thewanderlustking Posted March 9 Posted March 9 So about a month ago my daily had a few hiccups. Starting after sitting sounded like a weak starter/partially dead battery. I didn't think anything of it beyond 'I should grab a starter to have on hand...), until a few more random stumbles and a time or two where the idle got rough. Popping the hood and looking about, I noticed coolant was low in the reservoir. I KNEW it had been full the week before. Didn't see any leaks, then an "Oh crap" thought and I pulled the dipstick. It was milky. Along with the dreaded white foam on the oil cap. Headgaskets were done about 12yrs ago according to the PO (and fresh-is looking heads would have me believe him). This had been selling point actually for me. Anyways, here are some general thoughts on my experiences with it. Before I start down that though, I didn't even bother reaching out to Toyota and trying to get the campaign done. I am sure my truck is out by mileage alone. And the prior job for sure wasn't done at the dealership... 1) My truck is pampered and rarely gets driven hard. Its also a 4Runner, so I am not toting a house around behind me, although it usually has camping gear or is loaded with tools in the back. It has NEVER BEEN overheated since I have owned it past few years. It didn't overheat when the gasket went, it literally started leaking and gave very little "your head-gasket just went" indicators. The ones it gave were easily mistaken for other issues... 2) Now I do not have any fancy coolant temp gauges beyond the wonderfully inaccurate factory one. But my nose is well tuned to hot/overheatign cars after many years of wrenching. So I honestly don't think my truck has been hot since I had it. Now it HAS gone through storm flooding for about a mile that was 18-24" deep... But that was also last summer. 3) This had modern head gaskets on it, supposedly even the upgraded OE ones from Toyota. They were your standard cometic with metal squish rings type of gaskets. And yes the main failure was drivers side rear. But the fire rings are not round, and you could see other places where they had also pulled away from the head gasket material. I am not a combustion engineer, but a non-circle shape does not seem like it would be as strong as a circle. This seems like a poor design and a serious contributing factor. 4) I bought brand new cylinder heads. While there are eBay/china heads readily available, I felt uncertain of there quality. I got brand new custom built heads from Clearwater Cylinder Heads of Florida. By custom, I mean they were built to order and not anything additionally special. These were actually surprisingly inexpensive. I won't post my cost as I don't know if some random Joe Shmoe calling in would get my same price. Mine were ordered through the shop. But I knew they were lapped and valve clearances set etc. 5) The rest of the parts were more expensive than the heads... And again I used my sources and did not go crazy getting the highest priced Toyota OE parts. Most stuff was on the middle to cheaper side. Ironically the Duralast timing belt kit, came with a Mitsubishi timing belt that I believe is actually OE Toyota. 6) What I hope is my ace in the hole was picked with a lot of research. The magic bullet to fix this is supposedly to use ARP head studs and a multi layer steel (MLS) head gasket. The ARP studs are custom made exclusively for LCEngineering, and expensive. The only brand of MLS gasket I found out there, is made by Evergreen. I found some unmanned brands, but any time the Manufacture was listed it was Evergreen. I got the full engine gasket set from LCEngineering. It was missing the gasket for the bypass, or coolant temperature sensors housing on the back of the lower intake. 7) Order EVERY SINGLE PLUG ON THE HEAD you have to touch. If it isn't broken coming off, it will break going back together. Injectors, coolant sensors, Throttle Position, Distributer, Knock Sensor wiring harness, and plug it plugs into, literally EVERYTHING. It sounds expensive, surprisingly it wasn't. Maybe $100. All of it is actually available pretty quickly on Amazon with some searching. I had a few plugs I thought were fine, I am now waiting for those to come. These plugs are 30+ years old and anything Japanese made of aluminum or plastic seems to decay at accelerated rates to begin with. I suspect the pile of dust that used to be my sensor plugs would trigger a geiger counter... Just a theory though. 8.) Be good at soldering. Replacing all the plugs hasn't been really hard, just tedious. I used a seam ripper to carefully remove anything left of the harness wrapping. I used the heat shrink tubes with solder in the middle, and glue bands. This wasn't enough though and I had to solder each joint first FLOODING them with rosin core solder to really get good connections. Then finally adding the heat shrink tubes/seals. My heat-gun I usually use for normal heat shrink wasn't hot enough. I had to use a micro torch with the air adjusted to partially "flamed out" so it acted more like a really angry lighter. This took some practice, and I still overheated one or two. I still felt much better using these than just regular heat shrink. 9) I got a pack of 4 cloth tape wrap off of Amazon. Wolf brand or something, I can post a link up if anyone wants. This stuff REALLY surprised me. I got away with things that you could never pull off with electrical tape. Like cutting long strips and threading it around and around without it folding over and sticking to itself turning into a big mess. It was REALLY EASY to work with. And it feels like it will hold up better than the old style cloth tape that turns to goo in engine bays. Time will tell, I will report back someday on that aspect. 10) Use big zip ties to hold the timing belt to the cam pulleys while setting it up. Amazon again has white paint pens for cheap. These made a nice job of marking all the timing marks. I used a couple more zip ties in other strategic places to keep the belt squinted together so it would't spin on the crank pulley. Hard to explain that without a picture... But it makes sense once you are in there. 11) Amazon failed me with the cheap toolset to hold and remove the crank pulley bolt BTW. This was a struggle with shop air and impacts. A flat bar with two hols dried in it could be used, reference the Toyota special service tool. This was probably the hardest single part of the job. I was glad I wasn't doing this in my driveway... 12) Exhaust manifolds, these sucked coming off, and were much worse going back on. Only real tip here is to get all replacement studs/nuts from LCEngineering. 13) There is a hidden bolt on the power steering bracket, don't forget to put it back. See 14, organize with envelopes so you know when you have an "extra" bolt in a step. See 15, get Toyota FSM so you can review and figure out why you have extra bolt... 14) BIG TIP is to put as many bolts back in holes as possible, and to put the remaining bolts in labeled paper envelopes. For example I had ones for power steering bracket, drivers side manifold exhaust stuff, passenger side + egr, etc. Sometimes I would add notes like 1b (1 bolt) 3n (3 nuts) and also note if something was missing when I took it apart. Its common for people to use ziplock bags. They do not work nearly as well. Any writing you do is likely to rub off the first time you get a little oil or other chemicals on it. The writing also never stays clearly readable. Paper envelopes is key. Even if you THINK its going right back together, this will go a LONG way to keeping a multi layer job organized. 15) Get the paper Toyota shop manual. Spend some time going through it. Bookmark relevant sections. Use gloves so you can pull off quickly to flip through it if needed, and thus keep the FSM clean. I have access to Aldata/Identafix. I did print out the relevant pictures for the head torque patterns. 16) Yeah, it did require some specialized tools. I have a pretty well stocked toolbox, but I still had to go and borrow two things. I needed 3m Roloc bristle/finger brush for safetly cleaning the block up, and rounded nut/bolt extractors. Otherwise I was mostly using high quality 1/4 drive tools. 12mm and 14mm short, middle, and deep sockets along with various length extensions. I have a whole range of ratchets from short to silly long that can apply way more torque than you should put on 1/4" extensions and sockets, unless they are HIGH quality. I used some 3/8 stuff. A lot of tight spaces so I ended up using hand tools probably more then my electric ratchets, and guns. But 12mm and 14mm cover probably 90% of the fasteners. I had to use a vise to push the timing belt tensioner back together, the kit didn't come with one. If all you have is a small clamshell case of poor quality tools, I wouldn't recommend attempting this job. But anyone really considering this, probably has most of what's needed already. 17) This isn't a parking lot of Autozone emergency type of repair. In a pinch, I consider doing a 22RE head gasket in an AutoZone parking lot. I would not even THINK about doing the 3vze though. 18) DIY versus Shop... Well I'm at about 3k in parts alone. Not sure exact numbers... But I I don't have a long list of "I wish I had repacked this while I was in there..." I have had to replace some odd items too. I had to get a set of used exhaust manifold heat shields for one... So I haven't pulled any punches. A shop doing it would probably be about the same price, if not a fair amount more. For amusement my service manager looked up the labor time and came up with something like 21hrs. It was a CRAZY amount of labor whatever the exact numbers were. He gave me a quick and dirty quote of $3500 for parts and labor. Mind you, this is without time/parts added for all the plugs and additional wiring repairs. While I am not necessarily saving much over the shop price, I am happy with what has been done and no corners have been cut that will bite me later. At some point a shop will either have to charge you the additional time and parts, or something gets cut out/rushed. No, it hasn't been an easy job, but I also wanted to go in there and knock this out of the park. Hopefully I never have to go back in there and repeat this job. And in all seriousness, an engine swap to a 3.4 probably would have been a little cheaper, possibly smarter choice. We shall see. I am a couple small parts away from completion. I am waiting for an EGR delete kit, and a couple plugs I thought I wouldn't need, but did. Like the distributer plug and TPS... Quote
IdahoDoug Posted March 9 Posted March 9 Wow, nice job, and I hope startup is uneventful for you. I have stripoed and rebuilt a half dozen engines and done a couple HG jobs in the last 25 years. Being organized is indeed key. If you dont mind, to your advice I will add mine. 1- start a notebook where you will provide info to your future self upon reassembly. 'PS Bracket must go on before pulley' and the like. Often a part comes off with different length bolts and you dont want to put a long bolt in a short hole and crack something. 2- put tools away. You'll justify leaving tools scattered about so you do not have to make trips to the toolbox. Over dozens of these projects I have noted consistently the outrage of looking for the 13mm for 10 minutes multiplied hundreds of times is more of a time waster than 4 seconds to the toolbox to lay hands on things instantly. For long projects in the engine bay, consider taking 15 minutes to lnock together a wood shelf across the fenders you can kneel upon. Quote
thewanderlustking Posted March 9 Author Posted March 9 (edited) 6 hours ago, IdahoDoug said: Wow, nice job, and I hope startup is uneventful for you. ... Thank you! Unfortunately, it didn't start... It did pop and then "diesel" for about 20 seconds, so I am close. BUT, I don't have the additional connectors or the EGR delete kit yet. I had left the EGR and intake tube in place, but without reinstalling the rest of the EGR system, it leaves a big vacuum hole. I grabbed a soda can and was going to make a couple blank off gaskets, but it seems like the EGR diaphragm itself is actually leaking to atmosphere. There didn't seem to be a real point to spending 1-2hrs making gaskets, struggle to reinstall it, then likely have it not work anyways when I have the proper block off plates arriving on Tuesday. So once that EGR is correctly deleted, I should be up and running. Why bother deleting it? It triggered a check engine a while back due to the thermocoule. I found it unplugged, so I plugged it back in. Light came back on, put a resistor in the plug and it stayed out. The whole EGR system would likely need to be replaced. The valve itself appears to be bad. The vacuum modulator deal on the front of the manifold has two broken nipples. The remaining vacuum lines and possibly the solenoids would also need to be replaced. The intake took a LOT of cleaning to get the cooked carbon out. And finally, I don't plan on leaving it on the factory engine management much longer, so all the effort to replace and fix it would have just been wasted anyways. Then there is the rats nest it adds to the engine bay. With all that crap removed, there is a LOT more room. I had neglected doing wires, because they sucked to get to with that all in place. This truck has had a badly rigged vacuum system anyways and a few things I want to work, don't. Anything I can clean up and simplify, is well worth it. Its gotten a consistently 8-9mpg since I bought it. Even for the 3.0, that's pretty bad. I am sure I can get much better. So when I was in there I did replace the injectors with some better 4-hole ones! Hopefully, this will be an improvement to economy AND performance. I have lived with it long enough and can try out some of the theories and performance hacks I wanted to test on the Mini Cruiser. Edited March 9 by thewanderlustking Quote
extech Posted March 9 Posted March 9 you are so lucky to live where you can do as you please with your rig. in ca. everything has to be there and working Quote
thewanderlustking Posted March 10 Author Posted March 10 For SURE! The irony is a modern correctly tuned EFI system is going to have better emissions and economy anyways. The crap I'm taking off is an emissions bodge to begin with... I also wonder if a faulty EGR system could contribute to the 3VZE head gasket failure problem??? Toyota sure did some oddities to these trucks that makes a brain very comfortable with aftermarket EFI systems, crash and burn... Apparently, the soleniods and lines connected to the fuel pressure regulator can actually change the fuel pressure. Independently of intake vacuum... I foretell a crash course in Toyota vacuum silliness in my near future. I wish they had a supplemental guide for the vacuum system, like they do for the wiring. Some of it was simple enough and made sense, like the bimetal valve for the charcoal canister. Quote
thewanderlustking Posted March 16 Author Posted March 16 (edited) The no-start was a dum-dum on my part... I had the distributer off by a tooth. The FSM was a little confusing and vague on setting it, but looking at the pictures I realized my rotor was pointing too far back and lined up with the arrow/mark on distributer when pictures showing it forward. It fires right up as soon as I corrected that. I got a couple heat cycles in, so far all good there. It wouldn't stay running tonight, and I discovered the AFM plug had come loose. The new pigtail is in my pile and probably going on tomorrow. Once I got that plugged in snuggly, it ran poorly for a few minutes before smoothing out. Was probably close to being flooded. We shall see how it behaves tomorrow. EGR is deleted now. MUCH more room to do things like change plugs and wires! I still have a lot of vacuum lines to replace, like all of them lol. But the list is getting much shorter and I think I will actually be driving it to work next week. EDIT: It runs like crap with the EGR deleted... Edited March 16 by thewanderlustking Quote
Paul winger Posted March 27 Posted March 27 When I was facing this problem I went for the 3.4 swap. I was having problems finding a shop that even wanted to work on my 3.0 . I did the swap myself and didn't hurry. 2 months later I have a wonderful RV again. I started with a 2002 4Runner that I bought for $1800 that has 134,000, wrecked. Motor ran well. Total cost adding up all receipts,$5500. Parts sold off wreck $2000. The most expensive part I bought was a motor electric harness,$1800 so the 95 ECU could talk to the 2002 motor and stock Auto transmission. With 4/88 gears I have no problem going over my Oregon mountains and cruise in overdrive. I drive between 60 and 65 and get at least 15 mpg. Planning a trip to Alaska. Quote
thewanderlustking Posted March 30 Author Posted March 30 It was a tough call for me... On one hand I really wanted to do the swap. On the other, I know what swaps like this take and that the only smart way to do such, is just like you did and grab a whole donor vehicle. The 1994 is actually my daily driver, and it being down 1-2 months for the swap wasn't going to happen without buying two additional vehicles... Ironically, two weeks in one of my good friends (and a tuning customer) heard I was down and lent me a spare car (knowing that going into it, might have swayed the decision towards the swap). For me the biggest hurdle to doing the 3.4 swap was multiple large purchases. While the heads and parts weren't cheap, and in the end probably totaled about what you have into yours with the money back from parts sold, I was able to spread out the purchases on my credit and shop accounts so it wasn't too bad. Paying for a parts vehicle alone, and needing a spare also, just wasn't really feasible. Also, I don't have a good place to keep a parts vehicle. Are these problems I could have gotten around? Probably. But not sure the added stress/time would have been worth it. Now if my truck was handling the extra weight of a house behind it, the decision would have again leaned more towards the swap, but also time wouldn't have been a big factor to consider as it wouldn't be a daily at that point. The poor running issues mostly ended up being timed incorrectly. Using the 22RE "cheat code" of loosening the TPS got it most of the way there. I have three issues left to address though. My kick down cable is junk/coming apart, and it's also not adjusted to the sweet spot it needs to be. My Check Engine light came on for two things, codes 41 and 71. TPS sensor fault, and EGR fault. Not sure what either of those are about yet, haven't had a chance to dig into them. I did rewire the TPS plug though... I have an OBD1 scan tool on the way though. So that should help with diagnosing it. Quote
Ssunrader Posted April 5 Posted April 5 You need to replace the sensor input signal for the egr with a resistor to get the ecu to not lean out your mixture under certain light loads. Also, the head gasket surface finish is different for an mls vs the cometic gasket type, something to consider, hopefully it holds. I noticed that the 3.4 uses the same head bolts and similar head gaskets as the most recent oem 3.0 replacement, so I followed the torque values for that configuration vs the original 3.0 that has been published since 1989 or whatever. The thermal stress on the lh rear cylinder is greatly increased by the fact that all the exhaust for the entire engine has to go through there, and the catalyst used was the more restrictive pellet type. Quote
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