vF Tuner for the 3.5L Tacoma

I need hills! Not flat land!

 

LR fun is tasty.

 

This is all just convincing me that the Tacoma should be MT only

 

MT Like!

 

We already knew that the AT is hot garbage

 

For real.

 

I made the mistake of thinking I wanted a DCLB more than I wanted a manual.

But I’ve got my AT shifting pretty damn good at this point. Once you accept this engine is worthless below about 1600 rpm the thing runs a lot better.

and I got 23mpg on the ride into work this morning running 65mph without ever touching 6th gear. So there is no mpg cost to doing this as far as I’m concerned.

 

I made this mistake of being impatient when I bought my 2016 lol and assuming that my 2005 was solid so the 2016 had to be better (which it was minus the constant shifting and no low end power)

Still blown away by how much differently the AT and MT drive in this truck. It was eye opening how much difference gearing makes and that that 3.5 actually is a pretty good motor.

 

I 100% agree, but the longer this all goes on, I start to lay significant blame on the stupid diff gear choice that leads to just epically dumb overall gearing. The ATs should have been 4.88s from the factory, minimally.

 

Yea I assumed since my brothers second gen was solid that my brand new third gen would be better. That aged well.

Gearing would definitely help.

The constant shifting and no low end power can be solved by just running 500-1000 higher rpms than toyota programmed.

 

This says it all:


Until Toyota COMPLETELY overhauls their transmission, I will not be looking to buy another. I'll stick with what I built.

 

2015 running 50mph in 5th gear: 1474 rpm
2016 running 50mph in 6th gear: 1245 rpm
2016 running 50mph in 5th gear: 1481 rpm

The solution is simple.

 

I think the KDM6 is taking care of this on my stock AT. It doesn’t even think about 6th gear until the speed is at least 57-60mph. 5th will kick in between 45-55mph. I must admit that I didn’t pay any attention to rpms at the time, just requested the upshifting to occur at higher speeds and it appears to have worked out well. Virtually no chance of it sneaking into 6 driving around town.

 

Those speeds sound pretty good in my experience. I've got my 6th gear min speed set at 70.

 

Around these parts we rarely get going 70+, so the 60+ upshift is good.

 

My mild and wild tunes run like that, and everyone bitched about how it held gear too long. Turns out it works rather well. Holds 4th longer than "normal" as well. No need to upshift and dog around when you still get good mpg and are right in the powerband. Oh well, at least people get it now.

 

I was one of those guys. Good learning experience. Still trying to regear my brain.