Stuck and Need Help!

Ok, sorry for the dramatic title. Not exactly "stuck" but in quite a bind.

I am currently 2800 miles into a coast to coast road trip and a long way from home.

My truck has been running rough since about 500 miles into the trip and getting worse.

It is a 2003 double cab 4wd V6 w/ 70k miles. 2 1/2 lift. 255/85r16 tires. If that matters.

The truck feels like I am towing a big boat or trailer. Any kind of hill slows the truck down and the downshifting (auto) begins. I have to climb most hills on the highway in 2nd gear (auto trans). It is hard to maintain 70mph on the flats. Truck feels like it is a 4 cyl and not 6. The truck has no CEL or pending codes. A shop in TN went thru it for 4 hrs and could no engine problems. Cats were clear. They changed the fuel filter w/o change. I changed the fuel filter in the desert of NM w/o change. All of the common things have been addressed. Vac leaks, plugs, wires, injectors. The engine does not sputter or surge. Just feels like it is towing a house boat.

I also have a whump-whump-whump rotational grinding sound from the front end around 30-65mph. The sound only increases with speed, not engine RPM. I have read that the front diff bearing go bad but putting it in 4WD would make the sound lessen. Mine does not change in 4wd.

Brakes are brand new Tundra calipers and rotors. They were installed right. No heat or anything strange from them. I am gonna recheck them in the morning,

No play in the wheels indicative of bad bearings.

I originally thought these two problems were not related but my inability to find any issues in the engine are starting to make me think they are related.

My problems is that I am 2000 miles from home in Tonopah, NV and want to make sure I don't break done in the middle of nowhere out here.

Anyone have ideas of what old be going on and how to fix it?

I am thinking something in the front diff is going bad. Really don't wanna take it to a shop as that is $$ and I plan to regear the truck when I get home and don't wanna spend the money twice.

In a hotel for the night until I can figure out what to do. Thanks for any help!


Joe

 

Any change in MPG? Seems like if it felt sluggish, your milage would be much less.

 

Get a bad tank of gasoline?

 

Possibly something related to that thread...

Apparently his crank was off and had a bad water pump.

 

Ya. Initially averaging about 14mpg when it first started. After the fuel filter change went up to 15mpg. Fuel filter was 11 years old after all. With the supercharger on it I was getting about 17.5mpg! The supercharger is currently off.

Have been through about 8 tanks of gas now. I had hoped the same. Tried some premium with Seafoam in it without change.

Thanks for the replies! Need help with the brain storming!

 

Does it have a supercharger that is disconnected? Or removed entirely?

 

Errrrrrr......

My water pump is fine. Just changed the thermostat but......


I have recently spliced in the URD 7th injector kit. It involved cutting and splicing a wire from the crank position sensor. I originally thought the problem was a worn out supercharger so I took it off before the trip. Gadget assured me that his system would be fine to left in place as it doesn't do a thing without a boost signal. I had run out of time so I had to leave before messing around with it further. I checked the wiring once but it was thoroughly taped up and difficult to access. I will check that wiring again first thing in the morning!

Think the sound from upfront is unrelated?

 

I don't have a 1st gen here to look at, but I know the earlier ones came with manual locking hubs upfront. If your truck doesn't have those, from what I understand, there is a bolt on flange in place of the locking hub body. If you unbolt those it will allow the wheels to rotate freely without spinning the CV shafts or anything in the front diff.

With the truck in 2wd, even without unbolting anything, you really should be able to easily spin each front wheel with the truck jacked up. If you can't, something is wrong.

Edit: Looks like I steered you wrong, I found this thread with an exploded view of the front hubs, no bolt on flanges it looks like : http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/suspension/276297-manual-hub-conversion.html

Even if there is a problem in the front diff, you could still pull the CV shafts apart and just leave the outer portion in place to hold the bearing and hub together for 2wd only mode to get home.

 

Removed entirely. URD piggy back 7th injector electrical system still in place as it all had to be soldered. Gadget assured me that it would be absolutely fine to leave it in place.

 

Hmm...

Have you tried pulling the ECU fuse to reset it? Perhaps an error is preventing it from relearning the stock firing.

 

That sound, are you sure its from the front? A bad carrier bearring will make a similar sound. Even tho the bearring is under the middle of the truck, it will drive you nuts trying to pin point the origin of the sound.

When mine went it cost me new tires, new rotors, new struts and new front wheel bearring before I changed it out. I could have swore the sound was coming from the front. I was wrong.

In addition, you wont be able to feel a bad carrir bearing spinning it in your hand after you get it off. I figured mine was still good, but opted to put the new one in. I later cut the bearring apart to find that some of the chrome on the inner race had delaminated.

 

Is the "front end" sound only at 30MPH+?

 

Wish I could lend a hand op, if you were all the way out west I'd offer you a driveway. Not sure what altitude your at but my 01 double cab does terrible in high altitude, going up any grade it's just a slug, even on flats is hard to accelerate. The wump sound though could it possibly be breaks or alignment? Something might have gotten loose after the install?

 

How soon into the trip did this start.

 

Carrier bearing has a decent amount of play. Gonna need to be addressed soon but I don't think that would cause a significant drag like I am having? Or just a coincidence with two separate issues?

 

30ish.....

Isn't always present. Getting worse though. Seems worse when off the throttle.

 

Carrier bearring is supposed to have play. The rubber bushing around the bearring is quite flexable.

 

It started after heading back from Overland Expo. Was supposed to head out west from there but a very sick family member brought be back home for a night. On the way back is when I noticed it. I drove all the way to expo with full camping gear and the supercharger running 80mph + without issues. Coming home I noticed it took more and more boost to pull. By the time I was home it was running 5lbs of boost to pull a modest hill at 70mph. The supercharger is older at 110k miles so I figured it was that.

Under normal conditions I would not have left until I was 100% confident in the truck but I had a 10yr Marine reunion in San Diego that I wasn't going to miss if I was still breathing.

 

simply check your secondary cat. It sounds like its stoped up.If thats the case,remove that section of pipe and tie up the back half of muffler pipe and throw it in the back. you can complete the rest of your trip and fix it later.

 

Bad spark plugs?