New Tacoma Engine Issues

If the battery is disconnected for whatever reason will the computer lose all of the "learning" described above? I'm asking because I plan to install a dual battery setup so will be disconnecting the battery. I only have 2K miles on my 2017 Tacoma but I have noticed that the truck seems to drive much better now that when I bought it.
So-------if disconnecting the battery does cause the computer to lose "learning" then I suppose I would need to buy a small device to keep power on the computer. If so, would this connect at the battery leads or just plug into the cigarette lighter?

 

It's because your transmission is most likely on 6th gear. Similar to when you make a turn from rolling and after the turn the truck feels like it's lugging, it's because it's on too high of gear instead of being 2-3, it's like on 4-5. That's Toyota's trans mapping.

 

I read on another form that yes 5 minutes thou lose it. I put mine in storage and when I come back I'll have to reconnect the battery and it'll "learn" my driving all over again. Can't help with the rest of your post but partial is better than none so far ?

 

Nooooooooo.

 

20k in 1982 is over 50k today. no thank you...

 

take it back to the dealer and have the t s b regarding the shifting problem done. that should fix it.

 

Unfortunately the combination of engine, transmission, and cruise control is not set up well for the interstate. If you drive the same section of road without cruise control it will probably only downshift once to maintain speed which is completely reasonable in a vehicle with a six speed transmission.

I love my tacoma until I have to drive anywhere on the freeway. Especially if the wind is blowing. I took a 230 mile trip the other day with a stress fracture in my foot forcing me to use cruise control. Probably shifted 200 times between 4 and 6th gear and spent half of the trip in 4th gear. It is an unfortunate characteristic of an otherwise pretty awesome truck.

 

I bought my 97 Tacoma extra cab 4x4 V6 with 5 speed LX for around $24K back in Fall 1996. I think it was near top of the line. No limited model, no TRD model offered by Toyota yet.

 

I had a friend that had an '05 SR5 that would do this when he was towing is boat down the highway at 65 - 75 mph. It would drop to a lower gear and sound like it was going to blow the crap up then shift back in a higher gear. Never like how it did that all the time.

 

That’s pretty normal. I know a lot of people on here complain about the constant shifting but that’s what transmissions do. You go up a hill it’s going to downshift. You go down a hill or cruise on flat road and it’s going to chill in 6th gear.

Everyone wants the truck to go up a 20% grade in 6th gear at 1800rpm but that’s not realistic.

 

That's equivalent to $38k in 2017 dollars. Guess what? That's what they cost today, but it's a much bigger, smoother, quieter, faster truck.

 

My friends Tacoma would do this on dead level highway no hill or decline at all. Only did this when towing that boat, if that makes any difference.

 

Shoulda got the extra pedal.

 

If it was only 20% grades it wouldn't be an issue. Simple stated it is a poor design which creates an uncomfortable driving experience. If Toyota intended the truck to drive that way, they must be smoking crack. Yes transmissions are supposed to shift but I have never owned or ridden in a vehicle that has the spastic shifting of a newer Tacoma at freeway speeds.

 

Interesting. I remember struggling to justify spending $24K on a truck back then. Man, I loved that truck, but it was really simple compared to the new one.

 

Our f250 at work will downshift on cruise to get up a hill. So will our diesel 3500HD. Sometimes more than one gear. If this bothers you, buy a manual.

 

That's interesting because my Tahoe doesn't shift on the same hills that the Tacoma will shift two gears on.

 

My truck smoothed out a bit at around 10k miles. It does shift aggressively, but somewhere along the way I decided f*** it and would just step on the pedal and accept the high rpms. Whether the fly by wire worked or some placebo, it feels smoother now. I won't pretend it's the greatest shifting truck but I never had much of an issue with it in the first place and almost never used the ect button.

OVTune would probably help you a lot. If I ever added new tires or more wait I would consider getting.

 

I followed that thread for the first few hundred pages. It seems like the tune helped more for around town performance than interstate travel. Then some reported that there was a degradation of performance over time with the transmission "learning" again.

 

I've got just over 10k miles on mine, and while it doesn't drive like my former F150 3.5 ecoboost, I am pleased with it. The shifting seems to have gotten better. Either I'm getting used to it or they did an ECU flash when I took it in for service. There are occasions in DFW where I'll hit the Extremely Cool Turbo button for heavy traffic and I have to drive defensively and offensively in rapid succession. 95% of the time I drive with the ECT off and have plenty of get up and go with minimal gear searching. The gas pedal is stiff and requires more effort than other vehicles I've had excluding my old '85 22R.