What have you done to your Tacoma today? 1st Gen Edition

I see no potential problem from disassembling and greasing them so go for it. I didn't bother with it since I figured I'd be able to address it without disassembling later if I needed to. Just make sure you definitely grease the shackle bushings.

Side note about the leafs, I'd suggest coating them with something. Fluid film maybe. Wish I had. Haven't even had them a year and they are already rusting. I do live in NJ though, and this Winter had a lot of ice. This means lots of brine used on the roads. Still. Just one Winter and they are rusting even though they come painted. Not sure if this is common or not.
You probably have much less to worry about though, since you are in CA.

 

What the hell is rust?

I don’t have to worry much about rust unless I’m driving on the surf of the Pacific - rust is pretty nonexistent down here. I do have some extra POR15 I used to repaint my front differential with that I got from an absolute rust bucket 4Runner at the junkyard. I looked up the 4Runner’s VIN and it spent some time in New York, hence the rusty frame and probably why it was in a junkyard. I had to sandblast the differential with Garnet to get all the rust off.

I would say the only rust on my frame is on the exhaust hangars. Same for the 5-lug which spent its whole life in Nevada and California. The frames are absolutely pristine.

I noticed when I was in D.C. for the innaguration, you don’t see any compact or mid-size pickups. I made a game of counting how many 1st gens I could spot during my time there and I only counted less than 15. Every truck is a full size Tundra or F150. Bigger and beefier trucks are a way of life out there, can’t imagine older trucks like the 1st gen Tacoma would last very long in a Winter/Brine setting.

Meanwhile in California, 1 out of every 5 pickup trucks is a 1st Gen Tacoma 5-lug.

 

I would do horrid things to the only rust on my truck be on my exhaust hangers. Jeez, that's unimaginable. Here I am hoping a new buddy of mine will weld on caps to cover the holes I have...Salt belt truly is suffering.

Yeah full-size trucks have run amuck here. They are all over the place. I do see a decent amount of newer Tacomas but not an overwhelming number of 1st gens. Same goes for Rangers, as a good example. Best selling compact truck ever and yet there aren't that many around here. I guess smaller trucks take less time to rust through, so bigger trucks are more popular lol

 

50$ R-O Paint job

 

Most of the squeaking noise on my dakars came from the front eye bushing rubbing on the mount...lots of us have swapped in the daystar greasables, but be sure to throw grease on the inside of the mounts and on the outside of the bushings...mine are the same as @Speedytech7 in that the squeak when wheeling but silent on the street. All dakars do this at least for first gens from what Ive found. We put them on @YotaGurlIAm truck and she has sqeaking too...its just what they do.

 

My allpro expos only squeak when im out frfroading. Not enough to bother me

 

Thats how we know we be flexin haha

 

I made the mistake of spraying my Dakars down with white lithium grease last week, few days later I went wheeling and they collected so much dirt the squeak was nuts. Never doing that again, lol.

For what it's worth, the white lithium grease did quiet them down really well but not worth all the dirt it attracts after a few days. A hose works much better.

 

Shine it up, tune up, clean interior, Clean highlights I’ll bet your get like 4K for it. As you know they Bay Area taco market is craaaazy

 

well not all grease is equal. if you used black moly then idk what to tell you though. What i use on all mine and none of them squeak anywhere from those parts. I have alcan leafs though.

lol wow that is bad, didn't even tape off the tail lights or windows..

 

Like this stuff? Lithium base w/ moly added. Used it yesterday on my OME install.

 

It kind of looks like something someone would do while on meth.

 

never used that brand but yes. Lithium base is important when doing poly bushings as oil based breaks down poly.

I usually just use the cheap stuff and been great for me.

 

Exactly what I bought yesterday. The guy had no idea what I was talking about when I asked for grease w/ Molybdenum in it. Stuff was cheap, lithium base w/ moly, and NLGI #2 spec.

 

Drove it home from training, 100 miles. Nothing major this week. Working outta town is killing me. Hotels and crap food get old...

 

Traveling for work sucks. I never understood why some people get so giddy about it. After day two I'm ready to go home.

 

@Blackdawg, I say "Lithium based". It says "NLGI #2 Grade LB Lithium 12-Hydroxystearate EP Grease", but then says "Base material - Base Oil" on the same data sheet. It looks like the Lithium is the "Thickener", which is making me think it actually is petroleum based.

Do I have to pull all of my bushings out now?!

Edit: Nevermind. My mind is at ease now after digging deep into this issue. See: https://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1920110

I get way too worked up sometimes.

 

hmm odd. On the stuff i use in the MSDS it has petroleum base stuff too but does say how much. Either way I think you're fine as its mostly Lithium anyways. I've never had issues just using the masterpro lithium ep grease which id wager is the same stuff.

 

Yeah. This stuff seems like it'll do the trick. I just need to stay on top of regular lubrication intervals. Now if I could get resolution on my axle relocation plate issue, I can call this project (almost) complete. Still need to do LCA bushings and inner/outer TREs.

 

I think it depends on what you do and who you work for. The company I work for sends people out of town all the time and you get paid a good deal more and they put you up in nice hotels with a big “food reimbursement” check.