"New" 4Runner

[hogtyd]

After several years and almost 10,000 miles of towing my 13QBB (mostly up mountains, it seems), I decided to give my trusty 1997 Toyota 4Runner V6 5-speed a break as it nears its 20th birthday, and bought a "new to me" 2007 4Runner V8 SR-5 Sport Edition.

The V8 should definitely handle the hills better...although to it's credit the '97 did pretty well and returned about 12mpg towing. Just felt like I was pushing it pretty hard for a 20 year old truck. And the manual transmission in stop-and-go traffic could give my left leg more exercise then it really needed!

Old



-Graham

[gbpack]

Very nice! Congrats on your new tow vehicle! Last year, when we were looking for a TV, we looked at the new 4-Runner's, but found out that they don't offer them with a V-8 engine anymore. Like you, we really wanted a V-8, especially since our 21BHS is probably around 4,500 lbs when fully loaded and we have plans of going over the Rockies some day soon. So we ended up with a Jeep Grand Cherokee, which turned out to be just fine (we love it and the V-8 Hemi is an absolute beast)! But we have always liked Toyota's and were sorry to see that they don't offer a V-8 in the 4-Runner anymore. We also test-drove the Sequoia (with V-8) but that felt too big and sort of lumbered around through the turns and was very sluggish on acceleration. Liked the 4-Runner much better than the Sequoia and might have bought the 4-Runner if they still offered the V-8. Enjoy the one you found!

[hogtyd]

Thanks, and I agree it's too bad Toyota doesn't offer the V8 in the 4Runner any longer. I would have liked to have bought a new (or even just newer) one but hoping to still get plenty of miles out of this one.

Graham

[admin]

Congrats

[daplumbr]

I'm a huge fan of the 4.7 L V8 in '07 4Runner. There are many instances of that engine going over a third of a million miles with nothing but routine maintenance. So smooth and torquey (if that's a word). You have a great setup for camping!  

[hogtyd]

Took the 4Runner V8 on it's first trip this weekend, a 500 mi. round-trip to Watkins Glen NY for the Finger Lakes Wine Festival. It was definitely a more relaxing drive then with the '96 4Runner, and it handled the 13QBB with absolutely no problems at all. I only got 10.5 MPG compared to 12 MPG I got with the older V6 4Runner on the same drive, but I guess that's to be expected with the larger engine and slightly higher speeds. I also highly recommend a visit to the [a href="http://www.flwinefest.com/"]Finger Lakes Wine Festival[/a] for a good combination of "camping" and wine drinking. They get an attendance of about 40,000 people over the 2-day festival, and it seemed like about 1/2 of them were camped there!

-Graham

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[gbpack]

Nice pic! You could pull our 21BHS with that 4-Runner!

[drake]

Very nice, love that hood scoop and the way they match!

[hogtyd]

Thanks for the compliments on the T4R. And yes, it could certainly pull more the the 13QBB...my wife is actually a little worried that a new camper will soon follow the "new" TV purchase. I don't think she has anything to worry about, although years ago when I replaced my Bronco II with a Suburban to better pull my 16' boat, I somehow soon thereafter ended up with a 25' boat!

-Graham