snow plows

I mean... make sure you plow in 4Lo only. Not 2wd or 4hi... only 4lo

 

I like this suggestion a lot. Slow and low

 

I love TW: brow beating someone new for posting a legit question, lots of speculation about the incredible damage it will do followed by posts by people who have just done what the op asked about with no issues. Rinse and repeat.

 

All three of my Toyota plow trucks I used low range and second gear. Even my 88 with the 22RE plowed surprisingly well with a 400 pound ballast.
I still say if you’re only doing residential, light duty plowing you’ll be fine. A smaller truck is much easier to manipulate in a residential driveway.
The key is BALAST!! Four hundred pounds BEHIND the rear axle works phenomenal. My last 1st gen V6 truck took some serious abuse without incident…..my friend and I were doing small commercial jobs and he had an HD Ram with a 9ft blade. I was the dedicated “tight area” machine. He was impressed at how high my truck could stack snow, plies were 6ft + high.
That said the frame rails on the first gen seemed much beefier than 2nd and 3rd gen.
You need to use common sense and planning. If snow was three+ feet deep, a first pass with the blade up about 6-10” to knock it down, then half blade passes I could clear everything I needed to. Also if you’re pushing the wet heavy stuff you just need to be strategic on where you push it.

 

This 2012 truck worked well with the Detail DK2 82" plow and the Curt front-mounted hitch. The wireless remote was intermittent; however, when approaching the company, they were only too eager to replace it with another. It's all play as Alan Watts states. I was laughing the entire time. Never done this before. The first attempt and 'she' was a load of hard Atlantic mist, very wet snow [6"/150mm]. The Tacoma does not have heated mirrors, bein' of a 2012 vintage. The window had to be rolled down since the supplied backup cam is only a postage stamp in the corner of, as the Brits tell it, the rear-vision mirror. hahaha

I tried turning 'round on the road, but the slope is too steep, [against our NS DOT's road slope regulations]. The combination slid, so I re-backed down the drive and twisted the plow in t'other direction. Laughing, always laughing at the absurdity of existence.

I had my life companion's 4 summer CRV tyres as ballast, although more poundage would be better. Every time the skids hit a minor snag, the truck would shudder. The driveway is 800' with a turn 'round close to the house. That was the biggest difficulty to traverse. Yeah, some early Tacs had frame rust issues. Not this one although the undercarriage will benefit from a 2024 spring power wash and rubberized undercoat.

If I stopped too long, the entire window side of me became blanketed with snow. Today I will get some 2" lumber and build a platform for the plow to rest upon so that it'll be easy to slide the contraption into the front hitch, without lifting. I'll upload an image once completed.

I'm into the pyramids and the megalithic stone masonry in Cusco and Machu Picchu, Peru which predates the Inca, so when I saw the wet snow pilin' up in large chunks, I instantly recognized The Universe's hand in this creation. Peru would be a great trip to take this vintage Tacoma and the reno'd '87 Sasquatch!

 

I seriously considered it and asked questions here. My driveway can be a real bitch, so I bought a JD2025r, does great and does not beat up my truck. 4th winter, just got chains this year, should've done that years ago.

 

I had a plow on a 1/2 ton GMC and destroyed that truck. The entire front end had to be rebuilt at 80k and I snapped 3 rear leafs after 2 years of plowing a 1000' driveway and my VFD lot in the Northern Catskill Mtns. I love my Tacoma, but a Tacoma and a big ass tracked Honda blower is a better combo than a Tacoma and a plow.

 

I considered a tracked Honda walk behind. I didn't wish to spend 2-1/2 hrs moving snow. 'Sides, the Honda was more than a kilobuck over the hitch and plow combined, even with assembly by a garage.

 

You can damage any truck with a plow . You need to use common sense . Go out several times during the storm , use 4 Lo , and go slow and stop with heavy resistance. Also put some weight in your bed

 

These trucks don’t like plowing.

 

@ Truck Guy...I have 4 rims and tires tied near the tailgate. I drove no faster than the recommended 10 mph. I overlapped the passes so as not to exert too much weight over the full width of the second and third passes. The first pass was executed very slowly. There's no way of not using the full width. I drove the truck 3o km after the plowing session and did not notice any issues or noises. The card in the driver's visor talks about beeping in 4L. The beeping never went off nor did the intermittent dash idiot light flashing. I found tire sping in 4L, but not in 4H. If I find bed weight an issue, I have extra cement blocks and some spare patio slabs that I can use as ballast, since it's late in the day to travel to the Fundy shoreling and fill some of Jeff's sandbags.