Turbo Maintenance & Longevity

For those of you who have never driven forced induction vehicles (let’s be real, that’s most of you) this video is a phenomenal starting point.

Maintenance, responsible driving, and leaving these trucks fucking stock is going to net you a long, rewarding relationship.

I would suggest to anyone who is looking at getting one of these to add a boost gauge, an oil temp gauge, and a turbo timer (keeps the engine running for a short time to allow for proper cool down after you get out of the vehicle and lock it).

Let the bickering commence!

 

Besides leaving it stock, only thing worth doing would be using a Euro spec oil with >3.6 HTHS.

Honda and Toyota don't really have stringent approvals for oil, so if you'd care to be extra careful use something like a Castrol 0w-30 European or M1 5w-30 ESP.

10,000mi intervals are totally fine with quality synthetics and oil filters, the US moved to 10ppm ULSG in 2020; with high sulphur being the culprit in souring oil of the past and inspiring the religious zealots of the 3/5/7.5k interval church.

 

tune it bigger turbo, downpipe maybe some cornhub mix gotta get it to 500+ horsies just to get groceries and run trash down the hill

 

A turbo timer? Is this the Buick GN forum?

 

Man I drove one of these for a few years. One of the great American muscle cars. Yamaha designed cylinder heads and intake system. GM engineers just couldn't get the heads right.

 

Classic GM move. The GNs were really a fantastic vehicle. I would love to find one and get it back to original shape.

 

They literally stopped making them because they were faster than Corvettes year after year.

 

Nobody needs a turbo timer on a modern water cooled turbo. The time you spend idling through a parking lot or driving down your residential street is far more than enough.

it’s not the fucking 80s anymore

 

Not only the turbo you have to worry about. I can see future posts now. Why is my electric power steering gone?? Installed 35’s a year ago…

 

Yeah because belt driven pumps never fail

 

The Tundra owner's manual shows a requirement to idle the engine for a minute after heavy use to avoid cooking the oil in the turbo: http://s3.amazonaws.com/toyota.site.p01/toyota/manuals/OM0C029U/OM0C029U.pdf

 

As someone already pointed out, the Tundra recommends idling for at least 1 minute prior to shutting the vehicle off.

1. These vehicles are creating a lot of boost at an extremely low RPM, which means they are creating heat quickly. This is why an an idle cool down is recommended.
2. After a long day of ‘wheelin, the turbo is going to be extremely hot. Most especially with high outside temps. This is where a turbo timer would be extremely beneficial.

Resale value on these new trucks is gonna be interesting.

 

And again, the amount of times you don’t idle or drive slowly for a minute prior to shutdown is virtually nil. Driving into your neighborhood or the parking lot of your destination is more than adequate. Maybe if you pull over at the top of an extremely long steep hill at highway speeds to pee you should leave it running

nobody wheels hard all day and immediately shuts down after a full boost run.

 

Anti stall on the MT should help prevent shut downs from clutch stalling.

 

The pump fails very rarely on 2nd/3rd gens. (Look through this forum, you'll have a hard time finding reports of failures.) Leakage at the rack is more common, but that means more frequent fluid top-ups, not outright failure.

The 4th gen tie rod has a thin-neck area that looks almost like an intentional "fuse" point to save the rack. I think water leakage into the 4th gen rack will probably be the biggest risk, if trails have deep water crossings in your region.

 

Pump is like 300 bucks lol.

Electric power steering assembly's are $$$$

Just had to do one in the girlfriends Jeep grand Cherokee. It was $5200 dollars. I almost shit my pants when they told us how much it was to repair.

 

Stop recommending a turbo timer. Not only is it not required on a water cooled turbo, it starts creating issues with modern security systems.

 

Turbo timer lol. Hello 1990s lol.

 

You thinking of the SHO? Pretty sure the heads and engine design were Buick.

 

The Tacoma turbo doesnt have a water cooled turbo with a separate turbo water pump? I have a BMW S55 engine and the turbo has a separate cooling system that when you turn off your car it runs automatically until the temps subside.