road trip maintenance - specifically brakes

Not a maintenance item. Doesnt count. You’re deflecting

 

Think of it as an investment

 

Exactly, which is why I have everything to rebuild my rear wheel bearings including the backing plates and axle seals sitting brand new in a box with some extra brake parts just in case. That shit is only ever going to get more expensive

 

Six years fucktard.

Shed-seasoned. For his pleasure.

 

#wizdum!

 

*despair

 

Looks good to me. If you've never been to Colorado your oversize and heavier tires will rob you of power. For most of the time over 5000' you may want to run in 4th gear and forget OD. Your engine puts out about 3% less power for each 1000' above sea level. At 10,000' your engine is only giving you 70% of what you'd get at sea level. There are some passes closer to 12,000' and you can drive to 14,000 in a few places.

There may be places where you will need 3rd or even 2nd gear. You can wait for the engine to struggle and let the transmission downshift. But I can read the road and manually downshift before the engine struggles, and you lose momentum.

Downshift before you start down long grades. Don't be afraid to go to 3rd or even 2nd gear, occasionally even 1st. Done right it doesn't hurt a think. You can't be doing 45 and downshift to 3rd, that is what hurts the transmission. Either downshift while at a slower speed or use the brakes to slow then downshift. You will still need to use the brakes, just not as much.

Once at altitude gas stations sell 85 octane as regular, 87 is mid-grade and 89 is premium. Don't make the mistake of using 85 octane. Pay the extra and stay with 87 octane. At higher altitude many older vehicles can run 85 octane with no issues. But your Tacoma and most newer vehicles need to stay with 87 octane even at altitude.

 

I’m about 45min south of Albany NY. Uphill battle is accurate.

 

Awesome, thanks for the info! I can feel the bigger tires around here, Im sure it will be even worse in the real mountains. Plus I hadn't considered the density or octane impacts

I picked up two small bottles of DOT 3 last night. Unless I discover some unknown issue in the drums, Im going to do a flush of the system and run it like this.

 

@SR-71A Did you put that second spring/clip on your brakes? When I put fresh rotors and pads on a couple of years ago I added that second spring and it eliminated that annoying pad slap.

I recently did a gravity feed/bleed on my truck and it suprised me how much it improved the stopping/slowing quality of the brakes.

Enjoy your road trip. Back in Feb thru early May I put over 4,000 miles traveling through parts of NM, AZ, UT and CO. Awesome trip for sure as I'm sure yours will be too.

 

Yeah I added those a year or two ago when I took everything apart to inspect and clean. Cant say I noticed a difference myself, but for $3 or whatever it cant hurt.

That sounds like an excellent trip! Several months must have been awesome. Any spots in CO you would recommend above others?

 

I spend a lot of time in Colorado, Wyoming and Montana. I would run those as is. Just remember to use your lower gears and not be the guy who rides his brakes when going downhill. Use your lower gears too when going uphill to save your converter and lower trans fluid temps.

 

Yes, retirement has it's benefits. I was mainly around the UT and CO border. My main purpose on this trip was to visit as many of the Ancestral Puebloans ruins in each of the states I mentioned. There was still a lot of snow on the ground and experienced a few snow events. Back in the summer of '74 and again in '79 and '81 I've been in and around the RMNP and Estes Park area. Once you're away from any city it's all good in CO. They're all good actually.

 

Only one question How much extra weight are you going to be dragging along ??

Maxed out with weight is the only reason I might think about putting new pads.

You your truck is in great shape!! This is a vacation not a timed event enjoy your trip.

Remember heat soaked mechanical parts can do strange things keep an eye on fluid levels .

I still enjoy Wyoming more then Colorado.

Have a safe trip and enjoy yourself.

 

I think those have some life left, but better safe than sorry? Not sure if that Baja edition is based on the Off Road or Sport. If Off Road, the dealer sells 2 different pad sets (at least this was the case when I did brakes on my 2012). One is cheaper and isn't what originally came on the Off Road. I think I paid about $80 for the original part number, while the low-cost OEM version was around $30. Or go with the Lexus pads as suggested.

 

Absolutely. I anticipate a lot of time in 4th gear, 3rd or lower as needed. Torque converter temp is one of the ones that is always up on my ScanGauge

Thank you! Going to do my best to remember the highlighted part of your quote while we are out there

The truck will be heavy, no doubt about that. But we are trimming down weight were possible. I think a brake fluid flush plus lower gears in the mountains will help. Worst case, Ill slap new pads and rotors on in a Napa parking lot

But I am feeling good about leaving them as-is for now.

 

Brake fluid flush done on Saturday and I checked the drums while I was there. Looks better than I recall, a little thinner on the bottom leading edge obviously but still plenty of life for shoes. I readjusted them too while I was there, each one took a few extra clicks - seems no matter what I do the Toyota adjusters just dont play nice.

But all good now, getting excited to head out on the trip!

 

Now that Im back from my trip and after a little hiatus on here, you guys were right. Definitely made the right call not replacing pads.

My drivers side started to squeak while running over Pearl Pass, but they still have some life left. Oddly, the squeaking was worse when aired down. Not sure why that would matter but it did.

Definitely not going to put another 6000 miles on this winter so Ill do em all in the spring. In the meantime I bent the squeaker out a little to quite it down over the winter