3rd Gen Poll: Rear End Noise howling when feathering throttle

Sent out some feelers to some 4runner folks three days ago,.

Guess what? The 4th gen 4runner people are telling me noisy rear ends are well established - pointed me to a few threads. Same symptoms folks.

A few third gen 4runner folks with chronic noisy diffs as well as the fifth gen folk. 53 to 60 mph. Some call it "gear whine" and a few folks over there are telling me "gear whine" on 4runners is "normal".

A very nice gentleman who is a Toyota Tech at an undisclosed dealer PM'd me and said that he has a long track record with improperly set backlash of the ring and pinion in 4runners, tacoma and FJs (from the factory) going back years.

I was pointed to the Lexus GX forums where my membership application is still pending. Others pointed me to the FJ forums where they claim bad rear diffs are well established. I was pointed to a 70 plus page thread of differential carnage on that site. You think Tacomas have it bad......

I'm not arguing with anyone there, just canvassing.

Food for thought....Tacomas apparently are not alone.....

 

Solid logic....not.

AAM and Toyota axles are way ahead of Dana engineering IMO. Whoever at Dana thought it was a good idea to put carrier shims behind the carrier bearings should be taken out back and shot. They are a huge pain in the ass to setup. Plus they are cast centers, which suck to weld on. And if that all wasn't enough, the ball joints from early Super Duty's stick and you end up chasing the steering of the truck all over the place.

The 14 bolt rear is way stronger than a 60. Not even close. AAM and Toyota gears are far easier to setup correctly.

The steer axles are popular because Dana was basically the only game in town through the 90's until Dodge went to Sterling/AAM.

 

Well unfortunately I sold that unicorn only to be like everyone else now. My third gen started serenading me at 1200 miles and hasn’t stopped since.

 

Goofy. Misery loves company I guess.

 

I guess the 4cyl Sr5 is what I should of went with. My dealer has my truck hostage on a lift for 4 days in service. No work performed and everything on mine is still intact. They give me this sr5 . It makes zero noise at any speed . I tried repeatedly. 40-43-51-55 and zilch.
The only thing I don't like about it is zero get up and go. Oh well . It beats paying for a rental when my truck is at the dealer under warranty. Driving the sr5 makes me miss my TRD Sport even more. Lol

This sr5 has 3,681 miles
I signed for the rental at 3,011
IT MAKES ZERO NOISE!!!!

 

All my coworkers ask ... where's that fancy Toyota you had

 

I'm seriously considering asking my dealer to let me swap for a CPO gray 2015 4x4 Tacoma Sport on their lot. Looks like it was a lease. It has 26,000 on the clock. Not sure if that is a smart move or not.

I say it would be because of the 1GRE 4.0 and it was the last year of the 2nd gen. Ironically the asking price is still like 30k ha. I would miss the interior layout of the 3rd gen though. The 2nd looks dated, but hey if no more mechanical gremlins it might be worth it. Looks to have the tow package and LSD from the order sheet. The sport doesn't have the bilstiens correct?

Still a big risk with 26k on the clock. Though.

 

Part of me regrets trading my 2015 prerunner in.. It was 2 wheel drive. Oh well my work vehicle is 2 wheel drive and they send me out all over Wisconsin,Minnesota,Iowa in blizzards! Lol

I just got such a great deal on the 2017 TRD sport and equity in my 2015. I thought it would be stupid not to.
I loved my 2015. It had the dash rattle. I went to the hardware store and got 4 ft of tube that you use for a fish tank airline . The tubing was smoke black. Just stuck in between windshield and the dash and bam!!!! No rattle. The 4.0 seemed meaner. Had the sweet growl at 90 mph down the interstate. Towed stuff like a champ. The fuel economy was about 20 on 2,000 mile trips.
It's too late for me to look back now. I wanted the Trd sport in 2015 but my wife said $40 k for a little truck! Lol so I settled for the prerunner at $24,000

 

Gotcha. I may just go that route if nothing gets done. I'm still waiting on the corporate and the dealer. I'm wonder what the sales manager will say when I ask for a THIRD truck being a 2015 this time ha.

Yeah the 4.0's 2nd Gen's do scream on the highway where I live. These guys are flying past us 3rd gens on the highway going uphill on a incline. I could only do that on ECT mode before my differential got toasted again.

I firmly believe the 2GRE FKS was a horrible choice for this chasis. The trucks got bigger and heavier, thus requiring a more powerful powerplant. Supposedly its 40 HP and 1-3 ft/lbs of torque up from the 1GRE 4.0.

On paper that maybe true. But everyone when you talk to them will say the 1GRE is a far better engine. I'm thinking they should have put 2GRE-FKS with a turbo at least minimum. Or a V-8.

 

Ha EM,

Mine has been hijacked by my Toyota dealer. On the lift for the 4th day in a row and no parts removed. They said they are waiting for Toyota to release the diff to them.

I'm racking up 800 miles a week on their loaner truck! Lol

 

when was the ETA on that differential? I heard months or???

Its almost like they don't care about the issues and keep pumping them out at the factories in Baja.

 

Drive that loaner for everything you do like there is no tomorrow! You deserve a road trip!

 

Fluid level was good. Went ahead and changed it, nothing unusual, looked good

 

Are there any 2 wheel drive with the noise ?

 

Read the Hilux uses the same Rear Differential, and those have been around for years... anyone have info on that?

People say they've changed fluids, to same fluid? Different weight?

I don't believe it's a failure issue, since these diffs have been around for a while, with the lawsuits Toyota is not dumb enough to bring something with failure history to the US, not with out litigation happy country...

also believe it's a simple fix we can't pin point... and no one has taken their truck to a rear diff pro? Taking mine in to dealer next week to document, if they say "normal" I will research locally and take mine in for a check up... or at least a drive and listen diagnosis. If it costs me a couple of hundred bucks to avoid the whine at 64mph, its worth my time and money.

 

Many have swapped to the 75-90 weight, others have picked up the OE fluid from Toyota. As far as taking it to an indy shop for diagnosis, there has been a lot of talk about such, but truthfully no one wants to man up yet because most of us are still under warranty. If we have a indy shop start ripping stuff apart that's just giving Toyota another reason to not fix it *if* a fix/TSB does come to light.

 

That's why I'm happy to chip in to a GoFundMe for whoever has a quality shop near them to diagnose.

 

But if you can have it fixed for $2-300, wouldn't you?

What are the chances of failure once fixed? Or are we waiting until the 60k mile warranty expires with the whine? I purposely avoid 64mph now...

 

I would totally do it for a few hundred dollars.

 

If you tell any one of us that there's a fix for $300--i'm sure we'd all be asking where and when. AFAIK, there still does not exist a fix for the howling. There's an alleged TSB on the horizon, but nothing set in stone.

No one can tell you the chances of failure once fixed, because again, no one knows what the exact problem is. There's tons of ideas and probable causes but no one has yet to tear the diff apart independently to diagnose.

I guess it really depends how bad the howling is and how much it annoys you, but i rarely drive in the range and my howling isn't loud enough to bother me. With the music on or windows down i can't hear it anyways, so I'm just patiently waiting.