2020 Tacoma DRL issue or Possible Short

Hello Tacoma World members..I have an issue with my Tacoma that is a bit difficult to explain. I wanted to take my truck to a mechanic that knows about Tacos. I do not want to take it to the dealer. I am in Los Angeles. I will try to explain what is wrong with it and hopefully somebody has a solution or might know of someone in Los Angeles I can take my truck so they can help me.

I connected a power inverter to the battery with supplied cables and followed instructions on guide. I then powered my truck and noticed that it would crank but not fully turn on. After several tries it turned on. However , It would stay on for a couple of seconds and then car would turn off. When it was on it would make a noise like if it wasn’t getting enough gas. RPM’s would go up and down. I checked the fuses by the battery and fuses to the left of the pedals inside the vehicle. All fuses are good. I tried moving the car by driving it and it would then stall on me when I would move it to the D out of park.

I noticed my dash info (doors,MPG,Mileage) would turn off and on when I would switch the lights on, DRL and off. I turn on the car with all three modes and noticed that my car worked with no issues while the light switch was off and on. It would only give me issues while it was on DRL mode.

On and Off my car works with no issues. DRL stalls when switched to D, Reverse or step on the gas. It also makes the rpm go up and down and lastly it makes the dash info system turn off.

Now everyday I need to leave my lights on day or night. I don’t worry about my battery because when I set alarm it turns them off automatically.

I hope I have explained myself and somebody is able to understand my issue.

 

Pull the 10A DRL fuse and see what happens.
This will help point us in the right direction.

 

Main Body ECU and/or Light Stalk...

 

Sorry for late response. I just came from the market.

i pulled fuse and tried starting the car. It would not start. Just crank

 

how big of an inverter and did you see big sparks when you connected the terminals? the bigger inverters have large capacitors on the input that unless charged through a cable with resistance will momentarily short your battery as they collect power and in turn short anything connected to battery. ICs act a little funny when you have large groups of them and you drop the voltage below the 5 or 3v thresholds. no codes?

 

@girMobi Inverter was 1000w.
Pardon my ignorance but you guys asked me to pull DRL fuse 10A. I pulled wrong fuse. My truck is the SR model. It does not have or come with a DRL fuse.

 

Here is my box

 

Which fuse did you pull then? So an SR with a light stalk that has a DRL position?

 

Ok So I didn’t see the DRL fuse on the box. So I googled drl fuse location for 3rd gen tacomas. I saw a bunch of photos of 10A INJ fuse. Reading more in depth I can see most ppl use that fuse for something else (raptor lights or fogs) and they mention drl so google tags it as DRL location.

 

I checked the 20 fuse by the pedal and it’s in good condition

 

Yeah, that would cause a no ON engine...

 

Yeah, I’m confused too.

 

The other function is auto lights on same connector/wire as the DRL select, but I'm unaware an SR would have auto lights.

 

Ok, we need to l on the following.

1. Does your truck have DRL on the light control switch?
2. Does the truck run with the headlights on?

 

When I have the car off and i move the switch to DRL it makes a noise Like if the gas pump is pumping. Also, the dash info screen turns off

 

Yeah that sounds very wrong. With vehicle off, Auto lights should do nothing.

 

Yes car has DRL switch and it runs perfect while lights are completly on or just the day lights/signal lights

 

Works perfect with top two but not with DRL

 

I reads DRL and could function as either auto lights depending on configuration. So we know there's no DRL up stream of the Main Body ECU, but the vehicle has a DRL select on the Light Stalk.
OP, can we confirm your 2020 SR didn't come with Auto Lights?

 

DRL worked great before I did the power inverter. I did see small sparks on battery terminal when I plugged in the inverter for first time. Car had DRL mode when I installed it.
I believe if there was a short it would have popped a drl fuse. But my car doesn’t carry one.
So what controls DRL shorts?