While having an alignment on my 78 Toyota pickup, it's second one, the shop next door offered to do a safety inspection for free. So, I thought I'd see what their sales pitch would be. I've owned the truck since new, it has 578 thousand miles with a top end rebuild at about 300 thousand miles. I was told the truck was in generally good shape but with that many miles on the engine it was unsafe and might fail at any time due to metal fatigue. It needed a replacement engine. He told me I was lucky because I was doing the work myself, not using a professional mechanic, using the wrong oil, Castrol 10w30, and a toilet paper filter, a Frantz for both oil and gas that would not last long before it plugged up the oil passages. I'm still waiting for that last problem to develop, nothing so far. He said I was doing pretty good for an old guy but it's time to turn the work over to a real mechanic. Here is my question. Are the members of this forum tolerant of diy people that do absolutely everything themselves, that drive 'em till they drop, don't have fancy vehicles and lots of money?
Advise received....
- Thread starter Lonnie
- Start date
- Status
yep we love yah.
bruce
bruce
This forum is 99% do-it-yourself people. the majority of them seems to be drive them till they drop type folks.
you are in good company here.
you are in good company here.
So let me get this straight. You bought said vehicle new, Drove it over half a million miles and then someone wants to tell you your doing something wrong.
Hey that sounds just like me
. As you will see the majority of members here are DIY'ers. And BTW
Hey that sounds just like me
Last edited:
I am one of them, got a high mileage Accord V6 and also drive two vehicles entirely dependant on DIY and one has 176000 miles on it already. Bravo, I know Toyotas are built to last in the league of OM616/617 engined W123s so good luck to you.
Boy, they would love to see my dad's car. Original owner 1966 Chevrolet Biscane with over 795,000 miles on it. On it's second 250 straight 6 engine which now has over 350,000 on it. Still get's 21 MPG and runs great.
Should've asked how long that "real mechanic" has his vehicles last.
I spent over 20 years as an aircraft mech and 20 years more as a motorcycle mech... and I love it when some grease monkey tells me that I need to turn it over to a "PROFESSIONAL". I usually tell them I'll never get that old, or who would he recommend.
Kestas
Staff member
If you kept your truck running for 578K, I think you'll have a lot to offer everyone on this web site. Welcome.
everyone here is tolerant of diy people and do their own work. However, most here don't drive their vehicle until it drops like your truck. Wow, your truck is 28 years old! I'm less than a year older than your truck!
People around here trade in every 10-15 years or sell. A rare few have to have a new car/truck every 2-3 years and do UOAs.
I like to drive them until their toast too. I've only had five vehicles in the 12 years I have been driving. Two have ended up in the junkyard via total accident and headgasket/oil leaking engine. the other three are in my signature. btw,
Please let us know what kind of service like oil change intervals, replacement parts, that you had to do with that toyota truck.
Situations like that are one of the reasons I went to tech school in the first place. There are other reasons of course, but I was sick of getting lied to and cheated. After tech school I have been able to purchase a few vehicles brand new and the first couple vehicles I took to the dealership for maintenance because of the warranty. I can't tell you how many times I discovered that things weren't done right or just weren't done at all. In the past few years I've bought a couple more vehicles and I only take them to the dealer for warranty work-period. I've worked on vehicles at the independent and dealership level and I know the things that go on. I have friends who are techs, service writers, service managers and owners and many repair shops are completely legitimate and honest but many are not. If I had a vehicle that had 578K on the clock and some idiot implied I was "lucky", I'd laugh at him. Yes, that may be rude, but he was being rude by implying that you didn't know what you were doing, and stupidity rarely deserves a cordial response. Welcome to the board and don't lose any sleep over the metal fatigue of your engine, LOL.
Another newbie right here that does all his own work. I have seen too many examples of service shops ripping people off. If I do the work myself, I know that every bolt was tightened, I know the quality of parts that were installed, and I know how the part works. That way if it fails prematurely, I dont have to go screaming at some mechanic. I scream at myself.
Believe it or not, alignments were the last thing that required me to go into a shop. After getting cheated during an alignment, I'm going to start doing that myself.
Lonnie, dont listen to one word the mechanic said. You are a professional.
Believe it or not, alignments were the last thing that required me to go into a shop. After getting cheated during an alignment, I'm going to start doing that myself.
Lonnie, dont listen to one word the mechanic said. You are a professional.
I'm glad to hear that I'm not alone. To answer some questions about maintenance, I change the oil, toilet paper and full flow filter, Purolator, every 5k miles. A couple of days before the oil change I pour in about a pint of Marvel Mystry Oil in the crankcase. I use about two ounces of Marvel Mystry Oil for every ten gallons of gasoline. The toilet paper gas filter gets changed once a year. I have a glass fuel filter after the toilet paper so I can change it when it looks dirty. I put these filters on when the truck was new and the glass filter has never been changed. It's still white inside. I flush the brakes and cooling system every two years and replace the thermostat. Every year in between I just drain the coolant and fill it back up. The upper radiator hose lasted almost 20 years. I do have a filter on the coolant and I use distilled water and zink chromate with a sacrifical disk, and about twenty percent antifreeze. I don't live where it gets cold and travel mostly in the desert and Southern California. I have been told that I'm doing it all wrong, but after this long, I think I'm doing ok. They could be wrong.
I think that is the understatement of the year!
This sounds like my local "Not so good year" shop. I took my 12 year old van there for some front end work - my back was bothering me a lot at the time and I just didn't have the time to do it myself.
Long story short, they called wanting to replace several other things that were "bad" 4 shocks, upper and lower radiator hoses, serp. belt. I played dumb and ask how long those parts should last. After getting a bogus answer (I think it was 2 years), I went into my glove box and pulled out my receipts for all the parts they mentioned. All were less than 6 months old - (installed them myself). Their response? They must have looked at the "wrong" vehicle. Uh huh, sure!
Lonnie,
Keep those wheels rollin', your only about HALF DONE with your truck though, there is some guy out there with a nice web site with over 1,000,000 miles on a TOYOTA PICK-UP and he's still driving it. Welcome, from the other coast, and share your knowledge with us!
Keep those wheels rollin', your only about HALF DONE with your truck though, there is some guy out there with a nice web site with over 1,000,000 miles on a TOYOTA PICK-UP and he's still driving it. Welcome, from the other coast, and share your knowledge with us!
I agree that over all, you're doing really well. But I have to ask, do you think it's wise to put in a new thermostat every two years, but stretch out a coolant hose for 20?
Well done lonnie, keep doing what you're doing! Many of us are DIY'ers here...myself included.
Tolerant? Lon, you're our kind of people!
Over 500,000 miles, and *you* are the one doing things wrong- yeah, he sounds like a real "pro" all right.
You gotta be doing something right, keep on. And you've found a forum where DIY'ers are definitely...
So far I only have 198,000 miles on my 97 Neon, bought new- but I plan to install a timing belt soon & make at least another 100,000 miles on it.
Let us know when you roll 600K on that Toyota.
You gotta be doing something right, keep on. And you've found a forum where DIY'ers are definitely...
So far I only have 198,000 miles on my 97 Neon, bought new- but I plan to install a timing belt soon & make at least another 100,000 miles on it.
Let us know when you roll 600K on that Toyota.
About the hose. I really wanted to replace it several times but it always looked so good. I think the water filter and zink chromate is the trick, along with the sacrifical anode and I am careful to correctly dispose the coolant, because of the zink chromate. When I did the valve job at 300 thousand miles, the inside of the coolant passages looked like brand new. The little bits of film hear and there, could be rubbed off with your fingers. I cleaned up the combustion chambers and had the head pressure checked before doing the valve job. The guys at the machine shop thought it was a nearly new head. I don't think a coolant filter is of much importance if you're only goning to keep a vehicle five years or so, but otherwise it could be a good investment. A lot of people make comments about coolant filters, but with no knowledge or experience. One metric that might be difficult to argue is radiator life. I'm still on the original, and the hoses last a long time, too. The heater core under the dash is original, too. Even if I'm wrong by others estimation, because they are smarter than me, does not mean that I won't keep traveling on my misinformed path.
I've taken to mounting my own tires, I'm that DIY. I buy well-used clunkers with issues and make them right... drive a few years, and move on to something else interesting. I greatly respect those with enough attention span to keep a vehicle that long. Not that I probably couldn't... I just get distracted.
- Status
