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I had an 87 4Runner, and still have an 87 Hilux. I've been using Castrol Syntec Full Synthetic, 10W30 in both of them. For the entire time I've owned them, since 88 for the Hilux, since 95 for the 4Runner. It's done a great job as far as I can tell. I lived in Yuma when I bought them both, and it get's a little warm there. The Castrol never had a bit of trouble, no matter how hot it was outside.
Once I moved up here to Oregon, it gets cold in the winter, like zero or below, and up to 100° F in the summer. The Castrol work great all through the whole temperature range. I did switch the 4Runner to 5W30. I drive it in the winter, and it starts a lot better with the lighter oil when it gets below about 30°.
What engine oil should be used? I've been using 5W30 full synthetic mobil
Up here in Michigan I run NAPA 10w40 in my '91 3VZ in the summer and 5w40 in the winter. Sometimes their high mileage, sometimes their blue bottle "performance" synthetic blend depending on what's on sale. It's all made by Valvoline.
As for cracked dash. It starts at the edge facing the windshield. I had 2 small cracks beginning, so I use 2 part epoxy applied with a pointed toothpick to control to stop the cracking. Like in a ship made of metal with a crack, you drill a hole it the leading point to stop the crack. I applied the epoxy in the crack and just onto the vinyl. Made sure there was small dab covering the crack leading point. Neither has spread in over 6 years.
I went one step further, removed the dash pad, and applied an epoxy cost along the whole front 'vertical' edge of the dash pad to prevent future cracks from starting. None have. That vertical edge is not visible from inside the cab.
Just bought a 91 4Runner with the 3.0, doing a lot of reading on here to get up to speed on maintenance. Question for all, I seem to have a bit of lifter noise coming from the engine. Growing up on the farm, we used to add some Lucas Oil Stabilizer to the engine oil, and I'm considering doing this when I change the oil this weekend. Any thoughts on adding the stabilizer in the 3VZ-E and what it could help/hurt?
@Rusty Shackleford first off welcome aboard and second that thing looks like it's in great shape. I've put Lucas in a lot of things and had mixed results but I've never had it destroy anything but I don't think it will make your lifter tick go away because from what I understand the 3.0 has solid lifters and you have to shim them to adjust them
08-12-2022, 11:33 AM
