No, it makes no difference.

If you are stock, you stall more. Thats it. Otherwise you heat up your clutch. If you cannot wheel a trail without burning up the clutch, you should not be on that trail, as you do not have the driver skill to do so. I have only had a 4.7 case for a year. Before that, i stalled a bunch, but never had a clutch get hot or even warm.

Regear= 400

New clutch=180.

So, burn up two clutches and a regear starts to look a little less expensive.

 

Does the SR5 4runner come with a Clutch thermometer?

400 for a regear? Maybe parts or if you have a friend. But for most of us, at least in california, that is a n unheard of price. More like 700.

 

He is talking 4.7s in the tcase.

...and don't forget with that cost comparison the labor for 2 clutches vs crawler gears once.

 

LOL...No, no thermometer. They should though..

I suppose i should have defined what i mean. A warm clutch you can smell, a hot clutch is smoking. I've never had that problem, but have been on trail runs with both. warm is a warning, once it gets hot, it takes almost two hours for the truck to be driveable again...Ask me how i know (yeah, that ride sucked bad).

As for 400 for regear, i'm pretty sure it cost the same...not sure what you mean by that, I'm figuriing in CA tax is about the same, maybe a bit more, than for shipping to CO? I'm going off of Marlins site.

I don't count labor becasue that depends on the person, the truck, and the area...Parts to parts, a regeared T-case is nearly the same as two clutches purchased from toyota.

 

Well, i suppose you are right, although its a little tough to compare.

I do clutches, and i did my own t-case. The clutches only take me about 3 hours, truck driving to truck driving, but that is becasue i've done a lot. The t-case took me 11 hrs truck driving to truck driving, but i took my time and reread the directions about 1million times throughout the process.

For a shop, it would probably work out to be about the same in labor...probably takes a shop twice as long to do the case than the clutches, but since labor varies place to place, and there are a million other variables, its about double.

 

Both have spooky traits.
Steep downhills with an auto sucks
Hill climbs interrupted by pushing in the clutch to downshift sucks in a manual

after 5 or so hours on the trail in my truck (5spd) I get a little fade with my clutch. Is there a similar thing with autos? Meaning do they act kooky after they work for a while?

I am thinking Auto in my next rig, I am getting lazy, and they are nicer in rush hour traffic duties.

 

This is a tough one. What engine are you going to run? This is your first thing you need to decide. If you switching to toyota stuff.....

Rock crawling, at extream angles the auto tranny can suck air, becoming one giant paper weight. Manual you can drive upside down but your clutch hydrolics might suck air (as well as your brakes).

Auto can switch from forward to reverse in a slap of the hand. Manual switching to reverse while the vehicle is moving can be a turd and a half.

Auto anyone can get into your truck to move it, well most goobs out there at least. Manual you might get the scared people who wont touch it.

Your creator only gave you 2 feets, autos make starting on a hill easier(no roll back). You may have mad skills and this doesn't matter to you then. Park brakes usally don't hold well enough on the really steep stuff.

Manual you can roll start the turd if the starter gives up after starting 5million times on the trail. Auto, well if you are good with a rachet you might be able to spin the crank fast enough..........I have seen this done on a 22r as drunken fun.

For me I perfer a manual for the rocks because it is simple, if you do have a failure they are easy enough to fix to get you home. And I only ever crawled with a monster 22RE with a w56 and a marlin dual setup. I don't have a crawl truck anymore because after 8 years of extream it lost it's appeal for a while. When I do get back in it will be a buggy with a 1uz and a modified a340f with duals. But don't expect anything for a while from me, I've found the sand and the speed that goes with it. Hill climbing in sand is loads of fun if you have power.

 

Back when I owned a stock 1st gen manual I decided to do Black Bear pass into Telluride.

I pretty much crapped my pants attempting to shift from 1st to reverse a zillion times while doing a 5 point turn on a sharp switch back pointed down a really steep hill.

I kept imagining myself missing the shift and flying down the 1000ft cliffside in neutral.

I drive an auto now

 

Great.

With stock gearing, neither is going to be great down hill.

 

I would say if you can spend the $$ and get a good crawler to add to your manual, go manual!

If not, go auto. But like TC said be careful - I HAVE to have 5:71's in order to drive highway speeds in my runner because the overdrive is so tall. (I have auto) Still becaus of my low geaing my auto almost feels like a genuine crawler.

Oh and ironically TC's starter keeps going out this week. We keep laughing at how glad we are he has a manual right now.

He has a new starter now. It's me in the passenger seat - jumping out to give him a push! LOL

 

uh huh....

and I suppose starting from a stop sign in 3rd doesn't work the clutch any harder either

I've been in a number of situations in various stock geared 5-speed ORVs (subaru, YJ, yota, and a nissan), that in order to have the clutch fully engaged, and be in an rpm range that yields enough power to get over the obstacle, you'd be going WAAAAYYY too fast. For true crawling, on stock gears, you are going to find yourself feathering the clutch quite a bit. This is a non-issue in an Auto, period.

manuals still have their advantages, don't get me wrong, it does still boil down to personal preference.

 

Well, now we are just going around in circles. I'll argue that you aren't really crawling if you are burning up a clutch, that you are just driving something you shouldn't be on. You'll argue that its been done, and i'll have to agree with that, since i've seen it. Around and around we will go. I know that you have a good point, and you know that i have one, but this is the internet, and i for one am not to be able to let common decency get in the way of good pointless arguement.

I guess i will drive how i drive, and you can drive how you drive. I do not feather the clutch, and you do. Again, we are at personal preference. Neither one of us will ever have to wheel with the other, yet here we are...I begin to question my sanity.

However, amazingly, this thread will progress, and as it does, it will continue to spiral lower and lower into the abyss of meaningless debate over an issue that has no concrete answer, and in the end, none of will care anymore.

Anyway, this debate will come up again in a month or so when another newb fails to search and asks the same question. I'm looking forward to hashing this all out for the millon and first time.

I'll be gone for a few days, but i'll be happy to pick up when i get back, if this thread is still alive and kicking.

 

Wow! I love how this thread has spiraled out to left field....

The simple fact, if you want to crawl, you need a crawlbox..............

I'll say it again Autos are for people that don't know how to drive a stick. That means you must know how to properly engage the clutch, with that said I'm still running my original stock clutch.

starting on a hill is easy, simply leave it in gear and turn the key, no rolling back.

 

Toyota put s aclutch start cancel swith in the old 4runners at least, I think it makes hill climbs a bit easier.

 

How exactly do you go about using the clutch start cancel to get going? Just stick it in first and instead of using the clutch, press the button and crank the starter?

 

Exactly.

 

that's not personal preference. I've been in numerous occasions where if the clutch is not slipping, you're going wayyyy to fast, and are going to kill someone. that is not an arguable point, though I'm sure you'll argue it anyway.

I do not consider those trails to be too hard to be driving, they're pretty easy, but the clutch does have to slip.

 

I disagree - I can go AWFULLY slow with the clutch fully engaged, and I only have stock tcase gears. Ike can go painfully slow as he has 4.7 tcase gears.

 

For driving the frickin freeways of LALA land, I cannot imagine anything other than an auto and for rockcrawling, the 4th gen auto is great.

Just because a driver has an auto this doesn't mean they are incapable of driving a stick shift. Its a matter of priorities and personal preference.

My 1st and 2nd gen's had stick shifts and were great for towing and sand beach runs in Oz. I could not imagine driving one on the freeways of SoCal.

 

and still be in an rpm range capable of getting over a large rock? I've never driven anything with stock gearing that's low enough to do any real crawling without doing at least some dragging on the clutch.