Toyota Tundra Hybrid DEAD

Posted by admin (Jason) in January 15th, 2008

Posted in: Tundra Hybrid

Jim Lentz, President of Toyota’s U.S. sales operations, has officially declared the Tundra Hybrid dead. While we had determined that the Tundra Hybrid was due out in 2009 as a 2010 model, Lentz stated that “different models require different types of fuel saving technology…there may be a few [models] where hybrid technology doesn’t make sense“. Lentz then went on to say that diesel engine offerings in the larger vehicles (Tundra and Sequoia) will be both clean and very efficient.

So Toyota’s stated goal of offering a hybrid version of each of their vehicles by 2012 is officially off the table. Some environmental groups are dismayed that Toyota has backed off their plan - Toyota has long been a leader in the field of hybrid drive trains and environmentally friendly vehicles.

As far as we’re concerned, it’s very disappointing to learn that Toyota will simply follow other automakers with their plans to develop light diesel truck engines instead of offering a true hybrid. Of course, if Toyota’s new diesel Tundra (confirmed on Sunday) gets more than 25mpg, we’d learn to live with ourselves…

There is one other possible explanation for this latest announcement…Toyota intends to hide the fact that their new diesel Tundra will also be a hybrid. Here’s to hoping.

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13 comments

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Tundra Fever Said in January 16th, 2008 @9:14 am

R.I.P. Tundra Hybrid.

steve Said in February 12th, 2008 @7:46 pm

have a 2006 single cab long bed tundra
carry a lot of weight , a work shell,
i installed air bags on the rear with a capacity of 5000 lb per pair, no I don’t intend to carry that much weight but the price was not bad around $265.00
I performed the labor, and they sure are nice.

steve

Steve Said in June 10th, 2008 @7:36 am

Why won;t they make a Hybrid??? Chevrolet will have a gas/electric Hybrid Silverado later this year…….

admin (Jason) Said in June 10th, 2008 @11:19 pm

Steve - Toyota believes they can accomplish more of a fuel economy improvement with a diesel than they can with a hybrid. Still, as you say, Toyota shouldn’t concede leadership to GM on this issue.

Hexmate Said in July 7th, 2008 @2:54 pm

Never fear Chevy Silverado has your hybrid.

Hexmate Said in July 7th, 2008 @2:56 pm

Well looky here! The famous Baja 500 begins today in Ensenada, CA, and one of the more interesting dirt racers discovered by our friend Mike Levine at Pickuptrucks.com is the Tundra D-Cab PreRunner from TForce Motorsports. It looks good, has ridiculously huge King off-road racing shocks, and it’s owned by former Indy 500 champ Danny Sullivan, but that’s not what makes this rally racer unique. Power for the PreRunner comes from none other than GM’s LS2 small-block. TForce crew member Matt Riggle told Levine that the team chose the 375-hp, 400 lb-ft powerplant because of its reliability, as well as its ability to run on regular Pemex gas that’s much cheaper than facing fuel.

For the record, Toyota does not sponsor team TForce or its hopped-up PreRunner, but you can imagine that choosing a GM engine over one by Toyota because of reliability isn’t exactly what the folks in Aichi, Japan like hearing.

Mickey Said in July 7th, 2008 @6:21 pm

Hexmate are you calling that silverado or that Tahoe a HYBRID? Hell you call 20mpg a HYBRID? Also GM called two years ago a Silverado as a Hybrid. Lets get the whole story out. Did this truck improve gas mileage? NO it was called a hybrid just to run electrical sockets from the bed of the truck. Chevy is putting alot in marketing Hybrid on a Suburban/Tahoe which only gets 16-20mpg. Hexmate tell me this isn’t so. My neighbor gets better than that with his Suburban with a CAI and a tuner. SO don’t talk the B/S. Also think Hexmate Toyota didn’t sponsor TForce Motorsports so to get backing in it’s powerplant they had to go with GM. That was a smart move on their part. Now who was a seven time champion there and in what? I think the name IRONMAN MIKE rings a bell?

Anonymous Said in July 9th, 2008 @9:09 am

Well Mickey I replied to your comments but the web weenie that calls himself the admin for this site keeps taking them down or censoring me. I can deal with that because a long time ago I learned to be a very patient person. I spent 542 days 3 hours and 12 minutes in Vietnam with the U.S. Army 1st Aviation Brigade at Phu Loi, RVN with a helicopter unit – Call Sign Hexmate. Everything I ever needed to know about life I learned as a helicopter crew member.

My response to your comments is quite simple. The Tahoe is a true hybrid and it gets better than 20 miles per gallon on average with a 24/21 rating which is just about as good as my Z06 which gets 28.5 on the highway and on average around 20 overall. Hey 28.5 on the highway is better than a Camry and the Z has 505 ponies! The advantage the Tahoe has is it can haul 6000 lbs and you can load it up with a bunch of stuff and people – can’t do that with the Vette. I’m sorry I don’t follow you on the electrical sockets on the Silverado. Who is this Ironman Mike? Is he Dale Earnhardt’s cousin or Mario Andretti’s nephew or something?

Hexmate Said in July 9th, 2008 @11:57 am

The above comments did not come anybody named anonymous, they came from Hexmate.

Mickey Said in July 9th, 2008 @2:49 pm

Ironman Ivan Stewart won 7 bahas in a toyota. I’m, sorry wrong first name. I was talking to my neighbor as I was typing this. His name is Mike. I got those mpg’s straight off the Tahoe Hybrid winshield sticker, which was on display down in Daytona for the Coke Zero 400. I was there. EPA stated 16-20mpg. So I’m not sure where you are getting your figures. Now for the Silverado two years ago was for the Daytona 500 which it was on display but mpg was the same as the regular Silverado. The only thing that was pointed out was this truck’s capability to help the construction worker i.e. home builder by running power tools from the bed instead of a generator. The truth that was a good idea but to most people that was misleading because people don’t fully understand the word Hybrid. They relate it to Honda and Toyota for mpg’s not charging batteries to run electrical tools. from the bed of a truck. The last several years GM and Toyota been heavily committed in displaying what each other has at the races. Hell what got me going was in 06 at Daytona when I first seen an Intimidator SS. My wife liked it alot and we left to find one. Only to find that they wanted you to buy a truck without looking and even test driving it. The truck ran different the a regular SIlverado because of the different suspension and motor involved. So I wanted to test drive one to make sure before dropping $45,000 on a truck. But we happened to come across an LT3 which had LT1 and LT2 features in it. It was balck with dark grey leather and Bose. So the wife was happy with that since it was February at 8pm and the heated seats made her comfortable and her words were “Sold”. So she bought it. We should’ve waited like I was planning but the truck had all features I wanted and was very close to the SS model so I was okay with it. I would be still in a Silverado if my 98 wasn’t hit from behind and pushed me into a city bus which killed the truck. It was a plain ext cab 3rd door which was two tone Black and pewter down low. Grey cloth interior but ran like a top. fix an a/c fan blower at 800 miles and next thing replaced was an alternator at 95,000 and a/c compressor went bad at 98,000. So you can’t beat that. It was wrecked at 108,000. It was customer service and that pushed so hard to get rid of me which did me in. To be asked if I owned another GM product had nothing to do with fixing the truck’s headliner. I was asked that question everytime I called customer assistance. I got so pissed at GM I traded the truck in and sold my 78 Camaro LT to get rid of every GM product I owned. I will not be treated as well as anyone should not be treated that way when you put out so much money for a vehicle. To be accused by a factory rep for pulling down my headliner 3x just didn’t make my day when I took a day off from work and loss over $200 that day for missing work. If I do come across a 57, 69 camaro, or 72 Chevelle I won’t pass it up if the price is right. But you won’t hear me bragging about GM either.