Another Tacoma for me

Hey folks,

Just picked up a 2006 Tacoma DoubleCab this past weekend -- Black Sand Pearl, Double Cab, 4x4, 6-spd. manual, TRD Off Road. It has about 68,000 on the odometer (not bad for the year). I picked it up in Charlotte and drove it home a couple hundred miles... drove great for the most part! Got it for a great price, paid cash.

This thread is sort of a brain dump for me over the past 24 hours, as well.

I've owned numerous Toyota trucks in the past (coming off a 2006 4Runner, had 2-3 1st gen Tacomas, had an older '88 4Runner back in the day, etc.), so these things aren't really new to me... but I'm excited to put my own touches on this one, and I've already started.

Of course, there were a few issues with the truck:

- Giant crack across windshield (knew this going into it), being replaced Monday

- Previous owner had mismatched Uniroyal Laredo (ugh) and Cooper Discoverer H/Ts on it (double ugh). So, today, I went ahead and got some Bridgestone Revo 2's fitted up in 265/75R16. Big difference -- truck looks "correct" now, and that size really filled out the wheel wells without looking stuffed. This truck is a commuter, so I'll be building it out to retain its ride on the road as best I can but still make sure it's set up right for the fun stuff.

I've run BFG AT/KO's in the past, but frankly didn't want or need an LT 10-ply tire and couldn't get it in a P-metric... I've also run the Revo2's before and had good results, so the fact I got them a little cheaper in a non-LT weight sealed the deal. Should ride a little smoother (it does) and save a little on gas compared to the BFGs.

- Engine compartment was filthy. I mean, really filthy. I don't know if the P/O had ever opened it up himself to look around. To me, cleaning cars is inspecting cars, so one of the first things I did today was clean the engine bay out. A good blast of water, some windex, a warm engine and a closed hood really cleaned things out. I put a little shine on things with some Meguiar's and it looks like it was never dirty at this point. All the hoses I traced seem to be in good shape, fluids at appropriate levels (save the washer fluid), and no fluid seemed burnt out, so that's good -- he may not have kept it pretty, but at least he kept it up.

- The P/O had three small boys, so as you can imagine the interior was pretty dirty. I spend most of today cleaning things pretty hard. Meguiar's cleaner on all the interior plastics, some very light Armor All, a good vacuum, etc. I had to take a steam cleaner to the seats as most of them had some pretty gross stains -- I think I managed to get a lot of the stains out, but some remains, so I'm going to have to keep working on that. Looks a lot better than it did when I picked it up, though!

- I noticed as soon as I drove the truck away that there was some pretty serious clutch chatter. The clutch isn't slipping, per se, but sometimes it will chatter pretty heavy, normally when taking off in 1st gear, or a slow shift into 2nd. After I got it home I noticed a very small squeak from the throwout bearing. I suspect this was the exact problem addressed in the TSB for the throwout bearing... but seeing his this truck is about 8,000 miles out of warranty, I'm probably SOL on that front. I'll need to do a little research into the best way to address this issue outside of the TSB.

Also, the shifter action in these things is pretty poor. URD short shift kit and cueball shifter from sickspeed.com going in tomorrow ASAP

- Truck seems to feel "rougher" than my 4Runner, but I suspect that's just the nature of the vehicle. The 4Runner was built pretty quiet and smooth and had coil springs all the way around, so that could have something to do with it. Probably just takes some getting used to.

- Repaired some very small paint chips on the A-pillar (suspect it chipped when the windshield took the rock that cracked it) and one on the hood that had developed a little rust. Took some sandpaper to the inside of the chip (very small), cleaned with alcohol, taped up everything around the spot itself, and then followed up with 3 coats of Dupli-Color black sand pearl, and then a Krylon clear coat I had laying around. Turned out OK -- far from professional, but they weren't big enough to make me drop any money on it.

- Installed 48 LED ~120Lm overhead dome light from V-leds.com (as I do all my cars from now on). For some reason I've found their LEDs to be much better than LEDs from places like SuperBrightLEDs.com. VERY bright, and a white 5K temperature so it's not blue.

I also put some red radial-firing LEDs in the map lights. I went with Red because the only time I use the map lights is at night, usually when driving, and red does not kill night vision like normal white light will do. Plus it looks pretty evil when I cut them both on...

Well, that's pretty much it for now!

On my agenda is #1, addressing the throwout bearing/clutch issue, #2, researching some sort of lockable bed cover solution, #3, perhaps a very small lift if I can get a hold of the TSB spring packs and some Bilstein 5100s.

Thanks for reading!

 

Welcome to TW Chatty Cathy
HAHa

 

Welcome!
Sorry, didnt read that whole post. haha

 

Welcome aboard!

 

Welcome and congrats on the longest TW intro. Oh and congrats on the truck too.

 

Welcome on!

...i hear ya about the manual shifter. It is certainly not the smoothest out there. These trucks must have remarkably short first gears

 

Thanks folks!

nmcqueen280: I'm in North GA.

 

Read it all. Seems like you have excellent plans in mind.

 

Welcome from NV! Congrats on the new truck!

 

Welcome to TW from Sparks, NV
Was there a question in there somewhere?

 

Ha, no question, just basically a brain dump for myself from the first 24-36 hours with the truck. I'd posted elsewhere about the best options to address the TO bearing issue outside of warranty -- but so far no replies.

I'm wondering if the URD bearing kit works well for the purpose.

 

Woa lot to read, Aloha