Considering Tacoma to replace Tundra

I get 16 in my taco, and my dad gets 13 in his 18’ tundra that’s leveled with 33’s. I’d say the MPG loss is worth the extra room and power. I’ve been wanting to switch, but with the new ones so close and rumors of them boasting a TT 3.5L engine, I may hold out one more year as MPG’s should improve.

 

Your absolutely right I just thought I would ask as some of you on here have had personal experience with the situation and I fee that it is helpful to see what others have experienced

 

Unless you don’t have the extra room or need the power and the smaller size is more convenient for parking/storage, etc. That’s what I’m talking about. There is no right or wrong answer. It’s just individual need and situation that determines which one is the right fit.

 

Keep the Tundra. There are too many Tacomas on the road.

 

I was in the same situation a while ago. I had an 08 tundra crewmax limited. I owned it for eleven years. It was a nice truck with lots of room. I decided to down size to a Tacoma and have not looked back since. It fits in my garage along side my wife's car. It's a lot easier to drive around town. When I go fishing, its easier to drive on logging roads and the 4wd system is much better then my old Tundra. I do miss the room in my old Tundra, but pros of my Tacoma out weigh the cons.

 

I also enjoy the outdoors and the tundra is often a little big for some of the areas I like to access while hunting.

 

l voted for the Tundra. It's paid for and you know how it's been treated.
Unless it becomes a money pit. There's times that you can't beat a paid for vehicle.

 

BAD Mileage was my 93 F-250 with a 460 boat anchor engine. 6-8 mpg no matter what you towed or coasted down hill empty.

 

The latest news is winter 2021 for the next tundra. A 2022 model.

 

I had a Tundra for 2 years. It was too hard to park in my town. Gas mileage as been pointed out will not be much better in a Tacoma but face it Tacomas are way cooler looking than Any full size.

 

If I could afford a tundra and the gas, I’d own one and DD it for sure. If you can afford it, the Tundra is sweet and I personally prefer it.

 

Don’t do it man, keep the Tundra. I sure wish I did

 

I had a 2016 5.7 Crewmax for a little over a year then totaled it. I loved it but it was our only vehicle and was not practical as an only car (parking especially).
I love my new Tocoma as well but for comfort room and power it doesn't compare.
If you switch you will miss your Tundra, being practical has it's cost.

 

You answered all of your own questions in your opening post. Yer' bleedin' cash! Trade in the Tundra! Get the Taco that suits you best and stop the cash hemorrhaging!

 

You and I sound like we have pretty similar situations.

I have a 25 mile one way commute and a family of four. The Tacoma is my daily driver and our primary family hauler.

Just recently there was a weekend where I had to pass some parallel parking spots because my DCLB wouldn't fit and parking in a parking garage had about a quarter of my truck hanging out of the space. Generally I try to work around or avoid those type of situations. But sometimes you can't avoid it when you're going somewhere busy on a weekend night. So I've been wondering if I should give up the six foot bed or pickup trucks all together.

I think from what you describe, the Tacoma might suit your purposes. One of the main issues is that it's tight inside, so it would depend on the size of your family. It works for us for now. Not sure about later on.

The mileage you're getting with your Tundra isn't too far off from what I was getting with my Frontier. Where I was getting about 14 to 15 mpg for most of the time that I had it. Then when I got the further commute that had less congested driving, it would get into the 17 mpg gallon range. The Tacoma gets about 3 to 4 mpg better in equivalent driving. ie roughly 17 mpg when I stay close to home. About 19 to 21 when daily commuting.

The mileage difference wasn't a big factor for me at the time. Where I was considering going to a first gen Titan as well. The main thing against the Titan was that I wasn't sure what the real world mileage would be. You can use the Carmax fuel calculator to see what kind of difference it would make for you:
https://www.carmax.com/research/mpg-calculator

One thing people complain about the third gen Tacoma is that they put a car engine in a truck. I recently decided that this works better for me since 90% of the time I'm using it for commuting and it does everything I want it to during my commute. The shifting is kind of annoying at slow speeds but that's the main/only issue that comes to mind. It'll probably be unlikely that I'll ever need to tow anything and if I do it probably wouldn't work the Tacoma's engine.

There are a couple of things that I'm not crazy about the Tacoma as well, other than the size of the DCLB. I was actually looking at the Tundra for a little bit because from the reviews it sounds like it had a lot of things that I was looking for. But it's way too big for my purposes.

At the time I decided that there's nothing currently out there worth trading in the Tacoma for. I'll probably come to the same conclusion now with wondering if I should downsize and keep my Tacoma.

So you'll probably have to make the same decision on your own. Your Tundra isn't that old and you'll have to think about how much is the convenience and fuel savings worth it to you. Also you'll be losing a lot of space inside. If I had a choice I would get a daily driver as other posters mentioned but the difference would be that the truck would eventually become a beater and I'd get something kind of nice to daily drive in. Going in I knew that the DCLB would be kind of long and not sure how long the inside space would work for us. But I was also planning on eventually having it become a beater truck. With my previous truck that had a five foot bed, it wasn't worth considering keeping it around as a beater truck due to the times that the five foot bed didn't work for me.

 

I would stay with the Tundra. There is a difference in MPG and size/parking capabilities, but not that much that would be worth the swap IMO.

For good mpg and when I go somewhere busy, my wife's trusty 2004 Solara is excellent.

While waiting for paperwork when buying my Tacoma, I got into a Tundra they had on the floor. It was sweeet... Loved the roominess... still wondering if I should have gotten that instead...

I go off-road a lot, and yeah, you can't go same places with the Tundra, due to size. But then... I already don't go same places anymore that I was going when I had a 2-door JK, so no big deal... You adapt.

 

keep that spacious tundra!

 

Bump

 

In similar situation. Replacing a Ram laramie and want Toyota reliability. I actually prefer the ride/ handling of the smaller truck. The tundra just seems so dated I am leaning to the Tacoma. Would probably get the tundra if the new model was released. My family is getting older so no longer using the truck as the primary family hauler. Probably regret the decision later but if Tacoma's have good resale

 

I voted Tacoma, but only because I don't need a big behemoth. In fact, I've been thinking of getting a Camry or Lexus ES250 for getting (zipping) around. I would still keep the Taco until I can hand it down several years from now.

Problem is, I'd prob get killed due to the super maneuverability or thinking I can zip in & out out of traffic and I'd get squash lol!

Best of luck

Cheers