It seems like my 88 4runner is falling apart. Here is what's going on...

1) Truck doesn

check the air intake tube and rubber boots, it solved an idle problem on my 86 runner. also make sure that all of the vaccume lines are in good shape, as our trucks get older the rubber lines dry out and crack. i would suggest to get the FACTORY toyota 4runner manuels, they will be most helpful...good luck

Corey

Thanks, i already have a few factory manuals, but I

The Toyota factory service manual has a pretty good trouble shooting guide, and will have you check all of the sensors with a digital multi meter. Have you looked at the spark plugs, do they show signs of a rich fuel mixture? How new are the plugs, wires, etc? The way I found my problem was when I moved the airflow meter with my finger the RPM went up, that is when I took off the air hose and checked for holes. If there is a leek in the air hose the engine can't pull the right amount of air across the airflow meter, if it can't then the ECM will not schedule the right amount of fuel. If your spark plugs have a dark sooty appearance, then you may have an enriched fuel mixture, which could be a leaky cold start injector, or one of the four other injectors. Back to the lack of air, you may also have a bad air flow meter

Thanks i'll check out the air flow meter, and it is good to know about the gas. the owner before me had no air filter in it when i bought it but he said it had only been out for like a week or two tops. do you think this could have messed up my air sensors?

Oh my spark plugs and wires have all been replaced, the old ones looked ok. I heard that spraying a quick squirt of carb cleaner or something very flammable into the throttle when engine in running is a way to tell if it is running lean, i did this and idle cleared right up and ran perfect for about 1 sec, the a few days later i did it again and engine ran so bad it almost died for about 1 sec, so am i alternating between rich and lean?

I will look in my manual on the airflow meter checkouts and send them to you; you will need a digital multi meter. When you start the engine does the idle go up for a bit and then slowly go down, if not you may have a bad aux air valve. One of the problems on mine was that it was hard to start, but once it warmed up it would run ok then I discovered the large gash in the air hose coming from the air box; this is what kept the engine from idling correctly. You may also have one or some bad injectors; I will send you the check out steps for those as well. I still would go to a Toyota dealer and order the Factory engine manual for your year 4runner, it will have all the steps in an easy to follow format. The book is about 300 pages long and runs about $30-$40.

Corey

the click when you start it is probly a bad starter solenoid. My 89 did the same thing changed the Starter and it went away