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patinthehat

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Hello all. I am looking at buying a T4R and after doing some research on one, I found your forum. I have been pouring over the buyer's guide and have a couple questions i was hoping you all could answer. I found a '98 T4R Limited 4WD Supercharged with ~175k miles. The dealer is a couple hours away so I have been relying on pictures so far. It looks to be in very very good condition and has a clean title with a very respectable price. Now my guess is he (the dealer) bought this at auction and does not know the maintenance history of the vehicle so I need to know what to be on the lookout for. I do have a little mechanical knowledge so I shouldnt be completely lost but I do have a couple questions.

1. Strawberry Milkshake: without maintenance records, is there any way to tell if anything has been done to fix/hide this problem?

2. Supercharger: It has the Gen 1 supercharger installed. How do i know if the 7th injector kit has been installed?

3. Supercharger: I saw where the nose cones wear out after about 100k miles. How do i know how many miles are on the supercharger?

Is there anything else i should be on the lookout for? It seems that i have found a real gem but i don't want to get taken advantage of. I really like the T4R as it is a very dependable vehicle and will go forever if taken care of. Sorry for the long post and i look forward to your responses. Thanks for the help!!
 
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patinthehat said:
Hello all. I am looking at buying a T4R and after doing some research on one, I found your forum. I have been pouring over the buyer's guide and have a couple questions i was hoping you all could answer. I found a '98 T4R Limited 4WD Supercharged with ~175k miles. The dealer is a couple hours away so I have been relying on pictures so far. It looks to be in very very good condition and has a clean title with a very respectable price. Now my guess is he (the dealer) bought this at auction and does not know the maintenance history of the vehicle so I need to know what to be on the lookout for. I do have a little mechanical knowledge so I shouldnt be completely lost but I do have a couple questions.

1. Strawberry Milkshake: without maintenance records, is there any way to tell if anything has been done to fix/hide this problem?

2. Supercharger: It has the Gen 1 supercharger installed. How do i know if the 7th injector kit has been installed?

3. Supercharger: I saw where the nose cones wear out after about 100k miles. How do i know how many miles are on the supercharger?

Is there anything else i should be on the lookout for? It seems that i have found a real gem but i don't want to get taken advantage of. I really like the T4R as it is a very dependable vehicle and will go forever if taken care of. Sorry for the long post and i look forward to your responses. Thanks for the help!!
Click to expand...

It's in Chattanooga isn't it? That is a nice looking 4runner and I have actually toyed with the idea of buying it and selling my 97. I can't help you with the supercharger info, but with the milkshake, look to see if it has a new radiator. That's a sure indication that someone had the milkshake and then sold it right after they fixed it.
 
it is in Chattanooga lol. figured someone local to this area would be able to figure that out pretty easily. it is really clean from the pics. I will definitely check out the radiator. Thanks!
 
If you can get the VIN, be sure and run a carfax on it. They aren't foolproof but if you see an accident or the milesage is off, that's a red flag.

You can also get maintenance history if it was done at a Toyota dealer. They go back about 5 years. Register at Toyota Owners Official Web Site: Service Coupons, Owner's Manuals, Service Scheduling And More and enter the VIN. It will give you history. Maybe that should be in the buyer's guide thread, if it isn't already.
 
the carfax was provided by the dealer. Ill put a link to it. The toyota website was a wealth of info. It looks like it got a new wp around 90k, new belts and fluid flushes around 113k, new exhaust around 114k. Now here's the 2 records that have me on edge. At 117k miles, it says the customer requested the supercharger be taken off and put back to stock. The dealer swapped it out and said it has a misfire, possible exhaust valve. 28 miles later the vehicle was back at the dealer and they said Rough idle possible burnt valve, teardown needed but the owner declined it. The vehicle sold less than a month later and then again 2 months after that. How concerned should i be about this? Surely if this thing was still running on a burnt valve it would have serious damage after 55k miles right? There are no records of it being fixed on the toyota website. Here is the link to the carfax. Carfax
 
patinthehat said:
the carfax was provided by the dealer. Ill put a link to it. The toyota website was a wealth of info. It looks like it got a new wp around 90k, new belts and fluid flushes around 113k, new exhaust around 114k. Now here's the 2 records that have me on edge. At 117k miles, it says the customer requested the supercharger be taken off and put back to stock. The dealer swapped it out and said it has a misfire, possible exhaust valve. 28 miles later the vehicle was back at the dealer and they said Rough idle possible burnt valve, teardown needed but the owner declined it. The vehicle sold less than a month later and then again 2 months after that. How concerned should i be about this? Surely if this thing was still running on a burnt valve it would have serious damage after 55k miles right? There are no records of it being fixed on the toyota website. Here is the link to the carfax. Carfax
Click to expand...

Yes, that sounds strange. Maybe they had the valve fixed but just not at the Toyota dealership. So at one point the supercharger was removed, but obviously was put back on later.

Here is the thread I started on this 4runner a while back.
http://www.toyota-4runner.org/3rd-gen-t4rs/151372-nice-98-supercharged-4wd-chattanooga.html
 
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Thanks for the link. Thats what i was thinking too though. it might of changed hands a couple of times without being fixed then that last long 1.5yr stint, the owner got it fixed. I'll still go over tomorrow and look at it. If it idles smooth and doesn't smoke when revved then i would think it got fixed. I've seen what a burnt valve can do to a 4cyl nissan after a few thousands miles so I would think if this went 55k miles, it would have some serious issues. BTW it said cyl #6 was the culprit too if that makes a difference.
 
anybody have anything else i should keep an eye out on? kind of excited. if everything goes right, i will have my first 4 runner tomorrow!
 
Haha! I totally looked at that one online too and seriously considered driving down to chattanooga to check it out. The thing that excited me was the supercharger and the thing that worried me was the supercharger. Ultimately what ruled it out for me was what I read online about a supercharger potentially putting excess wear on an engine and also really fouling things up if non-premium gas is used. Since I had no way of knowing for sure how the PO had used it, I decided to stay away.

My wife put the final nail in the coffin on that one when I told her that it required premium. Her words "#$&* that!" :yuck:

Anyway, if you do pick it up, please keep us posted. I really want to know how it turns out with that one.
 
yeah I'm thinking about doing what Bama said in that other thread and pull the supercharger off. For daily driving and hauling my 4 wheeler around for hunting, i don't really need it. Might as well sell it and use the money for other upgrades right :D
 
alrighty well i did pick it up. We worked out a deal and I went for it. Im going to start another thread that has more details and that stuff. Thanks for the help everyone!
 
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