Joined the 2nd Gen Club - 2015 DCSB Tacoma 4x4 TRD Off-Road

I'll start off by saying I've owned four previous Tacomas. A 1995.5, 2000, 2002 and an Inferno 2016 TRD Off Road 4x4. I sold the 2016 about 18 months ago as I liked how it looked, but I hated the powertrain. Plus mine had a odd vibration which bothered me.

Fast forward to this past weekend when I was looking to get back into a truck. I really wanted a 2014/2015 Access Cab TRD Off Road with the 6-Speed manual. They are rare and I didn't have much luck locating one of the past few weeks, so I found the 2015 I ended up buying. It's a DCSB 4x4 TRD Off Road in Super White. It's fairly well equipped, including the JBL sound system. When I test drove it, the interior reminded me of my 2005 4Runner V8 Limited that I had several years ago.

The truck had around 37k miles on it and it was serviced every 5k miles and had the 30k mile service completed right on time. It's overall quite clean, except for a couple of dings and a dent in the side of the bed, which I'll have fixed via PDR next Wednesday. I MUCH prefer the powertrain in the 2015 over the 2016. I will say the 2016 seemed more eager to go above 50 MPH and it rode/handled better, but that's about it. That 6-speed automatic transmission was garbage (bogs, shift flare, upshifts too soon, etc.) I've always liked the looks of the 2nd Gen, so I don't mind stepping back a generation. What I will say I miss is the interior of the 2016. It was a vastly improved space, much quieter and had no rattles. The 2nd Gen feels cheap (sorry) in comparison IMO and I'm going to need to remove the door panels and some interior trim to fix rattles. Turning up the JBL system (which sounds similar to the JBL in the 2016 I had) results in buzzing and rattles from all over the place. These are real world problems! haha.

I took the truck to Discount Tire today to install the same tires I put on the 2016, BFG A/T KO2 265/70/17 in Load C. I went RWL out, because the prior owner had it that way and I kind of liked the look. The truck had BFG M/T KM2's on it in the same size, but they only come in Load E, so it was a rough riding truck. Sold the tires to a co-worker for his Dodge Ram 3500 and boy, what a difference the KO2's make. It had aftermarket wheels on it, Eagle Alloy 058 series if I'm not mistaken. Not my favorite brand of wheels, but they look decent. I ordered hub centric rings from the AU today as well. I also installed a Tyger Auto tri-fold bed cover, upgraded the headlight bulbs to Philips X-treme Vision H4's and did a few small things. It's a third vehicle for me (DD is a 15 Explorer Police Interceptor Tuned Ecoboost 3.5L and my fun car is a 2017 Camaro ZL1 A10), so I'm going to keep the mods to a minimum. Maybe a Super White grille surround and TRD Pro grille. I also have a Pop-n-Lock locking tailgate handle on the way. Oh and I did install an older radar detector I had laying around using the rearview mirror harness located in the overhead console area. That was just too easy!

Anyhow, it's good to be back in the Tacoma family once again.

First day of ownership w/ Mud Terrains:


Today... just a few days later:







Installed my an older Uniden LRD950 Radar Detector:





My old 2016....

 

Looks nice

 

Welcome to the World!!

 

Nice truck, welcome to TW!

 

Guys, I'm not new to the forum. haha. I just bought another Tacoma after not having one for about 18 months.

 

Welcome to the second gen life, the last real Tacoma's haha

 

Ok welcome back to the World

 

Good looking truck. I have the same year, I bet you feel good being back in a truck.

 

Sweeeet!

 

Not usually a fan of white vehicles, but white Tacomas look so good. Congrats!

 

Well then

I take back the welcome.....jk

 

I did some rattle fixes around the interior today, mainly on the drivers door panel with good success. I also had to take the truck back to America's Tire, since I had a pretty bad shake in the steering wheel that started around 50 MPH. They balanced the tires differently and it fixed that issue 100%. Tomorrow I'm going to install the Pop-n-Lock keyed tailgate handle assembly too.

PDR will happen this coming Wednesday to get a few dings/dents removed, while I also ordered an Android based rearview mirror. That could prove interesting.

 

Looks good and welcome back

 

Today was all about paintless dent removal or PDR. I hired a guy named Jared from Bullseye PDR in the Sacramento area to come out and fix all of the dings and dents in the truck. He also worked on two other vehicles owned by a couple of coworkers. For my truck, the major dent was on the back passenger side of the bed side, above and through the TRD Off Road sticker and down behind the flare. It wasn't good and there was damage from the front of the sticker to nearly the taillight. He also fixed a ding in the tailgate and the drivers door.

I honestly can't say enough about these guys and what they can do. The dent on the bed was pretty nasty and he said it looks like someone had tried to push it out. I would say he got 99% of it out and pointed out a couple of minor defects you have to absolutely look for. When I got home, I tried finding them again and couldn't, so I call that perfect. Total time on my truck was a little over three hours and it cost $495.

It's hard to capture the 9"+ dent due to the color of the body, but I did get a decent picture of the after.

Before (notice distorted lines):



After:


I also decided to try out an Android embedded rear view mirror. It runs Waze great, has a built in front facing DVR camera, rear camera, GPS and a few other features.





Oh and I did use Krytox GPL 205 grease on the door seals and the rattles/noises from the interior were drastically reduced. It's literally night and day. If you have noises coming from your doors, this stuff works great if you apply it on all seals and behind them if you can.

 

So I need that mirror I really like it.

 

Nice truck! 2015 is a good year! I agree the interiors on the gen 2's are a bit cheap. I like the gen 3 interiors but hate the new exterior . How did you fix your door rattles? Dynamat? I have some vibrations in my front doors too just haven't had time to look into them. Great start with the mods, truck looks like new!

 

You didn’t just join the second gen club....... You joined the best gen club.

 

I took the door panel off, tightened all fasteners on the door and tightened all fasteners on the door panel itself. I then looked for any plastic to plastic or plastic to metal contact points and used felt tape to insulate those points. put tape across the entire top of the door where the door panel hangs on the interior door skin. I added some other pieces here and there, anywhere I could find contact points or could induce a rattle.

The last thing I did was use Krytox GPL 205 grease on all of the door seals. That made the biggest difference.

 

I added a couple of mods to the truck. The first is a Pop-N-Lock tailgate handle. These things are pretty crappy to be honest, but the options out there are pretty limited. I plan on being very careful when using it, but it at least adds a small amount of security with the folding cover.



I also saw a used Sport grille pop up on eBay for a reasonable price, so I bought it. I think it looks a bit better after the swap.



I may order a TRD Pro grille, but for $400, I'm not sure it's worth it IMO. I need to find some mud-flaps for the front which will clear with these wheels and the 265/70/17 A/T KO2 tires. I hate all of the crap being kicked up onto the side of the truck.

I also had a piss poor time getting a G key cut and programmed to the truck. The locksmith couldn't do it, and then I decided to update my TIS tool and it wouldn't do it either. I think it's just a crap key. Made an appointment at the local Toyota dealer for later this month to buy a key and have it programmed.

 

I'm not sure what planet you are on if you think the interior is cheap. The 2016-17 has to be the cheapest junkiest looking and feeling interior I have ever seen. The door panels flex and vibrate. The knobs are loose and turn pretty loose feeling. The gauges look like something out of fisher price catalog. The fenders flex as if they are made of paper and the exterior is seriously UGLY and overdone. Even the bed rails are chintzed out on with the thin covering on top that no longer goes over the bed rails completely. and forget about the weak ass engine and transmission that has no idea what the hell it wants to do. What a joke for 40K. My G/F's Corolla is put together much nicer for half the price.