4wd.roops 2012 TRD Sport Double Cab Build

Hi All,

New member here - figured I would do a build thread with what I've got going on. I am based out of Alberta, Canada . I will update this thread as I get the time to post...

 

Bought a house a year ago after living in a condo for over 10 years and realized I could use a pickup truck as a daily driver to help with all the household maintenance/chores and I've always wanted to do a bit of a 4wd build. I just didn't want to pay the crazy prices they are asking for new ones these days.

I had been scouring the classifieds for some deals when I was bored at work. One Friday about a month ago, a 2012 Tacoma popped up at a local Toyota dealership with no price....

I called and got the scoop from the sales manager - they figured it needed a new engine among a long list of other things (all at dealership prices) and they were keen to get rid of it. I ended up down there after work and after some negotiating, bought it at what I felt was a steal - they were just happy to get rid of it as they had no intention of putting a new engine in and warrantying that whole process and I probably caught it right before it ended up at some auction. The truck ran and drove but it wasn't safe to drive it all the way home.

Here are some pics in the showroom:






After towing it home and driving it off the truck - got to work.




I did a bit of a teardown and realized the problem was with cylinder 4 and 6. I was hoping it might just be a headgasket at this point, but I realized i should probably check the oil that I had drained and sure enough, found some chunks of aluminum.





At this point I realized it was time to shop for a new engine

 

So after shopping around, found a lot of high mileage options on car-part, and none that were local. I switched the search to X-Runners and found a super low mileage engine nearby.
For context my truck has 195,000kms (~120,000 miles). The donor truck has 95,000kms ( 60,000 miles).

Donor truck pics:



Had the engine delivered and pulled the old one out.
Huge thanks to this thread here: https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/1grfe-engine-swap.76358/
I've done many engine swaps but mostly on Hondas and the odd Subaru. Never had done a truck or a v6 so that thread was helpful, particularly with the engine hoist mounting solution ideas.

So I originally wanted to take the engine harness off with the engine, but the clips on top of the transmission are difficult to get to. I also had no interest in dropping the transmission fully. So this is why there is a lot more unplugged here than necessary lol. If you have a manual transmission, it looks like there are less clips and you might be able to pull the harness off with the engine if you wanted (can't confirm) but for an Auto, definitely easier to leave it in the bay. With the FWD/AWD vehicles I've worked on in the past, there are usually connectors in 1-2 spots that connect the engine harness to the chassis making it a lot easier to remove the engine in terms of electrical connectors rather than going around the engine while its in the bay disconnecting each individual connector....



Quick spray down of the engine bay while the engine was out:


New engine off the delivery truck:


Old engine in the front, new in the background:


I think the previous owner ran it hard and when it started showing signs of overheating........they kept driving. Here is a shot of the dried coolant in the headgasket failure area:


Old motor was also showing signs of a slight rear main leak:


The donor engine had been hit in the front, and the water pump was cracked. Also, being from an X-Runner, researching here (and elsewhere) showed the engines are the same but the upper and lower oil pans are different. So I got the new engine on a stand, and started stripping off the oil pan and water pump.

 

Getting the X-Runner upper oil pan off was a huge pain - even on an engine stand outside of the vehicle. Tried a bunch of different gentle ways of trying to remove it with no luck. What ended up working was soaking the joint with gasket dissolver overnight and then using a flat screwdriver and hammering one small spot I found (not the spot in the FSM) and popped it off. Ended up scratching the surface a bit but nothing major, and just cleaned that up with some emery cloth.

4wd oil pan - all cleaned up:


Also ordered a bunch of replacement parts and fluids:


One issue I came across - the oil pan strainer gasket replacement. The part numbers shown on the Toyota dealer's drawings are wrong - it shows a rubber O-Ring instead of an actual gasket. After calling a few different dealerships trying to sort that out, I ended up taking the old gasket over to a dealer and we figured out what part worked by checking the physical gaskets he had there.

Anyways, here is the new engine ready to drop in with all the new parts installed:


Dropping the engine back in the truck:


One thing I realized after, I would consider hooking the engine leveler up front to back instead of side to side .....I followed the lead from the 1GRFE swap thread earlier, bu I think the engine would drop in better if you could tilt the rear of the engine downwards to begin, and then level it off afterwards.

Engine installed:


Another tip would be to keep track of all the harness brackets and where they go. The electrical connections are super easy to figure out, but all the harness bracketry and where they bolt on to the block is not. A lot of the brackets look the same. I would consider taking careful pictures of that if I did it again. I ended up having to look around this forum at random engine photos to figure some of them out - especially the ones at the back of the block.

After filling it with fluids, and priming the oil by pulling the EFI fuse, it ended up starting on the first try and no codes so far.



The last step I'm at is I did a transmission fluid drain and fill but I guess more drained out that usual, because I can't get anything to drip out when I do the A/T Temp procedure. Going to get another bottle and add that in this weekend, and then redo the level check.

That's where I am currently at! Hoping to start doing some actual cool modifications next.