I have a 93 4runner with the 3vze auto 4x4. I had my fair share of problems with the truck all related with the motor except for the tranny not shifting into overdrive in the winter. To be fair to the 3.0 it's had a rough life as a ranch and beach truck pulling jetskis. I have already pulled the motor with the intent to do a 1uzfe swap by buying the whole car taking what I need and parting and scrapping the rest. I also planned on rebuilding the 3.0 and selling it along with the transmission. So my question to you is should I rebuild the 3.0 with some work to make have more power such as headers, cams and polished ports, Or just do the 1uzfe swap? I'll be doing all the work so there will be no cost for fab or wiring.

 

Not sure about the motor but as for the tranny when mine was an auto it used to do the same when the transmission was cold, once it was up to normal operating temperature it would work normally. This is normal as the fluids are not warmed up yet.

 

Yeah same with me but it takes like 30 minutes to warm up so it'll run at like 4k for a good while acording to my dad who was driving it when the motor went since I don't have my licence.

 

Thermostat might have been not working, did the temp guage read cold all the time?

 

No I'm pretty sure it read normal. When I pulled the motor it looked fine.

 

It's hard to coax much more power out of the 3vz. Plus it would probably cost you more to rebuild it that a donor 1uz car would cost.