Hello. I just bought a 1st gen about a month ago. it was a good price so I took it. the body is banged up but still straight, clearly been crawling, but that's np. since that's what i'll be doing

The major issue I have is most of the instrument panel doesn't work. I have the back lights, turn signals, speedo/odo, and charge light. NOTHING else works here. Biggest problem is no fuel gauge, I can live without the rest. I've pulled it off and used my multimeter to check continuity though the circuit board on back, all looks good, the bulbs are all good. (swapped em all with the charge light that does work), I haven't been able to find a specific power supply to check, but with what does work I figure thats probably okay.

Rear window problem, i've been reading around and it looks like it's probably the relay box. the previous owner however wired directly to a new switch on the dash, so I'm not too worried about this one, but it'd be nice to have it working factory type. When the relay is hooked up I occasionally get a horrible buzzing noise coming from it, so I just pulled it out to use the hard wires.

Major hesitation. when it's cold it has a hard time starting, (once again previous owner hard wired the CSI to a switch on the dash, so he could have an aftermarket temp gauge?? it works, and it sucks, but I don't like it) after it has started it's really really slow until it's warmed up. I think my old Big Wheel could out accelerate this thing when cold. it does have some lifter noise, but I don't see why this would cause a problem. TPS is good and has been correctly adjusted (have a few friends who work at Toyota, but they're all stumped). Did a tune up when I got it, plugs, cap and rotor I got direct from toyota, (they didn't have wires, go figure) got the wires from local parts store as well as fuel filter. went with mobil 1 full synthetic motor oil, and changed the fluids out in the transmission, transfer case and both diffs, with what my friends said toyota uses, can't remember exactly.

4cyl 22RE 5spd manual not SR5, i forgot what they called those.

any input would be apprecitated.

Gas gauge problems are usually the sending unit in the tank. A lot of times cleaning the winding with electrical contact cleaner will help.
As to your warmup problems, have you tried pulling codes from the ECM? Could be one of the temp sensors has a problem. And it sounds like the PO's butchering of the wiring may not be helping.

DLX ??

Congrats on your new 4runner!

I feel your pain as far as the problems of previous owners messing with everything. I have random wires going all over the place on my 4runner and I am slowls fixing things and pulling the extra wires out of the truck. There has been a handful of redneck engineering on these things and it pisses me off! Why can't people fix things the right way? (end rant)

Thanks for the input. the fuelpump/sender has been replaced a couple of times. by the previouse owner and likely due to previous owners "butchering". I haven't been able to pull any codes because I don't know anyone who has a scan tool that can check codes without a working check engine light *sigh* The computer temp sensor I replaced myself with some very noticable improvement. It was even worse before. I also ran a bottle of heet through the tank, I did have a water in the fuel lines that was freezing over night. I don't know if maybe i've got more now or what. I've checked compression 120, 110, 110, 115. which if I've read up correctly is acceptable. I will clean the connections on the sender though. sounds simple enough

The fuel gauge sending unit should measure about 3 ohms in 'full' position and about 110 ohms in 'empty' position, measured from pin 1 to pin 3 of the connector at the tank. Measure it in the tank first. If it's anywhere in between 3-110 ohms it means the unit isn't totally dead.
If it's not working at all it may not be worth pulling the sender to clean the windings.

The fuel gauge in the cluster should measure the following (approximate) resistances between the following terminals on the back:

for cluster w/tach -
IG-FU - 83 ohms
FU-E - 156 ohms
IG-E - 239 ohms

for cluster w/o tach-
1-2 - 55 ohms

Okay so I got out the ohmmeter again and started checking. their are only two wires coming off the fuel sender so I tested both of them 2ohms, the tank is full so that sounds resonable. I tested on the cluster and (no tach) and had 55.6 ohms, when I was putting the cluster back in I noticed a burned wire. I couldn't see where it went, but using my ohmmeter again found that it did connect to the cluster. Everything that didn't work on my cluster runs, at some point, through this wire. Using a bit of wire I ran from the battery hooked everything up and had a christmas tree on my dash . so I patched in a new wire. (still couldn't find the other end, must have burned a long way back) and now everything except the 4WD lights work. Most importantly I have a fuel gauge, which should make the drive to Moab a little less stressful. and I have a temp gauge, which means I can get rid of the aftermarket one and locate a cold start switch. I still have some severe hesitation when cold, but I'm hoping a cold start switch will help with that too.

One thing I noticed though on my test drive is going around corners the fuel gauge dips to about half full, then slowly works it's way back up. Is this normal? or do I have another issue?

Thanks for all the help, I'm even happier with my 4Runner now.

Mine changes going up/down hills, it's just the gas sloshing around. At least it works
The 3rd wire from the sender is for the low fuel idiot light on some models.

Thank you. Thought I might have had some other issue going on there.

Mike

Not sure if this is exactly the place to ask but hopefully somebody can point me in the right direction. I recently bought an 87 4Runner and the guy who owned it before me installed a fuel pump that needs to be switched on/off manually. Can anybody tell me how I can get everything with it returned to stock?