I'm thinking about going to look at a 93 3.0 that has a blown headgasket. Current owner claims it ran pretty solid prior to this and says body/interior are pretty good. Little to no rust. He is asking $900 for it. I know its hard to tell without seeing it first hand, but is that price worth it for a fixer upper project? Or would I lose money? What should I look for to tell if the engine is worth repairing? Thanks!
Is it worth it?
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the_dingman
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If the body's in good shape, and you can handle replacing the HG yourself, go for it. I got my '87 with a shot transmission 4 years ago for $800. Best purchase I've ever made.
That's what I am afraid of. I'm not really in the position to lose my money on the thing, but if I could get it back on the road again, give it some TLC and maybe sell or keep it down the road that would be great.
You think if the engine is shot, I could still make it back in parts? At least its a manual trans. My 94 has been wanting to become a manual for a while
So, I went and looked at the beast. Body looked nice. A little bit of rust from chipped paint and frame had some minimal rusting. Interior was good for the most part. A few flaws. Story is that they were driving down the road from the mountains and all of a sudden there was serious engine knock. It was turned off and towed home. A mechanically inclined friend started it once after and said it was a bad head gasket.
Did not show other obvious signs of a bad head gasket. No overheating, no coolant in the oil, no smoke, etc. What do you guys think? I'm not completely versed in engines, but I'd lean toward something like a rod knock. Seems like the price can budge a bit (hopefully a lot). Guy is going through a divorce and offloading everything. I'm looking for a project, but this might be more than I want to take on. How hard is it to hunt down the cause of something like that and would the block even be usable?
Did not show other obvious signs of a bad head gasket. No overheating, no coolant in the oil, no smoke, etc. What do you guys think? I'm not completely versed in engines, but I'd lean toward something like a rod knock. Seems like the price can budge a bit (hopefully a lot). Guy is going through a divorce and offloading everything. I'm looking for a project, but this might be more than I want to take on. How hard is it to hunt down the cause of something like that and would the block even be usable?
spencergt66
New member
If you take the vin of a 4runner with the 3.0 to any toyota dealership and they can run it to see if the head gaskets have been done. If they have not, the dealership has to do it under warrrenty set forth by a campaign (aka recall) set by Toyota. If you vehicle applies, its no charge to you
Went for another look yesterday. It is a rod knock and sounds pretty bad. It has had head gaskets done already according to the dealership. A closer inspection in better light reveals a home brewed paint job that is starting to chip/peel in a couple spots. Peeled a little spot off and it was lots of rust underneath. So, body not so good after all. I left him with an offer of $400 which I'm sure he won't go for, but we will see. On the upside there is another more promising 1st gen in my area that I might just go for. Always wanted one of those
SUBTEGRAL
Banned
Even if my 4Runner is 24 years old?
SCRunner12
New member
Not the 1st gens. Those were excluded from the recall.
