That's all folks.

Pic isn't very good, didn't think at the time to take any. Was towing a car trailer for a GTI I bought, fortunately, it was lowered and we couldn't fit it on the crappy u-haul trailer I rented, so I was going home empty. I just have a little 4 banger, was doing a reasonable 50 tops going up a hill, weather wasn't bad, but not great either, not close to any sort of storm. Trailer caught a patch of ice, I just recall looking in the rear view as I could feel the back end slide, saw the fish tale, and thought "well I'm fucked, there's no recovering that" slammed the guard rail, trailed spun 90 degrees up and under my truck, blocking the left lane and half of the right. more or less tore the rear end clean off, rear frame is all twisted, driver side is smashed up real nice (2nd time hitting my head on a pane of glass and trying to figure out why my driver door won't open post accident..... because it's smashed the fuck up is why....)

I shit checked myself, figured I was good, then saw the trailer and was concerned about oncoming traffic, lucky I had some flashy lights I laid out, as 2 other guys in trucks jumped out to help. I had a bunch of tow straps so we were able to hook up the corner of the trailer to their truck and straighten it out so it wasn't blocking lanes. Watched it more or less tear the rear bumper off in the process.

RIP 2011 Taco. 3 years of service, never let me down.

https://i.imgur.com/3Bl55Pw.jpg

EDIT: Since I've been in the used car market as of recent (well before this happened, family member needed a decent reliable low cost car, I was helping out and picked up a 07 Jetta) I found a lot of sketchy deals in lots, especially with 2010 or older due to the odometer law that was changed as of recent. I don't want to see this truck back on the road, but wouldn't be shocked if some hack job repair was done and it ended up for sale. Hopefully, someone doing their DD will find this post, I don't want to post my full VIN but the last 6 are 003773 . Should you find yourself a 2011 ACLB 2TRE-FE in 4WD and black, DO NOT BUY IT.

Edit 2: When I gather my stuff out of it tomorrow I will try and mark something somehow as a warning. Not sure what yet. I feel there should be a site to submit vehicles on for a database of vehicles not to buy for reasons.

 

Sorry to that.
At least no one was hurt.

Hopefully you can find another Tacoma and be back out soon.

 

holy smokes, atleast youre alive, glass is half full What state?

 

Probably gonna wait a bit, market is too insane right now. I picked up the GTI for another project, but it was just to shortcut. The last 10+ years I have only had slow ass cars / trucks, so I might scratch my itch and rebuild this GTI and DD it for a while. For sure will be keeping an eye out for another taco once I come across a perfect one again. Took me almost a year to find the one I had, I was dead set on a Gen 2 ACLB in 2TR-FE with 4WD. Had to compromise on the auto (first auto I ever owned in the... 25 plus some years driving). Another perfect gem will crop up eventually. If anything, I still think I would want a Gen 2 4cyl, but man not in auto, I can only imagine how much better that truck would be with a proper gearbox.

 

I only buy cars you can't die in, Toyota and VW, I can say I have crashed both. Granted the VWs were a bit more spectacular. Joking aside, the damage would have probably been much less sever had I not had a trailer. that more or less really put the nails in the coffin. MN, I'm used to bad weather, snow, etc. Rocking K02s, I wouldn't even say the roads were bad, I was going up a hill which I even know is notorious and was cautious doing so, overly more just because I was towing. It's one thing to get out of a fishtale in RWD (I started out driving lightweight RWD cars in snow), but when you have 14' of trailer behind you, gets a bit harder. I would say maybe 20 or so min later, as police etc were on scene, a ranger biffed it and went off the road and down the hill but he went to the right down the ditch, I went left into the guard rail.

 

Glad you are OK.

Taco On!
Smokier

 

I edited my first post, added a warning to hopefully prevent someone from buying this truck should it somehow find its way back to the road. It shouldn't but I've seen enough sketch shit recently I wouldn't be super shocked if somehow it did.

Edit: Gah, especially in MN, this truck can still walk with a clean title if you know how to play it.

 

Glad you made it through that to post.

In this market I would also wait it out...

 

Yeah, if anything I really just want a gen 2 2tre-fe ACLB with 4wd again haha. But next time around, manual. That was my first auto I have ever owned, and man paired with that 4 banger, just miserable.

Just got this dropped off https://imgur.com/a/uXUuqok , is what I was going to get with the trailer, then accidented my taco up. Picked it up for next to nothing, had other plans for it, but now I think I'm just gonna find a short block, swap it, and take it for a DD until the market calms down and/or I somehow hunt down another unicorn. 09 GTI, someone put money into this but I still don't know what all has been done. The guy I got it from didn't do any of the work, and only had it for maybe 9 months before the timing chain and/or belt broke. I'm told it has an upgraded turbo, intercooler, etc and is wicked fast. Someone dumped some decent amount of money into this thing, bumpers alone are not cheap. Looks like someone was making an edition 30 clone. I speculate it was done in 2011 after it was in a decent enough accident the front end was totally redone. Sitting on H&R springs, couldn't get my floor jack under it. I suspect, and would be logical, someone went from a k03 to k04 turbo, but I have not verified that yet. Battery was roached, so I couldn't get my vag-com hooked up to scan it to see what's been modified. Basically bought it sight unseen, was looking for MK5 parts on FB, came across the listing that was only a few hours old, had just a few bad pics. Guy was very amendment he just wanted it GONE, and it had to be gone by 5pm. By the time I got up there, it was pitch black dark, and it was half in a snow bank. Blowing a good -20 while we dig it out, I never gave it a good look over, didn't care for the $1k he wanted for it. Lucky it didn't fit on the trailer. Just a mk5 jetta 2.5 running will fetch a solid $5k here right now, market is nuts. So all and all it kinda works out, sucks it cost me my truck in the process. Only been a few days and I'm starting to already be annoyed not having a truck, how do people live without one? How the hell do I get my snow blower to a shop? haha.

Anyways, I'll get another Taco when I find the right one. Just don't think that's gonna be for a while. Took me a good 9 months just to find the one I had, and that was damn near 2 years ago on the dot, looking at my join date, I know I got it jussttt before covid "hit", and I was in Mexico while the truck was brought back to the dealer because I found it didn't have any TPMS sensors installed.

 

Glad to see you are okay, popping your head on the window and slow to figure out why your door wouldn’t open, I’d suggest getting checked out for mTBI.

It’s strange that so many Taco owners have VWs. We have a MK7.5 GTI and Alltrack.

 

over the years I have found the same thing haha, lots of VW and Taco owners out there. I was also into ero cars, mostly BMW (biggest regret was selling my 88 m3), moved on to a mk3 jetta as a cheap DD econobox, loved the car with it's little 2.slow. Put over 120k on it, all I ever did was put a set of used plug wires I took from a yard. It ended life with 240k+ on it, not from breaking down, MN weather just rotted it away. I went to jack it up one day, line up with the jack point, jack goes through the floor into the car and the whole car wasn't very straight anymore... I'm supposed to be getting rid of cars but I'm somehow gaining them. Right now I'm sitting on a mint clean 03 golf tdi that has trans issues and probably electrical issues due to water ingress during storage so she might be done (of course after I spend $5k on maintenance and doing a full suspension overhaul, coil overs, the works), my 97 Jetta GLX "3.0" I built in school, checked the comp last summer since it too has been sitting in a garage for years, each cyl is still hitting 220psi so that's good. I've always wanted to make that a police car since it's white, just never had the funds to do it. Now that I make enough to carry a couple mortgages and several (well actually 1 now) car payments, I'm hoping I can get the vinyl done this summer. Have an 07 mk5 2.5 I got for a family member, needs minor work and some TLC, couldn't argue with it for $3200 out the door at a small dealer. Obviously the mk5 09 GTI I just picked up, and lastly my SOs DD which is a diesel-gate CPO Jetta Sport Wagon TDI.

Talk about value retention, buy a TDI for a DD, and a Tacoma for when you need a truck, both are on the top end of holding value. If dieselgates are still around, they are CHEAP, and come with an insane waranty. VW even has (and I'm mad I missed it by 1 year on my GTI) a 144 month rust warranty, damn near 10 years. I had a buddy who actually got a real rusted up mk5, still in that 144 month window (miles are unlimited) had the whole car fixed and resprayed, didn't pay a dime.