What have you done to your Tacoma today? 1st Gen Edition

Have you tried inclining the front?

 

Yeah, the truck was parked on a hill with the front elevated while idling. The short drive was also up and down a very steep road.

 

Make that 26.

Outside of a handful of manageable design flaws this has been a remarkable, very reliable truck.
Over all a nice reflection on Toyota.

 

Picked up this 1st gen about a month ago, so far have done balljoints, tie rods, belts, all fluids, new rear driveline, new headlights and taillights, brakes, clutch master and slave, and a soft topper

 

After header install (LC Engineering...done with encouragement from Tacoma World) I had noticed exhaust fumes in Cab. I took truck in to local shop here in North Texas (Goodes Automotive) and they said header install looked good but they noticed the gasket around one of the A/C lines was loose and suggested I get some silicone spray and then push it into place. They probably spent 15-20 minutes with me and would not take any dollars. Now hopeful that the cab smells better but have not tested it yet.

 

Let us know if that resolved the issue. Would like to get my headers in at some point.

 

You guys think I can pull this empty 20’ x 8’ steel flat bed trailer with my 04 V6? Not totally sure how much this thing actually weighs.

 

That looks quite heavy, but I doubt it is over 5000lbs unloaded so probably

 

Did you have the heater on full tilt during this process?

Yeah be fine. Don't expect to go 65+mph with it. But should pull it empty. If you have an auto transmission watch your temps on hills

 

Heat blend set all the way hot, and I switched it to cold and back a few times along the way in hopes of shaking things up.

Fan was on low-med but I don't think that matters?

 

Fan doesn't matter, usually just getting it hot and giving it a good romp works things loose, waterpump on 5vz spins slow AF at idle, needs to be over 2500rpm to move any real volume of coolant.

 

Over 2500rpm might be the missing piece. I gave it some gas--probably touched 3-4k briefly while driving--but never really gave it the full onion.

 

Is the blend door actuator actually moving when moving the temp knob?

 

Yeah I'd confrim the mix valve in the engine bay is moving. Its up against the fire wall on the passenger side towards the middle.

 

Pulled it with ease. Probably in the 2,000 -3,000 lb range. Using this thing as a bridge to clear a creek on our property.

 

I didn't look myself, but my second set of eyes verified that they saw movement of the valve on the firewall when I sat in the car and wiggled the knob. I could also hear a "thunk" from the passenger footwell, indicating that the blend door is moving. This is a 1998 4Runner, so the controls are all cable-actuated.

Update after another night working on the truck:

We got a third (really fourth at this point) set of eyes, a set with more experience this time. Things went as follows:

We found that the engine had sucked up a bunch of water as it cooled from last night. This seemed promising. We topped off the radiator and coolant reservoir, started it up, and gave it some thorough revs. The temp gauge climbed towards hot, still no heat in the cabin. The coolant didn't appear to be circulating at all--the upper hose and top of the radiator were hot but the body of the radiator and the lower hose were cold.

Keep in mind that everything worked fine prior to draining the coolant--this was supposed to be a preventative coolant flush and thermostat replacement. We had a new thermostat from the local Toyota dealer. We had the same symptoms (overheating, no heat in cabin) with both thermostats. We've boiled both thermostats to verify that they open. Both thermostats appear to be functioning correctly.

We had seen some bubbles in the overflow and weren't sure if they were exhaust gasses or just steam (we're still running plain water, not coolant). We got a head gasket tester. The blue fluid should turn yellow if the head gasket is leaking. The fluid stays blue. Doesn't appear to be a head gasket issue.

We disconnected the upper radiator hose and started the engine, thinking that water should pour as long as the system is circulating. We get steam but no water. Maybe the water pump has failed?

We dismantle the old thermostat and reinstall it (keeping the outer ring/gasket but removing the spring and valve, effectively making a permanently open thermostat) and refill with coolant. Now we can clearly see coolant circulating in the radiator and we get heat almost immediately in the cabin. After replacing the radiator cap, the truck drove fine for 5+ minutes without overheating (of course, the truck never reached operating temperature without the thermostat).

So the truck is running and driving but we'll need to go back in and install a thermostat again. We still don't know what the problem was, and are worried that we haven't actually solved it. The possibilities I see are...

1) We just had really, really bad luck with stubborn air pockets.
2) The previously-working thermostat and the new thermostat both malfunctioned. This seems highly unlikely (especially since they both passed the boiling test on the stove)
3) We repeatedly installed the thermostats incorrectly. This would be the most convenient explanation, but I'm not sure what we could have done wrong--we were referencing the FSM, jiggle valve down, spring facing in to the engine block.
4) The water pump is functioning enough to move coolant through an open circuit but too weak to work when a thermostat is installed. I'm not sure if this is even possible.
5) Something about running pure water caused the system to malfunction and putting coolant back in got things working again.
6) Something we're completely missing that's hopefully obvious to someone else.

The owner of the truck is leaving town for the weekend, so it'll be a few days before we work on it again.

 

Dude awesome truck. Is your truck lifted or is it stock height? Stock sized tires too? The stance looks nice..

 

Yes, LCE Header seems to work fine. The issue with fumes in cab was solved by adjusting the boot around the A/C line (made easy with silicone spray.) I had paid roughly $1000.00 for each of two exhaust manifold replacements (one at least was aftermarket) and that was only over about 5K of driving. Shop (in Washington State) that did 2nd replacement told me they would put a header on it and then said it was not available and installed the aftermarket cast iron manifold and claimed they had good results from the company. I then moved out of state (2000 mile drive) and only a little driving since then and discovered the manifold cracked. That mechanic had treated me well previously so don't want to throw him under the bus. My truck has 177K on it (2.7 engine, 5 spd, 4x4 from 2000.)

Others have put up charts on performance gains. It does seem to be running well but my reason for replacing manifold with header was due to repeated manifold crack. My truck is mostly stock (mechanic says it looks like stock exhaust from Cat back ...cat was replaced (with OE) several years back along with head gasket and 1st manifold replacement.) So header cost around $650 with new bolts and my labor. Wish I had done that the first or second time. I am hopeful this header will last a long time. I am in no way a mechanic but was able to do this install (but maybe was easier since the manifold bolts had been recently removed?) Still, I soaked the studs with PB blaster for a day before making any attempts to remove the nuts. Then soaked them again to replace them with the new ones purchased from LC Engineering. No broke bolts...I was really sweating that. Only thing left is to re-torque the nuts (as suggested by local shop--Goodes, here in Texas, after I put some miles on it...I'm not sure how many though?)

So if someone has cracked manifold I would definitely encourage them to go with a header (LC Engineering or other) instead of cast iron manifold.

 

When I pulled nearly 4,000# total of granite and 9x8 U-Haul ramp trailer at Interstate speeds of 70mph I tripped the A/T Fluid Temp light. And I had an auxiliary tranny fluid cooler up front. Slight grades and taking the tranny out of O/D seemed to exacerbate the temp issue.

After this experience, I put an actual temp gauge on the aux cooler line so I will know EXACTLY what my tranny temp is.

I do not consider the 5,000# tow rating to be applicable for highway speeds, but that's just me.

Mike

 

I removed the hitch receiver on my double cab. I wouldn't want to tow 100lb trailer with it but the manual trans can definitely take it