First time preventative maintenance

So I have a 2001 Tundra (I think its SR5, but I'll have to double check that later on). Anyways, I'm planning on doing a radiator flush as well as replacing all 4 tires. Somewhere down the road, I'm gonna order a lower ball joint for the driver side, but aside from that, I don't know what else to possibly take care of. Any ideas?

 

How many miles are on it?

I have 201,000 on mine and the moment I brought it home I parked it. Got the new LBJ's (lower ball joints) on and one new tie rod.

Will have it rollbacked to a shop for timing belt, water pump, other new tie rod, alignment, new O2 sensors, new radiator, and new rubber boot kit for CV Axle. No idea when that timing belt was last changed so I will not risk starting it again before that's replaced.

 

Here’s a sticky with everything you need to know along with links to the field service manual and owners manual that include all of the requested info https://www.tundras.com/threads/so-you-wanna-buy-just-bought-a-1st-gen-tundra-eh.115928/

 

passenger side has 3-4 10mm nuts that hold on the cover. You can pop it off to see the condition of your belt.

Read the link mamba posted. It'll save you days.

 

For real, it'll also give you warnings.

But if you want to remain ignorant of the many warnings, parts buying info, etc. that will help you avoid mistakes with your preventative maintenance, like which parts are known to be bad news and where to avoid buying parts, you can just jump straight to the "After you buy the truck (or sometimes before)" section. It covers most of the maintenance stuff you need to deal with.

 

Hey all, so I'm working on trying to replace the upstream o2 sensor. I was able to replace the downstream one without an issue. However, it seems like the upstream is stuck. I've tried using liquid wrench on it as well as drove the truck around in order to heat it up. Unfortunately no dice. I did notice that it is possible to remove the cat so that I can get better access to the o2 sensor (unfortunately the sensor is right next to the head of the cat. My question is would it even be possible to remove the cat?

By the way, its the driver side that I need to work on as the o2 sensors on the passenger side are fine (for now).

 

You're liable to snap one of the three studs off the cat, and then you're up the other end of shit's creek.

Upstreams are closer to the heat of the block, and flames coming out of the engine. They're always going to be more difficult to bust free, even in salt-free states. And, especially with the driver's side, getting proper access to apply any leverage on them is difficult. I've seen people on here recommend attemping from above to break it free. I've thought about doing mine, but no direct experience, and in monitoring mine, they seem alright to me, so no pressing issue.

You are using the right tool for the job, correct? This and an 18" breaker bar has usually always worked for me on other vehicles.

​

 

So I do have an o2 sensor socket, but I don't have a breaker bar. Ill go check Harbor Freight to look at their breaker bars. I honestly don't know how much it'll help, but I'm open to giving it a try before I take the truck to my local mechanic so that he can remove it.

 

A breaker bar is a 'must have' tool for working on these vehicles. Good thing is they are inexpensive.

 

Gearwrench makes a great breaker bar. They're readily available, and inexpensive, on scAmazon.

 

Haven't used this myself but if it works good it would be nice to have the adjustable size.
Here's a coupon

 

So small update. The breaker bar is doing better than a regular racket is when it comes to getting at the sensor. The only downside is the fact that there's some kinda metal shield of sorts next to the sensor that's hindering the progress. Hopefully I can get the sensor loosened enough to remove it tomorrow. Also I know that I have some anti seize around, but not sure where I misplaced it (unfortunately that's a common trait for myself). If I have to, I'll just go by Autozone to buy another tube. Thankfully they're affordable.

 

Depending which shield you're talking about, it may be removable.

 

So after spending at least 3 hours on the sensor, I've gotten some ways on it. However, I decided to take a break and put some more liquid wrench on it. Why Toyota doesn't use anti seize on the o2 sensors is beyond me. Maybe they're purposely trying to make the repair harder than it needs to be.

 

It's not just Toyota. You gotta understand, that channel of exhaust is basically getting blasted with hot fire constantly. Then cooling. Then heating. Then cooling. Rinse/repeat thousands of times. Those sections of metal tend to be more prone to rust. It just happens. I bet the majority of members on here, if they showed you the flanges between their exhaust manifold and cat, it'd be wicked rusty. Just goes with the territory. The farther upstream you get, the worse the bolts are.

 

Ok, so I'm gonna go by Home Depot to get myself a propane torch as apparently that'll help to loosen the sensor.

 

Hitting it with heat, then quenching the sensor with Kroil or PB Blaster may help.

 

So I've been using liquid wrench and its just not doing enough damage to loosen it. So I'm gonna get a propane torch to see how well it'll remove it because all the videos ive seen takes it out really quickly (at least way quicker than just liquid wrench does).

 

So bad news. Unfortunately my sensor is one of those few rare ones where the propane torch didn't do enough to loosen the sensor. I still feel like the location of the cat being next to it doesn't help the situation (neither does that metal shield).

 

Try tightening slightly before loosening. Those sensors can be a bitch to replace at high mileage. I used a 2ft flex head with O2 socket on mine but the truck was only at 150k miles. Now I’m at 250k and dreading it.

 

Hey all, so here's my current situation. So I thought that by undoing this area would possibly help me get some leverage in terms of being able to remove the sensor. Unfortunately now the truck won't start. I've circled in this photo where I accidently messed with this 'slot' (for lack of better terms). Anyways, as a result, I can't get the truck to start. Any ideas on what I can possibly do? Should I just wait til Monday to tow the truck to my mechanic? By the way, I recently changed my insurance on my truck because the previous policy didn't come with roadside assistance and so I decided to switch to another company that could include it in the policy.

 

You can see the circular void where the fastener on the slot used to be. Move it back to that spot.

I'm assuming the truck can't understand what gear it's in, so you need to get it back to where it can. For safety reasons, you can only start the truck in P or N.

 

~

91K on my 2005, so soon I will have to take a look at this stuff.




.

 

Hey shifty, just so you know I can't move to back to that spot or else you would've seen it back there. On the gear part, I figured that's what it was. Ill try playing with that tomorrow to see if it'll recognize P or N.

 

Grab a copy of the FSM from the megathread if you don't already have one. I swear it explains how to adjust all that out. I'm fairly sure I saw @The Black Mamba post screenshots from the FSM for that process. Or maybe it was the one for the park-neutral switch. I can't recall.

But never forget Occam's Razor. Backtrack on what parts you touched. Which ones would impact the truck's ability to sense what gear it's in? May not apply here, but it's something to keep in the back of your head.

Another thing to do could be to undo the cable, manually shift the truck all the way to park, verify start is OK, reattach the cable.

 

https://www.tundras.com/threads/dif...double-cab-automatic-4x4.108538/#post-3828929

 

Ok awesome guys. So great news. I did find out that the truck gear was stuck in N, so I moved it to N & it did turn on. Now im taking the truck over to my mechanic to have him replace the sensor & be done with that side. The next month I'll have the other side of sensors replaced so that I can continue to enjoy the truck without that hassle.

 

Hey shifty, so I found out that my mechanic is slammed with work, which means that I'll have to wait til Monday to get it in there. However, upon further investigation, I found out that the piston or whatever that connects to the drive shaft won't move back. I'm wondering if its old and just needs to be replaced. The shaft lever itself was able to move back into P without an issue.

Also I did open the link, but I guess I was just a little confused on it as I didn't really understand what it was trying to say.

 

Hey all, so I've d/c everything and have put the truck in park. However, this is how it currently looks and for some weird reason I can't get everything back into place. Any ideas?

 

Are you saying that you opened the link for the Field Service Manual? You'll need to search it and you’ll need to know specific search terms like "shift control cable", "park/neutral position", ect... Then from there you'll have to hunt. It also includes several flow charts to aid and diagnostic.