3VZE heal thyself!
 

Toyota lifer and proud of it, but new to the 3VZE 3.0 V6. I picked up a nice 93 4runner a few weeks ago for $600, with a great, rust free, straight body and very well cared for interior, at the sacrifice of the common V6 head gasket issue. She's a 3.4 swap candidate in waiting (after I finish up a few other yotas), but I want to "putt around in it" putting 10-20 miles a day on it where I work. My longest commute is 2 miles, and is typically riding through boat yards, so I bought some blue devil to see if it can let me limp by until the 3.4 time comes along... a few months and maybe 1000 miles.

All precluded by the fact that she's got the leaky head, with Blue Devil's Black Magic yet to be verified are the following.

I'm getting an occasional starter "cachink" cold or hot where the starter doesn't spin nor turn over the engine, and with repeated "clicking" of the switch the starter will operate and turn the engine with no resistance or issues. The battery is fresh and 100% charged. Has she just got a tired/dying starter at 207k from that unscientific symptom? I thought it might be hydro-lock, but after that "dead spot" it spins the engine fine, and the engine runs well, so I don't think it's that.

The steam coming from the tail pipe disappeared with the addition of the Blue Devil additive, and it runs much smoother, however twice I've cracked the throttle a bit and it died from that, (vacuum leak and/or lack of tune up?) but once it dies, she will not crank again with the starter turning the engine. Seems to be heat related because if I let it sit overnight, it fires up. Let her run and get up to temp and kill it or turn it off and it's a no fire situation again. Any ideas on what could be heat related off hand on that issue?

An associate of mine used Barrs Leaks in a Peterbilt Semi we have, and darned if it isn't pulling houseboats to this day, so I had to try the blue devil on this 3.0 to see if I can squeeze some out of her while I finish up a Taco and 00 4runner project-s.

I'm going to replace plugs, air cleaner and oil of course and I added sea foam in the gas tank today, and I noticed the throttle body had a good bit of "gunk/mayonnaise" in it via sucking in the water/oil mixture from the valve cover crank case vent.

The drive train, clutch, 4x4, brakes etc, work great and it appears she was "gently used" for it's life, so I'm excited to swap in the 3.4 (or perhaps a super charged 3.4) and I purchased a nice set of 16" Taco TRD rims and tires ready to go on her, but any ideas on the 2 current issues is appreciated and any more in general to make the 3.0 live in the middle world for awhile before moving to the other side and aside. Has anyone prolonged their 3.0 for a bit using Blue Devil?

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.yot...5927aecab2.jpg
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.yot...cc43dd6c30.jpg

Solenoid contact, relay, or the ignition switch itself if they didn't fix that system by this model (think they did).

​​​​Hot starts probably the fuel pressure, there is a tab don't recall the applicable years but even if it's newer some one could have put the "wrong" part in it. The other likely culprit us heat build up in the ignition coil.

Test FP up by disconnecting or applying vacuum to the regulator (better details are findable with a site:yotatech.com Google)

Test coil after applying heat, cold engine hot coil.