Well. This one is so new I haven’t even had a chance to really figure out what happened. I have a 86 4Runner 22RTE, manual swap, SAS and so on. Driving yesterday it started making a bad sound. I haven’t dug into it yet but I’m fairly sure it’s the motor and it’s catastrophic… if you were in my shoes what would you do? I can swing in another 22, or upgrade/swap. I don’t have the space to house either one though… anyway. Just looking for thoughts at this point.
22RTE Just blew up.
- Thread starter SMKent
- Start date
LS of course
Lastresort576
Hard Core 4+
K-Swap the world..with boost
DaveInDenver
Rising Sun Ham Guru
Assuming this is the normal kind of catastrophic failure, the timing chain, I actually did walk in your shoes.
First thing is verify for sure it is truly super bad.
The most common failure is the timing. It's easy to know. Take off the valve cover and look down the front of the engine with a flashlight.
The normal failure is the owner lets the timing go too long without inspection, the guides wear out or break and the timing chain can then wear through the timing cover or flop around and skip.
If you wore through the cover and ran it that way then coolant and oil mixes and this is bad news for the engine since you may have damaged the crank bearings.
If it just jumps, then you can crunch valves but if you've lived right and gone to Church the damage is only top end.
In the second case I'd personally refresh the head, probably have to replace a couple of bent valves, new guides, grind the seats, new head gasket, new timing and Bob's Your Uncle. You could go all out with a whole new head rebuild and even that wouldn't be too expensive.
If you did ruin the bottom end then the cost might start to make it worthwhile to swap. Since you're already running a factory turbo you could do a mild rebuild and keep it reasonable, though. If it was me I'd stick with the 22RTE, low drag, high speed quickie rebuild.
As for swaps, yeah LS or Vortec but for my money I'd go 2.7L 3RZ from a Tacoma. It's got enough power, super reliable, still Toyota and appropriate for the drivetrain and truck to avoid breaking other stuff.
You might be lucky and it wasn't timing (though I doubt it). A blown headgasket isn't unusual at all. Maybe spun bearing. Can't really think of too many other typical ways to blow up a 22R in a way that surprises you.
First thing is verify for sure it is truly super bad.
The most common failure is the timing. It's easy to know. Take off the valve cover and look down the front of the engine with a flashlight.
The normal failure is the owner lets the timing go too long without inspection, the guides wear out or break and the timing chain can then wear through the timing cover or flop around and skip.
If you wore through the cover and ran it that way then coolant and oil mixes and this is bad news for the engine since you may have damaged the crank bearings.
If it just jumps, then you can crunch valves but if you've lived right and gone to Church the damage is only top end.
In the second case I'd personally refresh the head, probably have to replace a couple of bent valves, new guides, grind the seats, new head gasket, new timing and Bob's Your Uncle. You could go all out with a whole new head rebuild and even that wouldn't be too expensive.
If you did ruin the bottom end then the cost might start to make it worthwhile to swap. Since you're already running a factory turbo you could do a mild rebuild and keep it reasonable, though. If it was me I'd stick with the 22RTE, low drag, high speed quickie rebuild.
As for swaps, yeah LS or Vortec but for my money I'd go 2.7L 3RZ from a Tacoma. It's got enough power, super reliable, still Toyota and appropriate for the drivetrain and truck to avoid breaking other stuff.
You might be lucky and it wasn't timing (though I doubt it). A blown headgasket isn't unusual at all. Maybe spun bearing. Can't really think of too many other typical ways to blow up a 22R in a way that surprises you.
I apreciare these tips very much. I will, unfortunately, be out of town for about two weeks so can’t do much about this other than send it to a shop.
I guess if I get lucky it will end up just being something fairly simple… In the grand scheme of these things…
Trapper50cal
Trail Ready
1GR-FE??
DaveInDenver
Rising Sun Ham Guru
Interesting.
Starting with a 22RTE means he’s got a R151 and not a W56 or G52 transmission. That only means sharing the bell housing with a 3VZ, 5VZ and 3RZ with the t-case of a 22R. It’s the ideal unicorn for a swap to one of those, not to mention a Marlin double case...
I like my 1GR a lot but swapping to it isn’t less work than an LS, etc. Might as well throw the 2UZ in the mix at that point.
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J1000
Rising Sun Member
Engine swaps add more complexity and cost in CO, especially in Denver. It is factory turbo which is rare and also means you can have a beast of an engine and still be emissions legal. I'd say rebuild it for big boost and turn it up!
I’m not against this. all of these suggestions lead to a question of what shop could do this for me. I simply do not have the time for it this summer.
White Stripe
Hard Core 4+
I would consider a 5vz swap. Can always add a supercharger
DaveInDenver
Rising Sun Ham Guru
Depends on what you're doing, budget and time.
Finding a shop to rebuild an engine is probably going to be fairly difficult but timeline could see you using the truck still this summer.
Finding one to do a swap even harder and I'd be thinking more like summer 2024 for it to be done and debugged.
Tasty.White Stripe said:
But no matter, he's already got the uber cool factory turbo!