on this since you seemingly have a lot of experience on this stuff, but as a product design engineer in my past, I can confidently say that it's not simple to achieve the balance that this vehicle has in it's OEM form while conforming to regulatory BS.

Also, personally I *really* don't want to talk politics on TacomaWorld as it's already a daily shit-show without the political and religious commentary. I gotta say though... statements like, 'Hillary will kill the 4Runner' takes the cake, my man. Happy wheeling.

 

You said multiple 2016s bogged down and barely made it up the hill...were any of them MTs? Or were they all AT?

 

This - I'm on t4r.org as well and saw Mr. Demello's post there and I have to wonder if any of the Tacos were manuals. I just got out of a 2010 4runner and into my 2016 6M/T Taco. The on-demand torque in my Taco is MUCH better than the dual VVTi 1GR-FE, obviously explained by the manual and "better" factory diff gear (4.30). Top end speed, however, seems like more of a struggle to reach, again a symptom of gearing. All of these engines make decent enough power, it's just a matter of getting there (sharper and deeper press of the skinny pedal on the autos, smooth input won't do it). A sprint booster will fix the throttle issue and give you a better SOP feel.

If one's baseline is the VVTi 2UZ in 4th gen 4Runners, disappointment will surely ensue. Even the 5th gen 4Runners are pigs with anything over 33s and armor until you re-gear. That said, there's still no excuse on struggling up a hill in 4low and in 1st and there's still no excuse for oil issues in off camber situations.

OA

 

Oh no please do contest it. I want to feel like I got a good truck too.. lol I'm strictly speaking from owning almost every motor and trans combo that Toyota has made in the past comparing to all those. Comparing to all those in relative-ness to use verses function. I just feel like Toyota dropped the ball on this one. Again I don't completely fault them, they have growing Cafe standards they have to meet. The ironic thing is these new engines get no better mileage than the previous generations "if" you use them as trucks or haulers as they are intended for.

I wasn't trying to make it political. That wasn't my opinion, that was a comment made from a Toyota guy who said they are simply waiting to find out who gets elected. The more regulations that are handed down to the car manufactures effects them and they have to base some decisions on those. I didn't mean it to slant one way or another, just repeating what i heard. So to correct that it's not "hilary will kill the 4runner" it's more of "regulation may kill the 4runner" but the general thinking is she will make more regulations.

 

None of the ones I heard about were stick shifts. I really wish we would have gotten a manual. Funny thing is around town here it actually wasn't that bad to me. Well till I drove the 2015 4runner with the new sprint booster and it's re-geared.

 

The camber related oil issues that are mentioned on here are concerning as hell. How much camber we talkin about? Curious to know more about this. Maybe DeMello can chime in....

I want to say that VVTi 2UZ you mention is a V8 platform that I think has been around for years in old school (mid/late 90's) Lexus LS and SC's. Could be wrong, but if it is I'm sure that thing is bulletproof. Would have been nice to have a turbo or supercharger option on these Gen3's

 

When the 2016 came out I compared the HP and Torq numbers the 2016 does make more HP than the 2005-2015 but both the HP and the torq come in at a significant higher RPM.

I actually like how the 3.5 on the street even with the big tires has a power band. It revs up nicely and it was really only the low end on the street that I was not liking. Which I assumed would be fixed once the lower gears were in . Then we loaded it full of gear and took it through the hills on a road trip.

I understand what Toyota did, they were trying to achieve better MPG numbers with a smaller displacement and fancy engine management. Which works fine if you drive it like a car and use it like a car. But rather you are loaded down with a several hundred pounds using it as a truck or several hundred pounds using it as a weekend warrior off road beast. The engine knowns no difference in the weight and the mileage suffers. Maybe cafe standards should be changed to include a 500-700 load in the vehicle when testing for mileage? If that were the case, I believe we'd see engines that produce more torq at lower RPMs and while empty would get 1-2 mpg worse mileage but when loaded would see less of a drop.

I'd love to find a equally equiped 2005-2015 Tacoma with 35's and no gears and run it through the same paces as the 2016 to see if I'm full of crap or if what we are seeing is true.

 

I took it in for the low fluid, I assumed they did the TSB for the computer update? Maybe I should take it back and ask for it?

 

Regarding contest, nope. Like I said, you probably have a lot more experience with Yota motors / trans than I do. I come from the Subaru world where arguably the majority of the car's dollar-attention is in the drivetrain It sounds like we are saying much the same thing, but approaching it from different ends. It's just that (maybe it's my ignorance here) I see your monster Tacoma damn near catching air with 35's and I just can't picture any generation Tacoma, even the old 4.0, being in the right powerband or gearing from factory for that kind of action. I don't have much experience with the old 4.0, and would love to be corrected if I'm missing something. And Cafe is a bitch, for sure, especially when you look at how they calculate fleet fuel economy using harmonic means... but that's a whole other conversation for a whole other thread.

Regarding regulations and Hillary's death grip, I totally understand what you're saying and agree with trends we're seeing. I just thought it was somewhat comical when I read it. I mean, I never thought I'd live to see an all aluminum, 4-Cylinder, Turbo F150, but lo and behold.... Wait, Toyota.... you reading this?

 

Exactly right - sorry, should have clarified, coming from the 4Runner world a late model 4th gen sport edition with the 2UZ V8 is God's truck to us. That said the engine itself was bullet proof but suffered from a pretty stupid secondary air injection pump design, which will inevitably fail and leave the user stuck with a permanent code or limp mode; 50/50 shot (work around is to prematurely bypass the system before it can fail on you). I guess the point is comparing to that V8 isn't a fair fight.

100% agree - though I've yet to see a "legit" dyno sheet, the peak numbers are way up there for the new engines and they have a very odd, bouncy curve - which annoys the hell out of me. In my opinion that atkinson cycle doesn't belong in trucks; leave it to the small displacement turbo or hybrid crowd. If you happen to have an opportunity to cruise around in a 2016 v6 6M/T definitely give it a shot, or if you're ever in VA, try mine. The 4.30 gears make a big difference (and are available from toyota for probably WAY too much coin). Though I follow you on IG, I can't remember if you have the TRDOR or the TRDSport; if you're in the Off Road the 4.30s are compatible.

OA

 

Absolutely. Got mine done today. Lots of positive reviews, but also lots of uninformed opinions on here (to be frank). Feels like a reset ECU to me, but I haven't driven it enough yet to have a valid opinion.