QuestionQUESTION: My 1988 4 Runner develops a miss when under a load with the vehicle in either 4th or 5th gear. It does not have this miss when idling or in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd gear.
It is like one of the cylinders is working but only firing every other time or every three times. I can let off the gas or down shift and the miss leaves.
I have changed the rotor button,spark plugs and spark plug wires. With the new plugs and wires, it still misses from time to time but not as often. I did not change the distributor cap.
I have found on the internet many different suggestions from many different sites. After reading your site, I am positive this is the best site I have been on.
What is your suggestion?
ANSWER: It still sounds like it's an electrical misfire, it could bery well be the distributor cap arcing under a load so I would suggest giving it a try and check the ignition coil for any signs of crcking or arcing to ground.
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QUESTION: I appreciate your previous response about my 1988 Toyota 4Runner with a 22 R-E motor. I have performed work on it being plugs, wires, distributor cap, and rotor button. I also checked the coil for arcing--none.
After the tune-up, the 4Runner ran well without any kind of miss. After about two weeks [or 600 miles], the 4Runner started to develop a "hiccup" that now, two months later [or 2,400 miles], is a miss.
Here is the strange part, this miss only happens in two ways. For both ways, assume zero throttle [foot off the pedal] is a "1" and full throttle [foot to the floor] is a "10":
1] While driving in 5th gear, throttle is at a "1 or 2" while traveling on a flat road the miss is present.
2] While driving in 5th gear, throttle is at a "7 or higher" while traveling up a low to moderate incline [under a load] the miss is present. In this scenario, it feels, a little more than a miss, as if the motor is only running on three cylinders.
Now, with the above said, as long as I am driving in 5th gear, and the throttle is between "3 and 6" I have no hiccup or miss at all.
This is a very annoying problem.
What is your thoughts?
Thank You!
ANSWER: Check to see if there may be any diagnostic trouble codes in the computer, open the diagnostic check connector under the hood, locate the terminals TE1 and E1, with the key on put a shor tjumper wire between those terminals, the check engine light will blink a code, for example if it's a code 12 it would be one blink followd by two, there may be more than one code so wait for a short pause between each code, if it's only on it will just repeat.
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QUESTION: Question: I am still having problems with my 4Runner that I asked questions about over the past couple of months. I am thinking about going in another direction.
I have noticed that my engine is beginning to smoke when the engine is started or after the engine is started and revved [accelerated]. I do not know if the smoke is caused from rings and valve stem seals. The engine has 155,000 miles on it.
I have been considering changing the engine, would a 3.4 engine fit and hook-up to the motor mounts, transmission, and wiring [etc]? Should the 3.4 not work, would you recommend rebuilding my engine or replacing my engine with a rebuilt engine from an auto parts store. O'Reilly's Auto Parts has an engine for approximately $1,700.00 with a 3 year warranty and unlimited miles.
Which direction should I go?
AnswerThanks for the update, I'm not sure the engine itself is the problem but it could be loosing compression but the problem would be there most of the time or all the time, what color is this smoke? Worn rings are usually indicated by blue smoke where a white smoke/steam is a blown headgasket(these engines do have that problem) black smoke indicates it's getting too much fuel. The later model 5VZN-FE engine is completely redesigned even though the engine block configuratuin is the same and would bolt to your transmission, the problem is that there are numerous other changes that make this impractical, the computer and wiring are different, the transmission was also updated so this would affect transmission operation of your existing transmission, there may be a few people who on various forums who have done this successfully but to me it's not worth the time, effort and expense. My recommendation is to not try to rebuilt the old engine as this may cost more than the $1,700 for the echange unit which sounds very reasonable and a good warranty, more than the 2 years the dealer provides.
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