3/13/2012
Ok, went offroad and through mud for the first time in THIS 4Runner and used 4WD for the 1st time. It was awesome. My girlfriend and I visited my Grandpa for his 82nd birthday past Sacramento. I saw Prairie city offroad place and HAD to stop by. Soooooo much fun, and the 4Runner made it up everything I tried a lot easier than expected. Using the 4WD is like night and day. I went through this mud puddle back and forth about 5 times. Drove around a little more and stopped to take a few pics and shut the motor off. I went back in after taking pics, and it wouldn't start! Just a click. Called T4R4life and he was trying to help me and explain things to check but still couldn't get it started. I ended up getting pulled by this sick 1st gen and got to a wash area and sprayed all the mud out of the engine bay. It was 1-2 inches cakeed on EVERYWHERE. Some guys there were trying to help me get it started by wacking at the starter but it wasnt happening. We ended up getting towed to the nearest toyota dealer. Had to leave it there over night and left a note. They diagnosed it the next day and found it being the starter needed replacing. They wanted $700 total, wtf! So I bought a starter for autozone for $90 and brought it up there. My brother, Dad, and I were gonna replace it in the parking lot but toyota wouldn't let us, and it was raining and we didn't want to pay for towing, so toyota installed it for me for $250 and waived the $125 diagnosis charge. Not horrible, but could have definitely been better. Lost my wallet up there, missed work and was stuck just waiting for 6 hours too. It was a crazy day, but could have definitely been worse. Glad to have the 4Runner back and no worries. Here's a video and some pics: