Archive for December, 2007

TRD Parts for the Toyota Tundra: 2007 and 2008

Here’s a list of TRD parts available for the 2007 and 2008 Toyota Tundra. We’ve included the suggested retail price as well as what you can expect to pay for each part (prices don’t include install).

TRD High Performance Brake Kit

TRD’s part description: “Provides increased heat capacity for substantially more resistance to brake fade and caliper distortion during multiple stops from high speed. Creates firmer pedal feel due to stronger and more rigid components. Better modulation characteristics under threshold braking…” Our take: Cool. Literally. Keeps brakes cool. If you plan on racing and/or towing like crazy, buy these brakes. You can probably get them for $2500-$2600, but expect to have to order them. The good news is you can put your old rotors and calipers on eBay or Craigslist and get some of your money back.

Fits Tundra 07-08′, Sequoia 08′ with 20″ wheels (or larger, will not fit with 18″ wheels) — Part No. PTR09-34070 — Suggested Retail Price: $2,795

Poor Man’s Alternative: G2 Brake Caliper Paint Red. If you’ve got a few hours and a little bit of talent with a paint can, you can get the look without spending very much. G2 is quality stuff too – stay away from cheap caliper paint kits. They don’t stand up very well under high heat.

G2 Brake Caliper Paint Retails for $38.00, and is available in black, green, purple, and yellow too.

TRD Cold Air Intake Kit

TRD’s part description: “replaces the factory inlet air duct, air cleaner lid, air filter and inlet system hose assembly and reduces the air inlet system restriction…A unique Intake Flow Accelerator (IFA) smoothes and accelerates the air flow into the TRD inlet system.” Includes reusable air filter and a spot for TRD’s “filter service guage”. TRD boasts kit adds about 8 hp and 8 lb-ft of torque at 5,600rpm. Our take: Nice quality, slightly higher cost than some other kits but comes with TRD backed warranty. Read our Tundra cold air intake advice if you’re not sure about adding one in the first place. Expect to pay about $385.

Fits Tundra 07-08′, Sequoia 08′ – Part No. PTR03-34070 fits 5.7L V8, Part No. PTR03-34072 fits 4.7L V8, – Suggested Retail Price: $475

TRD Cat-back Dual Exhaust System

See our Tundra TRD Exhaust review for more info, but you can expect to get 5-10% off of the MSRP if you buy the parts over the counter and install the kit yourself.

Requires TRD Tail Pipe Kit, Part No. #PT400-34073, MSRP $375 PLUS one of the following:

Reg. Cab Short Bed: 4.7L PT400-34070 MSRP $655, 5.7L PT400-34071 MSRP $675
Double Cab Short Bed, Reg. Cab Long Bed, and all CrewMax: 4.7L PT400-34072 MSRP $655, 5.7L PT400-34074 MSRP $675

TRD Drop-In Air Filters

Available for all Tundra motors, these are similar to products from K&N. We don’t have any performance data, but we suspect they’re the same as less expensive after market filters. We won’t recommend them until we have reason to believe they’re superior to K&N filters that cost half.

4.0L V6 Part No. PTR05-35060. MSRP $75
5.7L & 4.7L V8s, Part No. PTR05-34070. MSRP $75
Filter Cleaning Kit, Part No. #PTR05-00000-CL, MSRP $22

TRD Rear Sway Bar Kit

From TRD: “provide a flatter, more stable cornering stance. They are constructed of high-quality spring steel and powder coated to prevent corrosion and road damage.” Our take: It will give you better handling, better stability when towing and hauling, and it’s reasonably priced. In short, it’s a good deal. Just remember that it won’t work with a hitch that wasn’t installed at the factory – including the resin hitch you can buy from Toyota. Expect to pay about $235 for the part, and it you can order it from the factory that’s probably cheaper than paying someone to install it for you.

All 07-08 Tundras, Part No. #PTR11-34070, MSRP $259.

Our big tip for getting a good deal on TRD parts for the Toyota Tundra. Ask for the last model year’s part (as long as the part numbers are the same). Dealers will discount more on a part that’s for an older vehicle than they will for the current model year.

Popularity: 52%

Special Ordering a New Tundra – The Skinny

Here’s the deal with “special ordering” a new Toyota. Technically, it’s possible. Realistically, it’s often too much trouble to bother with.

Toyota, unlike domestic manufacturers, doesn’t build trucks to a dealer’s spec. Instead, before one vehicle is built, Toyota determines the number of red ones, the number of 4×4’s, the number of limiteds, etc. that they’re going to build. As the trucks are produced and sold, Toyota may (or may not) tweak their pre-determined production numbers based on sales rates and commodity availability. Witness the beginning of the 07′ model year — Toyota was producing quite a few regular cab Tundras in a “fleet” configuration because they anticipated a lot of fleet sales. Unfortunately, the demand for reg cabs was low, so Toyota’s first incentive was $1,000 on all regular cab Tundras.

In short, Toyota doesn’t build trucks based on orders. They build trucks based on what they want to build. It’s not a bad system — it’s been working for them for decades — it’s just not the way the “big 3″ do it.

To continue the story…A Toyota dealer gets a build list from Toyota that tells them what trucks they’ll be getting in the next two or three months. If the dealer wants to “order” a truck, they make a special request. Depending upon Toyota’s pre-determined mix, the truck might be built right away, might be built if a certain commodity is in excess, or it might not ever be built. If Toyota has determined the configuration being requested isn’t something they’re willing to build, the order will go unfulfilled. Hence, the term “special order” isn’t really applicable to a Toyota. It’s more accurate to describe it as a “please make this request.”

SO, when a dealer says they’re taking your order for a new Toyota, what they’re ACTUALLY saying is that they’re going to keep an eye open for an inbound truck that matches your specs and try and fill your order that way. They’ll also “preference” an order for your truck, but that may be a meaningless gesture (as explained above). Don’t get us wrong — that’s not a slam on dealers. They’re doing the best they can with the system they have. It’s just not what people think it is.

A lot of people find that when they discuss ordering a new car with a Toyota salesperson, the salesperson seems to be uninterested. The reason salespeople walk away when a person mentions “special order” is that it can take 2-6 months for that unit to come in. Most salespeople have an attention span that is measured in minutes, not months, so they’re not interested in working hard for a deal that might not happen for a few months (if it ever happens).

So what does it all mean? Basically, if you want to order a Tundra, make sure you’re asking for something that’s “normal.” If you want a truck that’s dramatically different than every truck you’re seeing on your local car lot, your chances of getting what you want are pretty slim.

Popularity: 8%

Possible Bed Bounce CURE

Great news! One of our readers, Matthew Davis, has come up with a way to dampen and CURE the Tundra’s bed bounce cheaply and simply — check out his full explanation and PICTURES below:

Hello everyone. I am the owner of a 2007 Tundra double cab 4X4 with the 5.7 engine. I have noticed the bed vibration since shortly after purchasing the truck in July. I had some time on my hands the other day, so I got up under the truck to see if I could identify the source of the vibration. Those of you who own this truck can go and grab the rear bumper and shake it up and down vigorously and you will observe independent motions of the bed and the cab. I began to realize that the frame of this truck has a harmonic frequency with a pivot point between the engine/transmission area and the rear axle area of the frame. (Visualize a guitar string.) You can get into the bed of the truck and stand directly over the rear axle and jump up and down, and you will find that it is almost impossible to make the same vibration that you can easily achieve by applying pulsating pressure to the bumper or open tailgate.

I thought about the idea of attaching some sort of weight to the rear bumper area, but as I considered the idea, I realized that this would only change the frequency of the vibration, but would not necessarily dampen it. It might even make the vibration more intense in the cab. So I thought about the idea of somehow canceling out the harmonics of the frame by creating a dampening device with a slightly different harmonic frequency attached to the area of the frame behind the rear axle as close to the bumper as possible. The logic here is that if you could CAUSE the frame to vibrate from this point, then it should be possible to DAMPEN the vibration from the same point.

I decided to use the spare tire for this purpose so as not to increase the weight of the vehicle. I lowered the spare tire a few inches from the frame, and I cut out two pieces of high density rubber foam and placed them in between the tire and the part of the frame that the tire is pressed against. (I used one of those kneeling pads that you use for working on hard surfaces on your knees.)

The pad:

(Click for larger view)

(Click for larger view)

There are four points at which the tire contacts the frame. I placed the foam on the rear points and let the front portion of the tire remain in its original position against the brackets that prevent the tire from moving forward. I then re-tightened the tire to where the foam was snug between the tire and the frame. (The tire should be tight enough that it does not rattle.) The tire holder at the end of the cable is spring loaded so it will accommodate some slight movement. This setup allowed the tire to “jiggle” slightly up and down, but at a frequency slightly higher than that of the frame harmonic. You can “tune” the frequency of the tire by tightening, or loosening the cable. This effectively canceled out most of the frame harmonic on my truck, and made for an amazingly smoother ride over rough, or washboard surfaces.

View from the left (drivers) side of the spare:

(Click for larger view)

Not enough detail? See another view from the right side.

It is also much more difficult to “shake” the truck from the tailgate area. Likely, when Toyota comes up with some sort of fix for this problem, it will use this, or a similar principle. In the meantime, the ride quality of my truck is much better. You can rest assured, that the springs are not too stiff, the shocks are not defective, the frame is not weak, and the tires do not cause this as long as they are properly balanced, and not out of round. (An out of balance or defective tire could easily magnify the problem, especially at the speed when the RPM’s of the tire match the frequency of the frame harmonic) Hopefully some of you will find this information helpful.

Matthew told us his years of experience owning a metal fabrication shop helped him realize exactly what was going on with the truck and the “bed bounce” effect. I thought it was interesting to read that a stronger metal frame is more likely to have a harmonic vibration than a weak metal frame…maybe that’s the Tundra’s problem. The frame is too strong.

The foam pad Matthew used is about 2″ thick, and its seems to resemble “closed cell” foam. Amazon sells a pad like Matthew used for $19.99, but if you find a better place to buy it please leave a comment below.

Popularity: 12%

Diesel Tundra Update: Diesel Tundra Likely in 2009

UPDATE – This post is out-of-date – see the latest news on the Diesel Tundra for more info.

Isuzu and Toyota made a recent announcement about a diesel they’re developing that shines some light on their development of a diesel Toyota Tundra.

GOOD NEWS: While not specifically having anything to do with the Tundra, Toyota’s recent announcement (see link below) contains some enlightening information. The press release indicates that Toyota and Isuzu can recuperate diesel development costs even if the diesel engine they’ve developed only sells 20k units per year. If Toyota can recover their R&D costs on on such a small number of engines, the sales volume needed to justify producing a diesel variant of the Tundra is probably lower than we estimated in our last discussion of a Diesel Toyota Tundra.

If we conservatively assume that Toyota will need to sell 40k diesel engines per year to cover R&D costs, Toyota only needs to boost Tundra sales by 20% to reach their “break-even” point. In 2006, Dodge sold 150k diesels, GM 200k, and Ford about 320k diesel powered pickups. Granted, some of those vehicles were “fleet” heavy duty offerings that Toyota may not compete with, but if Toyota only reaches 10% diesel market share, they’ll more than break-even on their diesel development costs.

Is this an indicator that Toyota is producing a Diesel Tundra? We think so — Toyota continues to demonstrate interest and investment in the diesel market, and the pending passage of new CAFE regulations requiring better fuel economy encourage Toyota to put more emphasis on diesel technology. Considering that Toyota Vice President Kazuo Okamoto has stated the Tundra is going to be Toyota’s first U.S. diesel, consider this another sign that a Diesel Tundra is coming ASAP.

Why do you think the Diesel Tundra will debut in 2009? The industry consensus is that engine development takes 2 – 3 years. Toyota announced a partnership with Isuzu to develop diesel engines in June of this year, the idea being that Toyota would be able to bring diesel variants to market faster with Isuzu’s help. If R&D for a diesel Tundra began immediately after the partnership with Isuzu was solidified, (which is easy to imagine based on the Tundra’s sales performance this year) that would mean that the Tundra diesel engine will be ready for production in 2009 or 2010. We believe that Toyota will most likely assemble the new Tundra diesel engine from components already available, making 2 years a likely time frame.

How big will the Tundra’s diesel engine be? It’s still a mystery. Toyota may be adapting a diesel for the U.S. from one currently in production somewhere else in the world, or they may be developing a completely new engine. The 2007 Tundra Diesel SEMA concept featured an 8.0L Hino engine, but we doubt that will be the final offering…Ford is planning to offer a 4.4L diesel in the F150 in 2010, and Ford will offer a slightly larger version in their SuperDuty line. Certainly not anything as big as the 8.0L Hino though — such a big engine would only worsen emissions and fuel economy. Expect the Tundra diesel in the 6.0L range, with the possibility that Toyota’s first diesel might be a little smaller than everyone else’s (just like their first V8 was).

We’ll continue to update you about diesel development as more information comes in. Read the press release.

Popularity: 70%

Sweet Zero to Fifty Five Tundra Video

Nice video of Will Travis racing his blue 07′ Reg. Cab.

Find more videos like this on TundraHeadquarters Social Network

I like the smell of burning rubber in the morning. Smells like…victory.

Popularity: 7%