I bought my 2000 LTD back in mid-december and have had some minor hiccups dealing with needed maintenance. Major things being a fuel pump going bad, then two weeks after that was fixed, a shift solenoid went out (P0753) and I changed out all three solenoids and two weeks after that, I got another code (P0770) for the lock-up solenoid.

Im hoping that it is just the solenoid since i replaced all three and the fluid. Luckily, I still have the original OEM one which wasnt bad. So much I want to do with my Runner but I cant seem to keep it running!

Not sure why people are trippin. Show me another 14-20 year old 4x4 that you don't have to replace things on? I've had to replace solenoids amongst many other things too. Par for the course IMO.

OP, don't sweat this stuff. Do your maintence and address things one at a time. After a little while — you'll be rolling easy.

How many miles?

Btw any vehicle with more than 150K miles is going to be susceptible to some issues and there is of course wear and tear.

By the time you get to 200K miles well its probably not a good vehicle for a DD.

These third gens are great and far more reliable than most other older vehicles but that doesn't mean you wont have issues.

Try to take one to 200K, maybe 250K miles and all of these will have been replaced:

Rear axle seals and bearings
Steering rack, bushings, tie rods
CV Boots (not CVs)
Front brakes and calipers
Complete Suspension
Ball joints upper and lower
Valve cover gaskets
Sunroof motor lol
Spark plugs
Wires
Fuel filter
O2 sensors
Exhaust
Radiator (do this by 200k to prevent the PinkM)

And that is pretty much best case for a 250K mile truck.

But even with all that it is a great truck. You can do much of the maintenance yourself and if you have to pay someone to do it, well its A LOT cheaper to fix a 3rd gen than a 4th or 5th gen.

Good post Brian

I think I've been lucky with my steering rack up till now (~230k miles, I don't drive her much)...

I do have poly bushings in there.

What is a symptom of it going bad?

Usually the truck feeling like it is wandering all over the road is a symptom.

I only go offroading a few times (2-3) a year but that has no doubt contributed to the wear and tear.

Btw everything on my list is something I actually had to fix on my truck. But I am rather picky and prefer it drive like a nice truck. I don't want it to drive like a truck with 240K miles.

I've had a few "odd" repairs like my steering rack and brake booster. But at 211,XXX miles and still my DD I love the truck. If I think about the trips I've done, places I've seen, and the work I've put this thing through then it's been an awesome truck.

On the steering rack, did you ever replace your guide rack roller with the newer guide bushing? On pre-01 it usually cures the wandering steering feeling.

Is there more info on this? It's worded like it's been talked about, but I haven't seen anything about it.

Thanks!

How to: Replace steering rack guide- Pictures

just got my parts in to do this as well!

Photos of me checking mine on the last page of my 4gunner thread in my sig. Since mine are 01-02, they have the latest and the parts you would want to order. My instructions are FAR better and more accurate than what toyota says to do which will always end up being to tight.

Learn to wrench on your own car and stuff like this starts becoming incredibly fun, believe it or not I have had a lot of fun in retrospect. Of course during the time I'd be swearing till my throat hurt but in the end I'd be pretty satisified that I fixed it. Just my 0.2 cents.

Thanks!

Most of the trucks on here are 6 cyl, 4wd and live in rust country.

I wonder how much the prediction changes for 2wd four bangers in warmer climes?

Mine as been throwing the P0770 for awhile now. I swapped out the shift solenoid with an OEM toyota one (luckily I work at a toyota dealership), Still keeps coming on, Leaning me to a problem with the actual torque converter. I just removed the torque converter to replace the oil pump seal in the trans hoping that the solenoid would fix the problem. It didnt. So ive been putting off replacing the torque converter because I had recently just removed it once. Such a pain.

With older car/trucks bigger problems arise and more of them. If the problems become too much to handle then purchase a newer car/truck that in theory should have less problems to address.