Hello, I just found your site today, it's good to have another source for Cruiser parts and info. Anyway, I have a item for your "Mechanical Tips" page. This is one that stumped 12+ mechanics (including Toyota Dealerships) across Texas. I was outside Dalhart heading East when the engine in my FJ40 started to run bad. It was losing power and misfiring something awful. As I was checking all the usual, I popped the distributor cap to look at the points and found metal bits on the distributor plate. I removed the distributor and found that the shaft had seized up due to the distributor gear breaking the roll pin and lodging against the distributor case. I checked the Cam gear, it was in good shape and turned just fine. I then hitched a ride into Dalhart, found a friendly garage (that wasn't hard), dis-lodged the gear and stripped down the distributor to find that the weight plate components had disintegrated. To cut to the chase, even though I had very good Oil pressure the whole time, it turned out that the Oil Pump gear teeth had started to cup on one side. This caused the pump to hang up enough that it was literally shaking the distributor (3 in 14 days) to death! I mean, Texas is a big state, but it took me 14 days to get from the NM border to Longview. When I finally made it to family in Pensacola, I took it to the local Toyota Dealership, they replaced both the Timing gears and Distributor. 3 days later, the distributor died again, and this time I made them check the Oil Pump against their better judgment. That's when they discovered the pump gears. I learned several things from that trip, among them, 1) How incredibly helpful Texans are and, 2)How to time my FJ40 by ear. If this had happened back home in Colorado, I would've checked the Oil Pump after losing the 2nd distributor. But since I was on the road, I was at the mercy of the mechanics (you really don't want to tell the guy working on your FJ how to do his job!). Every mechanic that looked at her swore that if I had the Oil pressure, there couldn't be anything wrong with the pump. Great Site, Steve Smith, Placerville, CO |
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