95-96 grill sawp to 2001-2004?

I have seen tons of 2001-2004 grills for sale and my 1996 grill is shot anyway so I thought I would see if the swap was possible and how easy it might be. I know headlights might need to be swapped as well but I am looking for a face lift since I haven't seen too many 96 grills for as cheap as the 2001-2004 grills are. Thanks for any help you can give!

 

i think you'd have to replace the hood, grill, lights, and bumper with 01-04 stuff

 

STLHarry is your man for this question.

He swapped a 95-97 grille onto his 01-04... so his thread/walkthrough will be very helpful to you.

What I've gathered, from nagging him like a wife, is that you will need:

Grille
Headlight assemblies
Headlight/bumper filler
Corner lights
Fenders
Hood
Bumper
Valence (with turn signals)
Core Support (I think)

The swap from 01-04 to 95-97 or 98-00 (or vice versa) is much more involved than a swap from 95-97 to 98-00 (or vice versa)

I'll try to dig up STLHarry's walkthrough and post it here

Edit: STLHarry's walkthrough: http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/1st-gen-tacomas/95766-how-95-5-97-grille-swap-onto-01-04-a.html

 

Thanks for the help. What about swapping a 98-00 into my 96?

 

Much simpler.

I'm eventually going to try and swap a 95-97 onto my 98-00 and from what I gathered from research is:

Headlight assemblies
Headlight/bumper filler
Grille
Core support (possibly)
Bumper (maybe not)
Valence (maybe not, depending if you don't need a bumper)

 

Oh hello everybody!

OP, have you seen rockauto's catalougue? They have 4WD grilles for ~$30. Here is the link to the description (although it doesn't list the cost there4...you have to get that from the listing).

I say this because swapping an 01-04 front end onto the older trucks is more labour-intensive than the other way around. The holes for the headlights are different.
Here is the 95.5-97:


Here is the 01-04:

Note how the first truck has round holes but the second has oval ones? The 95.5-97 headlights will fit in the oval holes, but the 01-04 headlights will not fit in the round ones without cutting.

You will also need a whole new hood, which will set you back quite a bit even without adding in the cost of colour-matching it (I was lucky because I found another white truck to buy...but I was fully prepared to paint it if I needed to).

After that, you still need the corner trim pieces that go under the grille, headlights, and hood latch. You don't actually need corner lights, fenders, or a new bumper (I don't entirely know about the bumper, though, because I installed the ARB with the grille swap too).

Any other questions, feel free to PM me. Always glad to help!

 

Thanks for the help! I think I will stick with the 96 grill and put my money else where.

 

95-97 Front ends FTW!!!!

Dont swap!

 

don't do it! you have the best front end with the best color already!

 

Good decision. I like the 96 grills.

 

Is there a difference between 95.5, 96 and 97 grilles?

(assuming they're all for 4WD)

 

nope

 

No, i don't think so. by 96 I meant the 95.5 to 97 style.

 

Agreed, I think late 97 Was when they changed over to the lovely plastic buckets and H4 bulbs. I like the new ‘96’ look on my 98. I may upgrade with better marker lights eventually and those filler panels but for the moment this will do nicely, currently painting the budget eBay grill semi-gloss black...

You can get away with a bit of Monet like roughness behind an ARB!

 

You can get a 96 grille on Rock auto for $40 and the hood for about $80 I believe.

but yes you can swap them fairly easy. After I bought the truck from StLharry I did the same exact thing to my 01 DC

edit: I miss understood, I thought you were swapping a 96 onto a 01-04. I swapped the 01 onto the other truck and it definitely didn’t fit as easy as the 96 did on my 01, but the truck I took it from was also an 01 with a 96 grille swap. I didn’t mess with it to make it perfect as it’s a donor truck.
I would suggest just buying a grille from rock auto for $40.

 

Oh ffs don’t tempt me

 

Off topic but ive searched everywhere. Has anyone done a 01-04 to 95 front end swap? I feel like a double cab with the 95 front end would be sweet but i’ve never seen it done.

 

That would be pretty sweet, would look just like a Hilux double cab. I may look into this soon if rockauto sells the parts for cheap

 

like this one?

 

Woah i didnt even realize when i first saw this pic that it was a double cab. So cool! I wanna see more pics of that truck. Now im really considering it. So all it took was the hood and grill? I would have thought fenders too but i guess theyre the same?