Fording water

[Friedom]

I was driving my lady's '14 T4RTEPE to dinner one night and it had been raining pretty hard, so I took her to some places where I know the streets pond up with water to splash around.
When we got to our destination, I discovered that the silver premium edition bumper cover piece in the center of the front bumper was missing..
I'm sorry to say I don't have pictures. Thought it was an anomoly. We went back to the water, found the piece, took it to the dealership to take up the question of why our brand new "trail edition" 4runner was so easily damaged by driving through 12" of standing water.
They talked to Toyota about it, who proclaimed that we had an accident.
That didn't touch any other part of the truck..
Eventually they came through and replaced it, and haven't thought about it since.
Yesterday, though, I was playing around in my '11 TE and went through one pool of water twice. Not high speed or really anything extravagant, but when I got home, I noticed my license plate bent out in the same location in front.


It appears that the 5th gen design will slosh a whole lot of water up over and under that area. Anyone else have an experience like this? I'm kind of not impressed that something so rugged and capable could also be so flimsy for crossing a moderate amount of water.

 

[jicko]

Not all 5th gen. 5th gen mid-cycle refresh fixed that. That portion had been redesigned for 2014+

 

[Orc]

You shouldn't go through high water anyhow, you can wash out grease and get things wet that shouldn't. If I recall the rear axle can be ruined by high water on the tacomas.

 

[BobsTrail]

Water

I think I will skip the fun and keep going slow.
This was deep enough for water to hit the fan and I had muddy splatters on the top engine cover.

_______________________________________________

 

[bythehour]

You shouldn't go through high water anyhow, you can wash out grease and get things wet that shouldn't. If I recall the rear axle can be ruined by high water on the tacomas.

That there is gonna stir some outrage.

We drive mighty 4runners, not Jeep Wranglers.


Why Did A New Jeep Wrangler Die In Ten Inches Of Water?

 

[Jeremy556]

If you bent your license plate you were going way too fast, lucky you didn't splash water into your air intake.

 

[1engineer]

Hm. I drove my '12 TE through lots of water and never bent or broke anything. I did keep it under 55 mph though...
Sounds like you might have some unreasonable expectations.

 

[Lexusbstrdchild]

Hm. I drove my '12 TE through lots of water and never bent or broke anything. I did keep it under 55 mph though...
Sounds like you might have some unreasonable expectations.

Obviously this was the problem, the OP needed to be going faster than 88 mph. This way Marty would skip across the water instead of breaking parts off his 4R.

 

[Intruder]

Good thing I got a front bumper otherwise I'd have tons of damage. Seriously, unless this water was colder than 32F you probably hit it going too fast - you can tell by the water drops coming off the hood. Just like doing a belly flop off the high dive as opposed to the edge of the pool.

20130627-IMG_2947.jpg by RickaShay24, on Flickr
20130626-IMG_2906.jpg by RickaShay24, on Flickr

 

[TOY2G]

Had the same thing happen on my sequoia, it's just the water (wave) being pushed in front of your truck. The hydraulic pressure pushes the plate out, mine made it nearly 90 degrees also. When you are pushing water, it has to go someplace, and since it cannot go down, and it cannot go throught you plastic bumper, it forces it way up, bending your plate in the process.

 

[High_Country]

Ditto all said above. I'm guessing for the OP this was more of a puppy-like romp and jump and splash around type activity than a calculated fording of a stream in order to get somewhere.

OP - if you expect to be fording water in the future, watch a few YouTube videos or do some research on how best to do it to mitigate the risks. 4-5mph is about tops. You'll learn about a 'bow wave' and how not to travel faster than it.

As shown by [MENTION=66300]Intruder[/MENTION], 4Runners are more than capable of going through some wet stuff.

 

[phillyd2]

Given enough speed hitting water is the same as hitting a brick wall :frusty:

If you want to go fast then the water can't be that deep. If going into deeper water you must do as the others suggested and make a bow wave - simple really but the key is to keep moving at a slow steady pace. See Bob's picture to see what it should look like.

 

[ben550]

I used to drive my jeep cherokee through every puddle and stream crossing i could find... now i stop, try to find a way around, get out, check the water level, and crawl through in my 4runner... don't want to abuse it.

 

[Intruder]

I used to drive my jeep cherokee through every puddle and stream crossing i could find... now i stop, try to find a way around, get out, check the water level, and crawl through in my 4runner... don't want to abuse it.

Yup, never know what's going to be at the bottom of that murky puddle and dirty water is bad for almost every moving part on your truck that it gets into.

 

[1engineer]

I used to drive my jeep cherokee through every puddle and stream crossing i could find... now i stop, try to find a way around, get out, check the water level, and crawl through in my 4runner... don't want to abuse it.

I did too. Until I got older...and theoretically wiser.

 

[KidVermicious]

I don't think this thread is going in the direction the OP and TruckUV wanted.

 

[Plano26]

or you can do it old man style...sloooowwww

 

[Curly Jefferson]

I was driving my lady's '14 T4RTEPE to dinner one night and it had been raining pretty hard, so I took her to some places where I know the streets pond up with water to splash around.
When we got to our destination, I discovered that the silver premium edition bumper cover piece in the center of the front bumper was missing..
I'm sorry to say I don't have pictures. Thought it was an anomoly. We went back to the water, found the piece, took it to the dealership to take up the question of why our brand new "trail edition" 4runner was so easily damaged by driving through 12" of standing water.
They talked to Toyota about it, who proclaimed that we had an accident.
That didn't touch any other part of the truck..
Eventually they came through and replaced it, and haven't thought about it since.
Yesterday, though, I was playing around in my '11 TE and went through one pool of water twice. Not high speed or really anything extravagant, but when I got home, I noticed my license plate bent out in the same location in front.


It appears that the 5th gen design will slosh a whole lot of water up over and under that area. Anyone else have an experience like this? I'm kind of not impressed that something so rugged and capable could also be so flimsy for crossing a moderate amount of water.

To me it looks like you have two (2) GoPro mounts on the front of your bumper, one below the plate and one above the plate? I noticed they are missing in your other photobucket pictures. Do you have videos of these water crossings?

If so perhaps we could see them and offer some insight?

 

[vailTRD]

Jesus. You all sound like a bunch of soccer moms. Op was just havin some fun with his 4R. He wasnt in a camry.

 

[1engineer]

Jesus. You all sound like a bunch of soccer moms. Op was just havin some fun with his 4R. He wasnt in a camry.

Pay to play. Don't b i t c h when something breaks.
Signed, soccer mom.