Empyre Off Road Grille

Just ordered a new grille for my '21 SR5. Anyone have experience with this brand? Looked like they were fairly legit. TSS sensor should work out great. I believe the lettering can be removed if you like (which I do), they also come in black. Smoked amber lights are a nice touch. Price was great and there was a 10% off code.

https://empyreoffroad.com/products/toyota-tacoma-honeycomb-grille?variant=39450036404312

 

Yet another good looking grill I can't use with my forward camera Raptor lights aren't for me but the grill looks good. Let us know how the install goes

 

So far I’m a fan. I’d like to see it when it’s on. If I bought one I would skip the over 80 lights and pull the letters. It looks to have the same profile as the Heritage grill, which is one thing I really like.

 

Looks awesome!

 

I'll probably start with the lettering and lights installed. But... I typically go for a "less is more" approach to things. So they may not stick around for long. I'll be sure to post pictures of the before, during, and after. Says it installs in 30mins, we'll see how accurate that is.

 

I bought the same grill in July. I chose the amber colored lights instead of smoked. No issues and great quality so far.

 

Pictures

 

Definitely not to my taste, but I don't see anything wrong with it physically.

 

Is the lettering removable? That was the only thing that wasn't really clear in their description. Looks great though! Last of my chrome will finally be gone with this upgrade.

 

Yes it's removable

 

Thats one huge TOYOTA emblem.

 

I have one of these for sale brand new without lights if anyone is interested.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/new-mesh-grille-w-tss-mount.753360/

 

I've had mine for about a year (no lighting) and no issues. Letters remove, but I seem to recall that there is pattern on the grill for attachment and it might not look great without them

 

If I had to buy again, I may just get the pro grill. At the time, I wanted something different than everyone else, but after a year of looking at all the different setups, I think the pro grill looks the best. Nothing wrong with this option and Empyre was great to work with. If I buy another grill, I would buy from them

 

Hoping that's not the case, because that would really make removing them pointless. For the price, I'll be happy with the lettering for now. Should have it before the weekend, but I'm not sure if I'll get it swapped out until later down the road. It's been 20 degrees outside and I don't really want to crack any frozen plastic if I can avoid it.

 

The only thing visible with the lettering removed are the tiny holes that they screw on through. The grill pattern is no different under the lettering.

 

Not going to derail with a bunch of pictures, but look at the X-Trek. It looks more toyota-like than the pro grille.

 

I ordered my TRD Pro grill, the lettering and raptor lights through Empyre less than a 2 months ago. I only issue I had was that they shipped USPS. Seems USPS has a habit of being late. The shipment was divided up into two packages. The first package, the lettering and lights, came within a week. The grill in the second package got lost. USPS doesn't like to update their tracking so for over 2 weeks it said "label created, not yet in system" or something like that. According to the FAQ's for Empyre, that means "If your tracking status says “Label Created, not yet in system,” that means that your package is no longer at our suppliers warehouse and has been dropped off at the shipping facility, but it has not yet scanned in to get the shipping process started."
When I sent Empyre an email, they responded real quick and another grill was sent by FedEx within a couple of hours.
Overall, I like the product I got from Empyre and they dealt with the shipping promptly.

Seriously, I hate the USPS. Rarely do I get anything on time when it's shipped through them.

 

That's how mine shipped as well, except it was 2 carriers. USPS for the lights and lettering, which showed up in a pretty normal period of time. And the grille came via DHL, which showed up two days later.

Lettering leaves a little to be desired. They didn't do the greatest job trimming the flash or the injection points from the mold. So I'll be going over all of those with a knife and cleaning them up. The lights and harness look to be really good quality. The grille itself seems pretty much standard for an injection molded part. They did however use a hot knife to "stake down" the cover for the TSS which needs to be swapped out. So I'll have to be careful getting that out without ruining anything.

It's still in the 30's and snowing here, and my fiancée has control of the garage. So it might be a few more weeks before I get to install this.... and my bumper covers.

 

Did the install last night. Couple things to note:

Had to do a decent amount of trimming on the letters as well as some flash on the grill itself.
The ground connector they send is garbage, replaced with a new one.
The connector for the main power lead to the "add a fuse" line is garbage as well, replaced by soldering and heat shrinking.
TSS cover isn't the greatest match to the grill patter, but it works.

Outside of that, it was easy to get the grill off the truck.
The clips holding the inner grill and chrome bezel in are a pain to get started, but go pretty good once you get a few loose.
I'm pretty happy with the finished product. I think it's a lot cleaner than the stock, and for the price it was a great deal.

BEFORE:


AFTER