I just dropped 4k on a 1997 SR5 3.4L 4x4. The clock said 130,000 and the cheap vin report I ran (through offerup) didnt show any mileage. I didnt even know carfax logged mileage. Thought it was just for accidents. LIVE AND LEARN right?

Anyways I'm invested now. It shows the car was maintained by toyota until 250k and there is zero rust, Thats good news at least.

Timing belt, and water pump replaced at 200k (the timing belt looks good still) but thinking it should be replaced again.

Throttle body serviced at 230k

Engine and power train checked at 260k

But the bad news is the car has roughly 300k now.

I replaced the starter 2 weeks ago and plan to change the plugs tomorrow but I'm not too mechanically inclined so I'm not sure where to start, or how to tell what needs replacing. The motor runs smooth, but transmission is starting to clank after I start moving from a stop, which I read is common on the forum. It just started this after my 1,000 mile Utah trip last week.

I was going to install the 6112 coilovers this weekend but not sure if thats a smart move. I may need to save the money for something big in the future.

I cant sell the car knowing the miles were rolled back, so I think its best to dump money into it and enjoy the ride.

What do you think? Should i start doing preventative maintenance or will I know when shit starts happening it needs to be fixed?

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If you like it then make the best of it. Do the few small things like LBJs, Radiator/trans cooler, plan a timing belt job relatively soon, and do all your fluids. then afterwards move on to the fun stuff! Since the resale value is already screwed up, you should probably try to get the most you can out of it, and it still has a lot more life left in it.

Hopefully you didn't overpay too bad, but there really are worse vehicles for it to happen with. Might as well ride it out, just treat it like a 300k mile vehicle.

I found out my first 4runner likely had a similar rollback at some point in its life. Clock showed 137k when I bought it, a couple years later I decided to run a report, which showed services past 200k miles, oddly enough the jump back to 130 and change at registration didn't trigger any rollback warnings on carfax or autocheck.

At this point I've come to terms that mileage is just a number with these 20+ year old vehicles and that will only become more true as time goes on. My current fleet consists of the rolled back runner that's had so many parts sunk in it doesn't matter, and 2 beautiful 2 owner Toyotas, my original power train 265k mile 02 Taco, and a 97 4runner with 270k that I did a top end rebuild on and am refurbishing.

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I only paid 4k. I just would have gotten a 3rd gen with a locker with high mileage for that price.Thats the only downside.

If you had known the true mileage you may or may not have still bought it for the same price but that's irrelevant. The fact is the mileage was rolled back and the seller either knew it or should have known about it. It's a crime in CA. A friend bought a Ford F250 where somebody had done the same thing - rolled the odo back over 100k miles. He went back to the seller and said "I'll keep the truck but I want $1,500 or I'm going to pursue criminal and civil charges. I will probably prevail in court but even if I don't it's going to cost you a lot more than $1,500." The guy went to the bank and gave him 15 $100 bills. Good luck.

3rd gen runner's odometers cannot be "rolled back". How????

They do break down and can be replaced.

Bummer is they carry the mileage from where ever they were installed previously.

Not sure that has to be disclosed Legally to anyone when vehicle is over 10 years old, at least not in good ol' Tejas! But yeah it would have been 'nice' to know.

On the flip side, they last a very, very long time (compared to all the other crap on the road).

Luck and enjoy the Runner!

I know in PA if there is evidence of odometer tampering or the cluster has been replaced the title has to be branded total miles unknown, not sure about other states

The 97 odometers are mechanical, not digital like the later ones, so it probably could have been rolled back

Been through that before. Are you planning to report the issue to the authorities?

I'm guessing the person who brokered the deal with you is supposedly 1-2 people away from the "real" owner, right? And now that you've uncovered an issue they are aghast, have no idea how it happened, and don't really know how to get in touch with the "real" owner?

On these 3rd gen 4runners and 1st gen Tacomas its pretty easy swap out a cluster in 5-10 minutes. And the analog ones, as any analog, its not hard at all to roll back the miles to whatever you want. I had to swap out the digital odometer cluster on my 99 DD cause of a faulty fuel gauge, so I actually have 57K more on the rig than the cluster shows. Shows 322K but has 379K, I'll never sell it so no problem. On getting an inspection sticker the guy commented to me on the mileage discrepancy, so the DMV is keeping tabs also.
So to be sure on these mileages, check the records trail carefully.

I had the same thing happen when I bought my 4runner. Bought it with "165,000" miles, and a couple weeks later decided to get the Carfax and found out it had service records up to 323,000 miles. I'm somewhere around 360,000 now. I'll never buy the Carfax AFTER I buy a car again. Expensive lesson to learn, but it has ran like a top since I bought it so I can't be too upset.

A little off topic but was the swap plug n play? Any issues with the replacement gauge? I have the same issue with fuel gauge and been going by miles but recently found a donor or two for a swap. I am afraid I will end up swapping in another funky gauge since this seems so common on the 3rd gens.

Gauge swap is simple plug and play. Issue with fuel gauge could be the cluster itself or in the tank sending unit. So as I recall, I think it was 4 years ago when I swapped it out...My gauge would peg either full or empty or something like that and possibly work sometimes. If its the sending unit, symptoms can be different. Fuel gauge issues are not super rare, nor super common.
There are write ups on testing sending unit ohms resistance on the plug under the back seat. Tank isn't hard to remove, but its not fun. I just replaced my fuel pump this Summer as preventive maintenance on the 20 yr old one.

My shop told me it was the gauge cluster. I confirmed it when I replaced the pump last fall.

Mine only goes from full to half.

96-98 have mechanical ODO's that can be rolled back just like any other mechanical ODO. The late electric ODO's can also be rolled back (or corrected to actual mileage) with an EEPROM programmer and a hex editor...

-Charlie

Rest assured the guy who brokered the deal is in on the fraud. Put him on the hook for it unless you want to simply overpay for a high mileage truck.