El Honcho - 1st Gen Taco build

Figured axle seal for sure. Sucks because I'm not doing it now. So now all that shit has to come off again at some point in the near future. I wonder if my diff is low? I pry should check that. I don't even remember the last time I changed the diff oil.

So I got the brakes done today. Definitely need to figure out if there's still air in there or the pedal is wayyyyyyyyyyyy softer now. I can't see how it could be this soft. I don't have any more air coming out of the bleeder when it's cracked but when I have the one man bleeder setup on the drums the zip tie can't get my clear plastic tube tight enough and when I press the brakes, fluid is coming out of the hose at the bleeder. I guess it's possible I'm letting a little air back in because of that. I had to stop for the day and get cleaned up. Pry going to go buy some more brake fluid tomorrow and try bleeding a little more/better.

Good news is the front passenger caliper's pistons actuated and seated the pads right against the rotor as they should be. My idle is so insanely high right now it's stupid. Bleeding the brakes this fucking thing was running at like 18, 1900... Shit is driving me nuts.

 

How many licks does it take to get to the center of the Tootsie DRUM?! 5 cans of brake cleaner and a 10 pack of shop towels...

 

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Went out there today and re-bled the brakes for the 69th time. No improvement and absolutely NO AIR. Pedal is definitely softer. Took the truck to get washed and get IN n OUT... Approximately 6 mile drive. Washed it, never got out and then straight on to In n Out. While waiting in the 15-20 minute drive-through only line my TRANS TEMP kept climbing and climbing, finally getting up to around 290 before I pulled out into the parking lot and put the truck in P to eat. While in P the truck is idling at 15-1600... The water pump is obviously spinning faster so while in P the trans temp fell to 245 by the time I was done eating (5 minutes). It fell another 10 degree over the drive back home but still upward of 225-230. The high idle has the truck pushing through the converter at idle. I think this has to be why my trans temp is getting so high. We noticed the same exact thing on our EASTER DAY CAMPING RESURRECTION fail before the truck DNF'd. In the two years now that I've been using the OBD2 blutooth Torque Pro app the only times my trans temp would get above 200 is when we're towing the jet ski 3.5 hours down to Mexico. The trans temp when towing usually is between 190-220 with a high of 240. I have never seen my truck trans temp past 190-ish city driving.

Other note: Brake pedal is soft but the truck stops and the brakes almost lock up. Definitely more stopping power. Parking brake not working however. Not sure if I need to turn the adjusters more... it feels like the pads are slightly touching the drums so not sure. Alignment is off and I don't feel like dealing with it like I have twice now in the last year or so. Just going to pay the $60 and take it to the alignment shop tomorrow. Hopefully they can look at the brakes too and let me know what they think.

This high idle situation needs solved though because I feel like it's making the trans hot aside from it just being annoying. My MAF is reading 8g/s at idle but idle is 1600 so that pry puts it back into the 5ish g/s range at 1 grand... That seems somewhat normal. I think I read that 5g/s at idle is normal for the 3.4. STFT is -3% while my LTFT is near 4%. I would think vacuum leak would put my STFT up into the positive numbers higher than 5%.

I need to learn how to set up this data logging tables on TORQUE PRO.

 

Your Trims look way different than what I’m getting. I’m steady -12 ltft and my stft is 0 to -2 so I think my issue might be more injector related. Also before I rebored the tb I could get a normal 650-700 idle if I bopped the throttle at idle it could close the tb when the revs dropped. Otherwise I’m right around 800-850 at idle

 

Just starting to learn and read more about fuel trims but -12 ltft seems too high of a number. That means the ecu is taking away fuel. So you're running rich. Stft at 0 to -2 is good though, however, it's still taking fuel away. My STFT yesterday on an 11 mile drive was around 0 to 2% and LTFT is staying pretty consistent at 4.7%. My idle just simply will not come down below 1500 when I rev the throttle hard and press brake, the BLIP that everyone talks about. It used to come all the way down to 1200 in P if I did that but something is telling the IAC to "catch" at like 1400 and then it rises or settles around 15, 1600. It's starting to push through the converter in D and I think it's contributing to this TRANS TEMP getting extremely hot.

 

BUMP!

WELP! I'd say there's my intermittent OPEN. Fucking AUTOZONE starters... this is complete bullshit! This is what has been fucking me?!

 

To add insult to injury, I had to completely remove all 4 bolts holding the crossover pipe to each manifold to push it up an inch to get to the top starter bolt. What a royal pain in the ass. I used to be able to change a starter in 20 minutes with the stock headers/crossover. Definitely like these Doug Thorley headers but what a pain in the ass if you have to service the starter!

 

This is all because the truck would start and run but first time you turn it off, no restart. No crank no nothing. I had been fucking with the neutral safety switch for the last 3 days and was absolutely convinced it was that. This morning I went out there and was putting pressure on the starter signal wire at that connection while I pressed the remote start button for the 2 way pager alarm and it starts right up. You let the "free" meaning, not touching it but it's still plugged in, nothing. I knew that connector felt way too loose, too much play side to side. Well now we know why. What a fucking joke.

I don't know if I should just solder this myself or go get a new one for free. Who's to say the new one doesn't do the same thing?!

 

Fix the heck out of it and test the heck out of it before putting it back in.

 

Decided to solder it because this starter was only 4 months old from Autozone. It's super stout now. Got the original solder so hot that it pooled into the new solder puddle to create one big lump of solder. Put some heat tape on the outside just to keep the side to side play at a minimum. I'm sure it will come off but for install it was good to have. Tried to be super careful putting it up in there. I can't believe that connector doesn't have something securing it in place... If it turns a quarter of a turn at all to either side I would bet that the copper inside has been compromised. Thank god I finally found this because it was getting super annoying.

To reiterate through all the bullshit above.

The no crank, no start nothing ended up being an INTERMITTENT OPEN inside the starter at the 12v signal wire connector where BLACK/WHITE enters starter from STA RELAY. This was NOT an alarm, neutral safety or wiring issue.

 

Now I can go get an alignment without worrying the truck won't start for the guys! Also need to go pick up some DOM tube for a back bumper/hitch receiver. Scooped a second kayak for my girlfriend after only having one for years and having to borrow a second one. NEED THE TRUCK TO BE SOLID! PLEASE GOD DON'T FUCK ME ON THIS.

 

BUMP for that JUICE

 

BUMP!!!! Just picked up a stick of 1.5" .095 for the rear bumper! Might start today... Not sure yet. It's hot AF here in Phoenix but only getting hotter. I think I saw close to 110 next Thursday. Need to get this bumper done so I can tow the jet ski. It's fishing/lake season!

 

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IAC & Trans Temp Update: Ok so I've had the worst 2 month stretch in recent history, Just bad beat after bad beat. IAC/HIGH idle issue still exists with no answers in sight. Sunday, instead of starting my rear bumper the GF and I decided to take the jet ski out to the lake and chill. Lost the rear PTO cylinder, had to be towed to the ramp for $200 cash, that was a bad beat in and of itself. Got home, sure as shit, 140 in mag cylinder, 60 in PTO cylinder. Now that will need about $500 worth of attention. Truck is idling so high that I think it's heating up the converter. I have never experienced trans temps this high. I'm very worried. The transmission's performance feels exactly the same. No hard shifts, no slipping. I noticed now with the Doug Thorley headers that the dipstick and trans temp sensor are pretty close to the down pipe/cat. Could there be any way I'm getting false trans temp readings?

Trans temp: When you start your drive it takes a while to heat up but then it will get past 212 and never come back down. Weird thing is the temp goes up while driving down the freeway... Coming home from the lake we were sustained at 250... Sitting at red lights with it in gear the trans temp goes up. I expect that to some degree because no air going through radiator which is the heat exchange for tranny.... but moving???? You'd expect the temp to come down moving. My trans never used to get above 212 in the city and only SOMETIMES towing the jet ski on a 3.5 hour trip does it ever get as high as 230 or 240 but as you come back down in speed the temps come down almost immediately. Fighting a headwind and having the trans keep downshifting and running at like 3k going 75 is the ONLY time this trans would heat up to like 230 or 240.

IAC: I just went out to complete the tests from @Dalandser.

IAC TEST RESULTS: Continuity was 23 and 24 respectively between middle and each end post on IAC itself warm after complete warm up. Key in, engine on, the middle pin on the connector has battery, 13.5. Neither one of the other pins has any voltage however, .02 and .02. SO WHY?????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! As soon as you plug the connector in the idle shoots up to 1700, disconnect and it goes back down to exactly where it should be. 1120 in P,N and 820 in D if you blip the throttle to get rid of the butterfly variance. I drove the vehicle with the IAC disconnected and it seems to drive and idle exactly how it should. The only differences I noticed are under braking the idle step motor isn't doing anything but noticed no harsh idle under braking. At complete stop the idle in D is 850-880. I noticed that at cruise or while using the cruise control the motor does idle lower than it would if the idle step motor (IAC) was hooked up. So you feel the "gap" in rpm between coasting and when the accelerator is pushed a tiny bit to either speed up or compensate when using cruise control. The last thing I noticed with IAC disconnected is the fuel cut. The fuel injection obviously gets input from the IAC because in the FSM the IAC is part of the fuel injection system. Because the IAC is disconnected it almost sounds like a turbo car when you're down shifting/coming down in RPM while in like 2nd gear you get that gurgling and popping from the exhaust. I know from watching Boosted Boiz and PFI speed, Cleetus, Hunter Tuned that in the tuning process for turbo cars you can play with the fuel cut so that it pops and gurgles when coming down in the RPM range. The truck is doing the exact same thing right now. Not to an extreme. Only noticeable in 1 or 2. Drive you can't hear it.

Trans TEMP: One more update. With the IAC disconnected the truck ran and idled as it should between 800 - 900 in D and 1150 in P. I figured this would eliminate the trans temp heat because the converter wasn't being stalled now in D while you have foot on the brake. Before the truck could go 20mph on idle without foot on brake. Now, 8mph without foot on brake in D idling. Didn't have much of an effect, trans temp still got up to 245 even saw 250 for a few minutes doing this IAC test driving about 30 minutes ago.

I don't know if I should repost this in the general maintenance forum???? Is that cool? I need more help now. So stuck. So unhappy how the last few months have gone. I don't want to keep driving the truck and damage the transmission so I need to figure this out asap.

 

quick and easy if you think you're getting a false. pull the headers and wrap them. prob a cheap and no negative outcome mod. I am at a loss reading through the whole thread about it. curious to see what you come up with. always been a OCD gauge watcher myself. good luck.

 

Exhaust wrap is actually a bad idea. I bought some but before I used it I read more about it. It's actually counter intuitive. The wrap works against you by trapping heat in the metal. The metal heats up more than it would without it and boom, cracks develop. Can't have anymore header problems. It might be ok for the section I made to connect the cat to the downpipe in the area where the temp sensor is... Shit is killing me. Trans is NOT low on fluid. Fluid DEFINITELY could be changed but never had tranny problems for the life of this vehicle. No hard shifts, no slipping. I don't want to continue to drive it with these high of temps. If they're artificial because somehow the downpipe is heating up the temp sensor than that would be different. No idea what I'm going to do....

 

BUMP!!!

Ya regrese EL HONCHO!

Finally got some trans maintenance done. Ordered the wrong trans filter. Apparently the A340E 2wd and 4wd filters are different. I was absolutely embarrassed to see how disgusting the fluid was. There was a thick sludge covering the mesh filter and bottom of the pan. There was only 3 out of the 4 magnets in the pan so someone has been in there before I owned the truck. I feel like the biggest douche bag for saying that I have NEVER dropped the pan on this trans in the 12 years that I've owned it. I put the new filter in and used the included rubber gasket so I don't ever have to scrape FIP gasket off again.

I decided to throw a trans cooler on there as well while I was doing the new fluid/filter. Purchased the smaller Hayden 11"x7.5" cooler without fan. Ran it inline with the champion 3 row. Filled up fluid to correct level so I don't puke all over the under belly per my last few fluid changes LOL. The truck shifts like absolute butter now out of P into R or D. Driving shifts are butter like they always have been. Fluid temps in a 45 minute test drive never got above 220 and that was only because I was in an IN n Out drive through for 12 minutes. Sustained airflow through the grill and this thing is sustained around 195 now.

My only concern that I had is how well it would do with the fluid warm (190) then have it in D for a period of 10 minutes or more IE long drive through wait or border wait/stopped traffic. I knew that it would start to heat up with prolonged stop and go or just plain stopped with truck in D without a fan. In the spot that I have it mounted currently I think I'd have to cut out the inside of the plastic grill to have enough space to mount a small 7" pusher fan. After I hit 220 in the drive through, pulling out and minutes later on the freeway the temp had already fallen to 190'ish. Right around 205 by the time I was putting the truck in P back at the CRIBO.

Overview: Trans temp is now good with airflow. Parked with the truck in P, trans temp falls to 185 or so. Parked with truck in D and the temp does still slowly go up albeit I bet it takes twice the amount of time to climb to 220 now. Problem I see is if you're in stop and go to where you can't keep putting it in P then you'd pry want a pusher fan.

Going to look into a small pusher fan. Otherwise, my TRANS TEMP CONCERN is now marked as RESOLVED. If I had to guess, combo of filter EXTREMELY clogged and horrible fluid condition. Trans cooler is definitely MONEY WITH AIRFLOW.... NO AIRFLOW and I think it needs a pusher fan.

Still have a little higher than normal IDLE as well but jury still out on what is causing that issue. It's reasonable enough to drive but still annoying. 1250rpm cold start, 1350 when it's warm, 1500-1900 when you put the truck in P after driving it (BUTTERFLY VARIENCE) Back to 1350-1450 if you BLIP the throttle real aggressive to 4 or 5k and let off suddenly it falls back to a reasonable 1350 but still annoyingly high.




ONE LOVE!!!!

 

BUMP!!!