Sons first truck. With Avery special history to me.

I just recently bought a 1997 Toyota Tacoma 4X4 truck. It gonna be my sons first 4X4 truck. He’s 17 years old and a senior in high school. I’m very proud of him. Real smart and a great football player to me. Anyways the truck has more sentimental value to me than what I paid for it. It belonged to my neighbor who bought the truck new in 1997. I’ve lived beside this man since 1977. He was a Vietnam Veteran in the Marines. He was a diesel mechanic of some sort in the military. I was six years old when I met him and my father and he were raised together. They were good good friends also. Both he and my dad worked together for 40 years with Duke Power. In turn me and his son grew up together, played football, learned how to ride a bike together, water ski, hunted and fished together. We were and still are best friends, only thing is when we graduated he went to college at Clemson and I joined the Navy and headed to the Persian Gulf War to fight for my country. His dad and mine taught me so much in life I can’t even begin to tell you how much he influenced me growing up and shaping my life into who I am now. He was a machinist for Duke and my dad was a transmission linemen. My dad traveled a lot when I was a kid so my neighbor became somewhat of a father figure to me when my dad was gone. He always built things. We used to be running around or riding motorcycles all over the yard while he would be in his shop fabricating something. He was always welding or using a cutting torch or plasma cutter. This man would take the time to answer a million questions from me and his son about what he was doing. Lol.. Well when I got out of the Navy I got into industrial maintenance and had a job doing that for almost 15 years. And I took off in that field, then when the textile industry folded I became a Millwright and traveled a lot like my father did. Well when I got tired of traveling a friend of mine got me a job as a pipe fitter in a fabrication plant that builds giant modules. I’ve learned to weld and fabricate and have excelled at it. Went to top pay in no time. Even today I still get told all the time how good what I do looks and how fast an efficient I am. I work hard. A lot of people quit there job because of the way I work. They don’t want to work with someone who works like I do which I don’t care cause they call it work not recess. So where I’m going with this is he helped make me who I am today. He’s definitely responsible for my career choice and also helped me with advice along the way. 7 years ago his wife of over 50 years passed away with lung cancer. It nearly killed him. About 3 years ago he finally started coming out of what I call a depression and bam! He started dating a nice lady that lives near where his son lives in Anderson county SC. The man I remember growing up was back. And I was so happy to see him getting active again. Then in November of 2019 his son and daughter walked over to the house and told us that he had gotten sick while visiting his lady friend and was put in the hospital the week before. We weren’t home that week we had gone shrimping in Edistoe SC. when all this happened. But they told us he was at home now and that they had some bad news. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and only had about 6 weeks to live. He died two weeks later. I never got to see him and tell him thanks for everything. And that really hurt. Me and his son , my best friend have spent the last year going through and sorting his stuff trying to figure out what to do with it all. We got it done and during the process I bought a pontoon boat and a Toyota truck for my son, which is the truck I’m giving to my son for his birthday in April. But it’s got some issues. Nothing major. It will run and actually it runs great because it’s been sitting for about 5 years out on the land he owned in a barn. I changed the oil, antifreeze and plugs and plug wires and threw a new battery in it and I’m not kidding that thing didn’t turn over a half turn and started up. Purred like a kitten. The a/c even worked. I was shocked. My buddy said he thought his dad had replaced the clutch, pressure plate and throw out bearings and slave cylinder. He said he thought all it needed was to bleed the clutch. We jumped in my truck and went to where I have it and he said if that’s all it was he could do it. Well he tried and couldn’t get it but y’all he wasn’t down there more than 2 minutes and said he couldn’t do it. Said it had to be the throw out bearing. Something inside me thinks he didn’t do it right. The clutch doesn’t feel weird as in abnormally hard or soft to push in and I can’t hear no noise like a throw out bearing. My question is what would you do next. I need to get this done so I can take it and have a camouflage wrap and some light bars and new tires on it and have the rest of the truck serviced such as brakes and all. Need some good advice on what I should do next. Please. I’m gonna do it my self along with my son but he’s gonna think he’s helping me but in reality he’s getting a lesson in life that nothing comes to you for free and the truck he’s working on is his. Please please help a man out. This truck will be back on the road soon, as god as my witness. It will rock and roll once again Thank you in advance for any help given.

 

Welcome to TacomaWorld
Slave cylinders are tricky to bleed.
Try pressure bleeding and check pedal adjustment.

 

Welcome to TW

 

Welcome! Check out some of these threads for clutch bleeding
https://www.tacomaworld.com/search/13198637/?q=Clutch+bleed&t=post&o=date&c[title_only]=1&c[node]=4

 

Welcome to TW!

 

Thanks for the welcome everyone. I can already see that this is where I need to be during this next project. You guys have already been a big help. The diagram of the pedal with the heights and all has already told me something that I had expected. Everyone that I know and work with keep telling me that I shouldn’t have any problems doing the job due to my work background. It’s heavy on the Mill Wright side and I’m a very determined person they sad. Lol. Never seen nothing I couldn’t move. But I also know that I don’t have the automobile back ground and I have friends that own shops in town that can blow your mind at how good they are but they understand I want to do this with my son so I’m gonna go ale a swing at this one instead of paying someone to do it. Thanks again and appreciate the diagram of the pedal assembly and the link on bleeding the slave cylinder. I’ll be talking with you guys a lot probably over next few weeks. Lol... No I’m not slow I’m just working 6 and 7 days a week right now 10 to 12 hours a day. Got goals so have to turn and burn for awhile. But I’m gonna be tearing it down and ordering parts, oh joy... Again thanks.

 

Welcome!

 

Welcome to the forum.