RUST issues?

M

MsLinda

Member
Have you had rust problems on your Tacoma frame?

In our research on a used Tacoma Prerunner (going to test drive a 2000 Tacoma Prerunner tonight) I see some recalls and rust concerns listed on the NHTSA site. I'm now reading through all the compaints (133 of them). Now I'm worried about rust issues. Yikes... I'm hoping this rust issue is only a problem in areas where there is a lot of moisture, snow, ice etc... not here in the California valley.

How much stock do you put into the online complaints? Better yet... are you happy with your own older Toyota Tacoma?

Should I just plain avoid the 2000 Tacoma Prerunner that we're supposed to look at today? It's so good lookin' online. :)

Thank you!

Linda
 
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It all depends, I know one member here (Byrd) lost his prerunner to rust. Really you just need to inspect the under carriage really well. Make sure there is no sign of serious rust and you should be fine.
 
What I know about the rust issue is from reading about it. But ... I read about it for hours and hours. It was just fascinating to me. It fascinated me that a an excellent major auto manufacturer with decades of experience could fail so massively in such a critical area. Also, I was planning to buy my first Tacoma so I read and read and read.

What I learned is that it is an extremely serious issue of rusting of the truck's frame. It can get bad enough to make a truck structurally fail. I read stories and saw photos of how trucks literally broke in half.

It affected a significant number of trucks.

It happened during a certain time period. I can't remember that time period?

There was a recall on them, but if I'm not mistaken that's over now??? Whoever still has a rusting truck is stuck with it???

Rust isn't always uniform. It could be worse in one spot or another. It can be hidden from casual inspection.

Some people will put rust proofing over it but that may not stop the rust once it started. Some people will put rust proofing over it only to hide the rust.

Anyway, take what I write with a grain of salt. I'm no expert. Just communicating stuff that might open new avenues into your research.

Good luck.
 
Rust? Yeah, plenty of it

Posted these over at TW, but apparently poor design and not removing the truck parts on a monthly/weekly basis is my fault :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

Nonetheless, rust on 2005+ taco frames as is still very much an issue. For that, Toyota sucks balls.
 

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Don't know what I'm doing wrong but I can't get the pictures to show, even after resizing. Will try photobucket next. Does photobucket still exist? It's been a while...
 
Thewarriordinghy said:
Would georgia weather rust it out?
Click to expand...

It's humid down there...

Honestly, who the heck knows. Every vehicle I've owned for the past 35 years had some type of undercoating on the frame. Never really had to wonder/worry if it was going to rust away beneath a unblemished/undamaged body.
 

Frame delaminating on the passenger side



Frame below drivers seat


Passenger side of the boxed part of the frame, roughly the same area as the drivers side from above.
 


My "favorite" :icon_eek:

The rear bumper reinforcement bar. The step pad covers this part. Was quite shocked to find how bad this was eaten away.
 
Some info:

Bought the truck brand new in Nov 2004, 3rd 05 tacoma sold by the local dealer at that time. Truck has 59k. I drove it regularly up until 2009-2010, then gave it to my dad. It was mostly used to make trash runs (no curbside pickup where they live) and for weekly golf course runs. Sat in his garage otherwise. He gave it back to me in December 13 after he bought a new Silverado. We use it as a third vehicle now since I use a Sierra for work. Nothing wrong anywhere on the body, paint looks as good as it did in 04, interior too. Underneath and inside the engine compartment....
 
must be lucky here in NC ..so far so good :thumbsup::thumbsup: no rust concerns on my '08..and hopefully never will be
 
Update:

Got my bumper bar yesterday so started taking the rear end off. Original plan was to drop the hitch to wire wheel it and paint it, but I started breaking the tacks on the frame nuts and most of the bolts were binding even with PB spray, so I had to stop and fix it on the truck.



I broke 5 of the bolts holding the bumper shell on the bar. While I was working on the hitch, I also cleaned up the bumper (chrome was showing rust on the bottom edge) and dipped it. After doing the hitch, I installed the new bar, then put the shell on, followed by the trim. The trim caps on the ends i couldn't get off, nuts were rusted and the bolt heads hide up in pockets on the plastic. I like the black, thinking about doing the fender flares as well.

 
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