Chuki

Here's what I'd do... Yeah whoever sold that to you could be scum, or could not. Who knows the HG could have been fine, and in the few days you've owned it finally went out. Or it could have been bad and they put something in it to keep it from showing up and in the few days you've had it got worse.

If you read my post above you can do this yourself and you can do it cheap. My engine has 170k miles on it, and whoever owned before didn't take care of it at all, the camshaft, and camshaft bearings (or saddles) had alot of wear to them, and grooves worn into them. That tells me they didn't change the oil like they should have. The proper thing to do would have been rebuild the engine, if the camshaft looks like that what does the rod bearings, and main bearings look like? I can't afford it, and it ran fine.

So I decided the most cost effective thing to do would be to repair the leaky HG and drive it till she dies, or have the money to rebuild, or put a 3.4 in it. I just got it back on the road a few days ago and its running great!!! The only thing you might wonder is why the oil PSI gauge is low, but anyone and everyone will tell you don't worry about it, thats just the Toyota gauges. I had my oil pressure checked with an true gauge and its actually still within Toyota specs. Runs good, isn't to noisy, oil pressure is still within spec, I'll keep driving it.

So if I were you, I'd plan not to business with that guy again, and fix it myself, the block I wouldn't worry about it. If it runs fine now and has oil pressure, it'll be ok. It will be in the same condition it was in when you took it off the lot. I'd buy an HG kit from EB with new headbolts, pull the heads take them to machineshop to have them decked (that'll cost ya maybe $60-$80 to have them decked and cleaned), clean the surface of the block and put it back together. I highly doubt your block is warped, your heads are warped I'll tell you that, but with the block being cast iron and heads aluminum the heads will warp WAY WAY before your block does. And then put it back together and call it good. Yeah the lower end has miles on it, but if the HG weren't leaking would that concern you like it is now? I say replace the gaskets and drive it, once the miles start to catch up with it, then you can plan for a rebuild or an engineswap. I assume you wouldn't have bought it, unless it was running great. It probably runs fine now, its just playing the roll of a steam engine.

For $300 you can have it back on the road without blowing steam, and it'll be the same if not a little better then when you took it home, since you'll have the chance to clean the intake, and free it from all that nasty black carbon oil gooey mess that builds up in it.

My 2 cents!

mt_goat

You know Chuki that really is pretty good advice, I wish I was more like that. I get cought up in the "while I'm at it, I might as well do this too" way of thinking too much.

mt_goat

I just can't stand it, let me add just one "while I'm at it, I might as well do this too" thing. Replace the timing belt, you will have it off anyway and they don't cost that much.

Chuki

if I had the money, I would have yanked my 3.0 out, but I didn't, I had practically no money, I even had to borrow some money to get some of the stuff done.

I planned on changing my timing belt while I was down that far, but my belt looked fine! So I left it on there, and the water pump, if you spin it yourself and it has some resistance thats still a good pump, if it spins freely then the seal is getting worn down and it probably should be replaced. My waterpump looked like it had just been replaced, and I imagine whoever did that put another belt on too. The timing belt tag on my timing cover said my belt had over 55k miles on it, the belt I had on there "DID NOT" If it did, then it was a hell of a good belt cause it was just fine. I wrote on my timingbelt tag though to replace it in about 10-15k miles.

In my opinion if it ran fine before, it'll run fine after. Regardless of miles, money is money, and if the engine is still running fine, might as well keep driving till it's done for, or you have the money and the want to put another engine in there right?

gohawks

That is too bad about your vehicle. You have a few options to look at:

1) My first option would be to approach the seller and explain your situation. Was it a private seller or a dealership/used car lot? Check local laws about it quickly, time could be of the essence. Obviously a long shot that they will provide any relief but it is at least worth an attempt.

2) Buck up and pay a reputable mechanicfor the repair. Obviously pricey.

3) Find someone to help you do it. You can save some $$ and learn a lot.

4) Sell it as is and take it in the shorts more than likely, but at least it will be off your hands and not a total loss.

89rnr91rnr

Chuki, mt goat and gohawks:

Thanks for the information and ideas. Chuki, big thank you to you for the amount of information, time and effort you put into your response. We can now make a well informed decision no matter what we decide to do.

89rnr91rnr

Ok this may sound stupid or obvious but what items must be removed in order to perform the headgasket replacements? I know all the vacuum lines must be moved out of the way, the throttle body needs to be taken off and the valve covers. Are there any short cuts? what items can remain connected to each other and be pulled off together.

The reason I ask is because the haynes and chilton manuals I have don't read in the order of removal i.e. they say remove this and refer you back and forth to other chapters. Is there anything that has been written up that one can follow step by step to do this proceedure?

Thanks again.

mt_goat

Forget those POS haynes and chilton manuals. Just look at the factory service manual (FSM) I posted earlier. I know there are very few changes from 89 to 93. The only one I know of is the timing belt tensioner.

Sonofmayhem

When i got my 89 22re runner, it had bubbles in the oil, however the head was rebuilt and they didnt flush it. for ÅÅÅÅs and giggles i ran some headgasket seal threw it(all day process) and then got the oil flushed and changed to synthetic, so im not sure if it was bad oil or the headgasket repair worked, but it is still good. Since you have a D.D. i would just take it all apart one night, but the new gasket on the next night. put some stuff on or all, then take it to get it timed and checked on.... good luck.

the radiator for easy reach, the alternator. i did the timing chain on my old 85 22re, so im not really familiar w/ the 3.0.. truly go to ebay find a 3.4(the engine mounts are the same.)and get a kit to swap it over, if you want to spend like 1400-2300 or so but youll love the power and gas.

Chuki

Pop the hood, and all thats got to come off. The main components that need to come out are.
I just did this so lemme see if I can give you a really fast step by step on how I removed everything

- Remove skidplate (makes getting at certain things from under easier)
- Drain coolant by opening radiator petcock
- Remove fanshroud
- Remove fan
- Remove upper and lower radiator hoses
- Remove radiator (recommended but I don't think its neccesary, I yanked mine out though)
- Disconnect negative battery terminal
- Disconnect air hose running to tbody
- label and disconnect vacumm lines from intake on passenger side
- disconnect EGR from exhaust manifold
- remove throttle cable
- disconnect any hoses from upper intake
- disconnect cold start injector connector, and fuel line
- disconnect ground wire near firewall
- double check make sure no hoses or vacumm lines are connected
- remove 6 bolts and 2 nuts(on studs)
- remove intake plenum bracket on passenger side (black bracket attaches from intake to head)
- carefully pull upper intake off making sure no hoses tubes, etc.. are connected
- mark distributor and mount, so you can align it back up to get your timing close if not dead on where it used to be
- remove all the plug wires, coil wire
- Disconnect distributor connector
- loosen the distibutor screw, pull distributor out
- disconnect alternator (2 wires, battery wire, and harness connector)
- Remove alternator (bolt on top, adjust bolt on bottom)
- Remove alternator bracket
- Detach screw holding dipstick tube to head
- Remove upper water bypass housing
- Double nut each stud and remove the studs
- Remove timing cover (11 or 12 screws, screws are hidden behind the neat plugwire holders)
- remove power steering mounts on block (kind of tricky, but you can get the entire mount off without removing the pump pulley)
- if manual tranny stick it in gear (prefer 4th gear high range) Pull e-brake
- Loosen each 17mm bolt holding cam gears on
- Release timing belt tensioner
- Remove cam gears
- Remove the metal plate behind the camgears
- Inspect timing belt and waterpump
- Disconnect fuel lines (careful not to lose copper washers, and watch for fuel spray)
- Disconnect all hoses and connector from water bypass at rear of engine bolted onto the intake
- Disconnect each fuel injector
- Remove bolts holding intake onto heads
- Remove lower intake carefully making sure nothing is in the way
** You may need to remove the fuel rail and injectors before the intake bolts will come out
- Remove exhaust crossover pipe from each head
- Remove tail pipe from driverside manifold
- Remove valve covers
- Loosen all Camshaft bearing caps bolts in several passes
- Remove bearing caps, set aside do NOT mix them up!!!
- Remove 6 point head bolt
- Remove 12point headbolts (in the correct order)
- Remove cylinder head (exhaust manifold and all!)
- Remove exhaust manifolds
- Take heads to machineshop to be decked

And put it back together...

If I missed anything to bad!!! I did all that off the top of my head in 10 minutes.

It's not a difficult task, theres just alot of stuff, nothing real technical, its pretty straight forward. To take the heads off without any real snags like stuck bolts you could probably have them off in 4 hours with a buddy or about 6 by yourself. Putting together you could probably have it done in about 6 hours with a buddy or about 8 by yourself.