Love Hate Relationship

I personally hated my automatic too on the highway, just the gearing is wrong. The manual transmission with the lower gears is perfect. I can hold 6th gear no problem. If the automatic had the 4.30 gears it would be perfect.

 

I traded a 2018 automatic transmission sport for a manual 2021 off road because the automatic was hunting gears on the highway and was beyond annoying... night and day difference as far as driving experience. If you’re an automatic guy, get the tune- it will be completely different.

 

I mean, there's potential for ANY aftermarket changes to impact your warranty. Most will claim that OVtune is virtually undetectable, unless of course someone were specifically looking for it. If you have it flashed and still have the truck, almost flashers on here will flash you back to stock for like $25 and no one would ever know.

 

@bikenut1 where 'bout you located?

 

Have you seen people feel the need to flash the 21s? IIRC they have a diff tune from the factory than the 20s

 

Yes, in general each MY has a diff factory tune, but they are all less then optimal.

 

I never understood the "underpowered" argument either. It's no V8 or EcoBoost, but it's still a pickup truck. I use cruise control religiously and cruise around 1800-1900 RPM at 70 and 22-23 MPG in the sunmer. My old truck was at 2300 at that same speed l, got 18 MPG on a good day, and had much less power at the high end where I wanted it for the freeway. I can easily get from 70-100 if I really need to. It's no sports car by any means, but it does what it is supposed to.

 

I am not sure about the tune differences in the 21s. A couple guys have reached out to me about flashing their 21s, but I did not have the tune pack at the time. The improvements might not be as major as in previous years, but I'm sure that OVtune would still provide plenty of benefit from a performance/driveability standpoint.

 

The tunes I have are certainly going to put stock '21 to shame. Heck a lot of us will refund your $ if you are not totally happy...because there is no change you will not want to keep it.

 

I tuned a '20 last week and the guy was so pleased I received several follow up texts after his 1.5 hour return trip. I mean for how little it costs and how much it improves the overall shift, accel control, and power delivery it's a must budget if you enjoy driving.

 

Like I said the truck's not underpowered. Its more a function of how the throttle and shift tables are mapped to the accelerator pedal that makes it feel unacceptably sluggish to some people's tastes. Get that sucker tuned and now you're comparing oranges to oranges. Bonus that most of the tunes out there increase torque / power on the low end which also helps.

 

Noob question here but do the tunes affect MPG? It's really just optimizing shift points so shouldn't have any significant impact?

 

We have access to a lot of tables beyond just shiftpoints (and growing). I am getting 20+MPG just like stock but I enjoy driving my truk...and it can get out of its own way at a stoplight AND onramp. That's the ticket for me. If you are in the pedal all the time, heavy truck with cab/tent, and big tires they all suffer but compared to stock I have not seen a hit on MPG when the tune is the only factor changed.

 

Goes two ways:

1) Drive the same way you always did and most people report increased mpg. Mine increased 10%. This is primarily because it takes less pedal (throttle) to get into an efficient gear for accelerating.
2) Accelerate and drive faster because the truck is now more responsive and fun to drive; most people report decreased mpg. (Should be obvious why)

 

Here is an unpopular but honest opinion:

Learn to drive the truck on the highway. Seriously. I say this as someone who came to my Tacoma from an Acura TL that was very quick and throttle responsive. By comparison, the Tacoma seems to lag and be sluggish. Throttle response seemed off, and it just didn't have enough power. Fast forward to today, I have no tunes, no Pedal Commander, and I don't run in ECT mode ever, but I zip out of stop lights, and drive fast in the crime lane every day. It just takes time to learn how to get the response out of the truck, but I guarantee you that it's there.

 

Or you can do all then, get tuned, and SEND IT!

 

If the Tacoma’s where you are at sell anything like Tacoma’s around here you may not take too much of a hit selling it privately.

I bought my brand new 2021 SR for 35,146 out the door. The used car lots here are selling 3-4 year old Tacos for more than that and they’re getting it because the dealer can’t keep any in stock. I caught mine because it showed up as Inbound and I called and put a deposit on it. Took about 6 weeks to get the truck.

 

Not for me. Tunes are like cheat codes. I'll stick with learning the power band of the truck and how to use it.

 

These tunes are more like new controllers where all the buttons work like they should have from the factory....but didn't.

 

I was able to grab one that landed because I drove up same day. It didn't even have PID done yet.

The one I bought was fully loaded TRD Sport with the advanced tech package etc which reduced the buyers a little due to the additional cost. I still had to basically drop what I was doing and immediately go to the dealer if I wanted a chance at buying it.

The one I bought actually had a guy looking at it that walked in the door right before me so I had to sit there and wait. Luckily he decided to order a Pro so I got the truck.