Replacing 97 2.7l Tacoma Head Gasket

Hey guys! So recently my head gasket went out on my 97 2.7l tacoma. So I thought I'd try at my first write up! This is just a loose guideline to what needs to be done. If you are following along and getting this done I recommend having a chilton or something AND a FACTORY MANUAL cause we all know nothing beats that. As for a few pointers on what you're going to need to get this done, I recommend getting a gasket KIT rather than a head gasket. it's only like $80 and so worth it. It will give you almost every gasket you could possibly hurt or want to replace during this job. Get new head bolts. I've heard of people reusing them and they are meant to be a 1 time use only bolt. You're going to need new oil and coolant (I ran 2 batches oil through my engine and had a total of 2 oil changes BEFORE STARTING THE VEHICLE, and then I will have one more after 500 miles. This is not needed at all but it is a good thing to do.) And you're going to need a lot of tools. sockets from 8-21mm, breaker bars, 3/8" and 1/2" drive ratchets, and lots and lots of towels. You will also need to get the head pressure tested and magna fluxed. This was $100 at my local machine shop. So lets get started!

So, first things first I got my truck into a nice open shop with the correct tools and space to change a head gasket.

1. First I decided to disconnect the battery and drain the oil and coolant out, since it wasn't going to be going for a while anytime soon.


2. After draining the fluids, I went ahead and took a few pictures and labeled all my plugs, hoses, and lines and just got a general labeling job of everything I could reach, we'll also be wanting to label anything new that we get at tearing into our trucks. Cleanliness is next to godliness is what my grandpa would always tell me before we painted or worked on anything. So any bolts you take out, put them back where there go just straight into the head. In other words, take the bolts and parts off then put the bolts back into the bolt holes without the parts on.


3. Now keeping in mind THE WHOLE TIME that you're going to what to keep EVERYTHING labeled and organized, LETS START WRENCHING!!!! First thing to start tearing off here would be your airbox and your intake. I just decided to rip the intake off and put it back together and lay it in the parts area on the ground. *EVEN IF YOU'VE DONE SOMETHING THIS SIMPLE SO MANY TIMES I'M TELLING YOU KEEP IT NICE AND ORGANIZED!!* The worst thing to happen is loosing a part or not putting it together right, so keep it organized! (At this point if you have heat shield covering your manifolds I would remove them now to get a little extra wiggle room earlier on. I didn't happen to actually have any so I picked some up.)


4. Next, knowing that it had to come off, I removed the whole egr pipe. this pipe runs behind the the head with one bolt in the back of the head, one end on the egr valve, and the other coming into the exhaust manifold. This was a little bit of a tricky one, each of the sides I used a small wrench and then on the bolt in the back, coming from the exhaust manifold side, I would follow the egr pipe until I felt the bracket and put JUST THE SOCKET on the bolt then i'd take the ratchet and put that into the socket.(found it was much easier this way) This bracket has a bolt on the bottom of the pipe and the top, BUT ONLY THE TOP BOLT IS IN THE BRACKET! I took out both thinking it was a c type bracket but it was more like the letter d with a bracket that wraps around the pipe and only has one bolt spot above the pipe. I will first post a picture of the exhaust side where I squeezed my arm and 12mm ratchet into and then the whole pipe.


5. Next, we want to take the belts off. So first, loosen the 14mm locknut on the pully face and then loosen the 12mm (or 14mm) bolt to relieve enough tension until the belt can slip off.


6. Afterwards, we have to unhook the heater core from the head. There is one line that goes into the head. So I disconnected it above the the head on the firewall. (The bottom hose). It is a lot easier disconnecting it up top then from out of the back of the head.


7. Next, I unplugged the coil pack, disconnected the wiring harness from the head (one bolt holding a bracket from the harness to the head at the rear exhaust side corner, and unclipping the clip near the front corner of the exhaust side again), then the spark plug wires were LABELED and removed and put in the parts pile. Next I disconnected any air lines going to the head, making sure to keep them LABELED AND PICTURED (labeled and pictured before I removed any spark plug wires).

8. After, I removed the bolts to split the intake manifold. (Have to do it anyway since I bought the gasket kit, and if this is done first it makes it easier to remove the throttle body and any other intake pieces by adding a little more wiggle room sooner). This has 4 bolts on the top row, and then i removed 5 from the bottom. YOU ONLY NEED TO REMOVE THE 3 BIGGEST FROM THE BOTTOM! I do recommend removing the other 2, because they hold lines on the manifold half bolted to the head. So you will probably have to remove them later, but might as well do it now so you can make sure those two lines won't get pinched or hurt at all!


9. Now that the intake is nice and wiggly and we have a little more room to work its time to start on the throttle body. This is easy there are 2 bolts and 2 nuts holding the throttle body to the intake. As well as 2 plugs, one on the side and one on the bottom, and a few vacuum and a coolant line coming from the water temperature sensor cover (right on the back of the head) leading to the very bottom of the throttle body. I had the throttle body fully disconnected except for this line in order to be able to reach the line.


10. With the throttle body off, we can now remove the upper half of the intake. You can do this by disconnecting the erg valve and unbolting it from the intake and disconnecting all the air lines. Since it is already unbolted, after this we can wiggle it out! There is a bracket coming off of the frame pushing against the intake, i believe to help support the intake, and all you have to do is be careful, don't go yanking on things, and gently wiggle it until you managed to get the intake off the studs and slide it out.


11. Now with the upper intake off, it's time to unbolt the fuel rail. This is also very easy, theres a few bolts holding it into the block and one 14mm holding the fuel supply line on. You have to remove the fuel rail because the supply line is right in the way of a bolt for the lower intake. so unbolt those few bolts and it'll come right off with the injectors still in the fuel rail. Do not remove these! Since I bought the gasket kit I did, because it comes with new o rings and grommets for them. These things like to leak if you try to re-use the o rings and grommets, so if you don't have the kit they don't remove them unless you want to go get some fuel o rings from your local autocrats store.

12. With the fuel rail off you can easily unbolt the bottom half of the intake. Before you do this, make sure to unplug your knock sensor and the other plug that goes in between the intake manifold. At least mine did. So after that intake slides right off, add it to the pile o' parts and lets move on.


13. OK, before we start tearing into our motors here, we've got one more thing to do. Time to remove the exhaust manifold. Now with mine I needed a breaker bar and a few extension, because these bolts were baked on. It's not the same for everyone! But if you're having a nasty experience with it, just take a day and spray some liquid wrench on it a few times throughout the day and in the morning it should be nice and ready.


14. After removing the exhaust manifold. Take an hour and go around and check everything is disconnected, that you're able to remember where everything goes, and you're sure you're ready to take the head off. So go ahead and remove the valve cover. make sure to cover it with a CLEAN towel. Before we start messing with the valves and cams and timing, lets have a talk. It is VERY important to keep your timing, camshafts, and sprockets IN PERFECT ORDER!! You do not want to skip a tooth and accidentally retard your timing, or you will be ripping apart a whole engine, not half of one. So, first things first, before we start loosening any bolts under the valve cover, take a paint pen make some marks from the cam sprocket to the timing chain and from the exhaust cam over to the intake cam, zip tie the timing chain onto the cam sprocket so it won't move, and whenever you are pulling the head try to keep the camshaft sprocket as high up as you can. I'm not sure if the chain can come off the bottom sprocket or not but in some vehicles it has some stopper or something but just be sure try to keep it elevated and your timing should be fine! For this part I got a little help. I had my uncle come in and hold the sprocket since he had smaller hands while I pulled off the head. So try to have someone there at least if you need help!

15. Before you start unbolting you have to make sure your timing is all lined up. To do this there is a little v mark on the edge of the center pully that can line up with a few different numbers that are casted into your engine block. The little tick is hard to see, so grab a flashlight and look right at the inner center pully and you should be able to see the numbers (Mine were covered in gunky oil that took me forever to find haha.) I'm very sorry I don't have pictures of this because its kinda a hard angle to to get one at. So just take your time and find the little line of about 4-5 numbers and line the tick up with the number 0. This sets your timing and camshafts to 0, and brings your cylinder 1 and 4 to top dead center.

16. Alright, we're almost halfway done!! So once your valve cover is off, zip tie and mark everything up! Here's my pictures of how I did it. I used bright colored zip ties so nothing would be lost in the engine.


17. Once everything is marked and together and lined up, its time to take the nut off the front of the camshaft sprocket. To do this, you have to have someone below you holding the crankshaft bolt so it won't just spin. After the nut is loose, take it off and remove the camshaft sprocket and hold it up or prop it up so it won't fall!


18. Now that this is off you can finally begin to take out those head bolts!! So take all the head bolts out plus the 2 in the front in the little section where the camshaft sprocket is. These 2 bolts do not need to be replaced. After all these bolts are out, your head is ready to come off! You can finally pull the head off but make sure to keep that sprocket elevated! Woo-Hoo! Now you can finally see the damage done!

19. Now, with your head off and an open engine cover that puppy up! At this point, I continued to do a shim and bucket job and replaced a few other things that are unrelated to the head gasket job. So this is where we part ways! Make sure to clean all your gasket areas very well. The last few tips I can give ya are take your time! Make sure you do everything right! Double check everything when finished! And last but not least, if something bad happens, take a step back, breathe, and maybe eat some fat snacks or something. To finish up your project, just reverse the order of everything you've done. You can follow this guide backwards if it help. Make sure to properly torque down the head as well. Other than that if you have any questions or comments i'll be checking back regularly!!

 

Very IMPORTANT !
Be sure to replace the head bolts also. If you do not replace the head bolts it may last another 20-50,000 and blow again.
If it need a valve job get it done now. It has shim and buckets so the cam will have to be with the head in order for the valves to be adjusted
The valves adjustment is part of the valve job with shim and bucket. If the shop doing the work doesn't know this you will need to find a shop who knows shim and bucket. Its not like an an old chevy or ford,
Hopefully you can get access to an OEM toyota manul , the Haynes and Chilton are sketchy crap but are slightly better than nothing

 

please read and understand the following (if you are not already aware of this) :
http://www.aa1car.com/library/torque_to_yield_tty_head_bolt_tips.htm

example :
http://www.yotashop.com/cylinder-head-bolt-set-toyota-3rzfe-2rzfe-058-2417/

 

I was aware of this and did in fact do a shim job. Thanks for the concern though!

 

Dude this is a great write up! I'm doing a head gasket on my 97 right now, I appreciate you writing this man!

 

Damn. I did this job and did not replace the head bolts. I did a compression test and got 1) 155
2) 160
3) 157
4) 97

could the bolts be a cause of this?

 

Do a leak down cylinder test.
How many miles on engine?

 

The videos ive seen show a bolt through the exhaust camshaft gears to keep them aligned. Not sure if thats necessary.

 

Could anyone tell me the head bolt torque and pattern for my 3RZFE can’t seem to find this anywhere

 

Taco bros will this work for the second gen 2.7? If not, is there a walk through for the second gen? Im having trouble finding one. I need to know the tools and parts I need to change. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Had the stealership confirm the diagnosis.

 

I would keep looking. They’re very much related engines, but the head is different.

 

You mean this engine......

(135) Toyota's BEST Engine Ever Made FAILED! This Will Shock You! - YouTube

 

Watched this the other day. That dude was definitely doing some snow plowing or something equally as stressing. Man I was hoping there would be a second gen head gasket replacement walk through, but I guess it’s not that common of an issue. Gonna have to get a Haynes manual lol

 

Moral of that story is your gonna have to closely inspect the head, especially between the valves....
and cylinder walls......

or you may be wasting a butt load of money......