Large cracks in transmission crossmember

Six year old thread revival time!

I am pleased to announce my membership in the elite ranks of the cracked crossmember club, with my '05 access cab 4x4 auto.



I have to thank @glorifiedwelder for bringing this to my attention when he was doing some other work on my truck last month, and I have been meaning to take it back to him to have it welded professionally. But with the whole pandemic/lockdown underway, and me wasting hour upon hour scouring these forums trying to stave off the growing waves of existential dread ... I am starting to wonder if getting the updated (2009+) part is the best way to go. It looks like a much better design.

Can anyone confirm that the following part is correct? 51203-04050

That is what I am finding as the closest-looking crossmember part for a 2009 tacoma frame:



But it's hard to tell, because apparently Toyota hired Salvador Dalí to draw their frame diagram:



I just went and double checked my truck, and no, my receiver hitch is not levitating in a rectangle above the front of a disjointed frame. In fact, my whole frame is assembled in what appears to be a very specific way. This makes it hard to know for sure which part is what in the Toyota fantasy land drawings. I am 98% sure, but if anybody could confirm this part number, that would be much appreciated!

 

Toyota Parts Dept. should be able to verify the correct part number with the last 8 numbers of your VIN.

Since you are hard enough to tweak your crossmember, you should inspect your rear most body mounts at the cab. My cab has cracks at each mount driver and passenger sides


And double cab problems that you shouldn'thave to worry about, both rear passenger and driver side door jambs ...

 

En cuanto al soporte de la transmisión, yo también tenia ese problema, pero lo mande reforzar y quedo muy bien.

En cuanto a la cabina es solo dobles cabinas ???? o también cabinas sencillas ????

Hoy reviso esos puntos en mi camioneta

 

¿Cómo reforzaste el travesaño? ¿Puedes publicar una foto?

Las grietas en la jamba de la puerta solo se ven en las cabinas dobles.

 

As for the transmission support, I also had that problem, but I sent it to be reinforced and it was very good.

As for the cabin is only double cabins ???? or also simple cabins ????

Today I check those points in my truck








Community

 

[QUOTE = "MonkeyProof, post: 23216775, miembro: 9774"] ¿Cómo reforzaste el travesaño? ¿Puedes publicar una foto?

Las grietas en la jamba de la puerta solo se ven en las cabinas dobles. [/ QUOTE]

El Sábado tengo que cambiar las crucetas de la barra cardan y le tomo fotos al travesaño, de hecho solo rellene las grietas y puse un hilo extra de soldadura en el ensamble del travesaño

saludos

 

The Toyota parts department says the frame crossmember for my truck has been discontinued... presumably because they fixed it with the newer 2009 design. I think I'm going to try my luck with the part I mentioned above.

Thanks for the suggestion regarding the cab weakpoints. I will keep an eye on those areas. So far the truck has mostly resisted tearing itself apart, but I am running a huge Northstar battery in the stock location, and I drive like an idiot, so it's probably only a matter of time...

 

You should probably consider in relocating the battery. All this started with the huge 31M battery that I had stuffed in there for a few years. Finaly gave up the ghost about a month ago when I was doing The Mojave Road, which is what you see here..


Also, my secondary battery located on the passenger side is starting to fail as well..

 

Interesting thread. And yes, I just peeked under my truck. No issues. Mine looks fairly pristine. The OP pics; kudos to hard driving that rig! The wrapped around metal looks to be a result of hitting hard stuff on the trail. Mine are straight and if I needed to take the member out, it looks straight forward.

I wheel mine on hunting trips. No airborne stuff.

 

Agreed, I would love to relocate the battery, but there is really no good place to move it to. Both wheel wells are already crammed with stuff, I don't have a double cab so I can't put it behind a seatback, I don't want it in the bed, and I've already eaten up all the space under my bed and behind the bedsides. The only place I can really put a battery would be where the windshield fluid and power steering reservoir are located... And I'm pretty sure that side is just as weak!

I think I'll try to devise a bracket to reinforce the battery tray in the OEM location someday... hopefully before it starts cracking. My plan would be to somehow support the battery directly from the frame, and just let the rest of the bodywork bounce around it. I can't believe how weak the front of these trucks are, my headlights are breaking because they're smashing into my bumper on every pothole.

Oh, and good work on driving the hell out of your truck. We are all impressed.

 

That's exactly where my secondary battery is located. I relocated the power steering reservoir, the bracket aligned up perfectly to preexisting holes and no fab was needed..

 

#4 bud.

That's probably one of the more comical things I've read today, about 95% of the parts dudes working the counter at Toyota or any dealer for that matter are morons who order your parts wrong making you wait even longer than you needed to in the first place. They are basically glorified catalog order placers. It's usually just better to check the diagram for them since they just about always get it wrong.

Not to rustle any jimmies and definitely not insulting the dudes who know what they are doing. Props to them actually.

Definitely #4 bud.

Jesus! Makes my core support issues look like child's play.

Put it under on the frame like I did.



Here's a better shot with an at the time smaller battery. The only drawback to doing this is is that unless you want to be under there often you need to use a QUALITY AGM like Odyssey or Northstar. I've heard some good things about the Deka Intimidator series (and that's what I ran for a little bit before I switched to my Odyssey which I still have not replaced to this day) as well so the options are pretty good for what it is.

 

I like that setup, good to know the P/S can be moved so easily. I've been eyeing that space for a bigger air compressor, maybe a Puma. Right now I've got a Vair 88P mounted on the wheel well, and it works great for what it is, but it is pretty slow for airing up even 285s. If I can figure out how to get rid of the washer fluid tank too, that would give me so much more space for activities.



Definitely no way to fit a 27F on top of either wheel well, nearer the firewall, where there might be better support.

Also, you can see one of my shitty fiberglass repairs to the drivers side headlight... the plastic keeps breaking on these because of how much the front bodywork bounces around. I'm taking this as a hint that I need to do something about that 70 pound battery I installed last year.

Thanks! I pulled the trigger and ordered the #4. I also ordered a set of the DMZ engine mount reinforcements -- too much time spent on this forum has got me paranoid about breaking those too!

That is a super nice install, what did you use for the battery tray? Sorry, I tried to find it in your build thread but if it's there I missed it.

I don't recognize that location exactly... but based on the exhaust heat shield, I'm assuming that's under the bed on the passenger side?



I think my bodywork is different with the access cab, but either way, there's no room down there because I recently installed a water tank taking up every bit of space between the frame and the driveshaft, from cab to axle, opposite the fuel tank. But maybe I could find somewhere else to hide a battery, like maybe a bed cubby delete... hmmm...

Do you have problems when you dunk the battery on water crossings?

 

The battery tray I used is linked here, it did require some additional reinforcement as I was not comfortable with the bottom of it being as thin as it was. Has held up to all my BS since install, though I have admittedly not wheeled it hard for a long time.

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/aaf-all76100

As for water crossings and dunking the battery, it's an AGM.. I don't use my truck as a submarine but I have the utmost confidence in knowing that it will not get funky on me if it does get dunked. The breaker I use is an auto resetting Marine 200A breaker. I really do wish that it was not auto resetting though and gave me the option to manually disconnect it. I have some revisions I am going to do to it eventually like moving the positive block downard on the side of the battery for easier access and changing the breaker to a manual engagement style one which trips and stays tripped if a short occurs instead of attempting to automatically reset itself over and over.

It's been a solid setup, but there is a little bit of room to improve which I will eventually implement whenever I get a handle on some of my other needed repairs like the alternator and AC compressor, but it's never give me issues so that tells me that the work which was done on it was solid.

If you have no extra spaceyou could definitely always investigate a cubby pocket delete of some sort but the bracket to bring it all the way up there would probably be very funky looking for sure.

 

[QUOTE = "Renteria05, post: 23217880, miembro: 325570"] [QUOTE = "MonkeyProof, post: 23216775, miembro: 9774"] ¿Cómo reforzaste el travesaño? ¿Puedes publicar una foto?

Las grietas en la jamba de la puerta solo se ven en las cabinas dobles. [/ CITA]

El sábado tengo que cambiar las crucetas de la barra cardan y le tomo fotos al travesaño, de hecho solo rellene las grietas y puse un hilo extra de soldadura en el ensamble del travesaño

saludos [/ CITA]


Hola, buen dia

Te mando fotos de como reforcé el travesaño. Espero te sean utiles

saludos

 

¡Me parece bien!

 

Follow up: Part #51203-04050 was indeed the updated cross member, and it fit my '05 just fine.



Well, it took a bottle jack and a pry bar, and a lot of swearing, because I wasn't thinking clearly and forced it in the wrong way at first.



See what I did wrong there? Don't do that.

Oh well, I figured it out in the end.

 

It is rather interesting how brittle the fender metal is.

 

I'll add to the 2005+ cracked Tacoma crossmember. Came across the splits, while underneath the truck that I am working on...