Towing with a Tacoma.....

[MTGunner]

Has been a while since I have logged in here. Currently own a Nissan Titan XD with the 5.0L Cummins. It is at the dealership being repaired AGAIN. Upon repair it will be sold. Perhaps traded.
I am thinking a new 2023 Tacoma. My concern is will it tow my 19’ Coachman trailer? My trailer weighs 3300 pounds empty. It is a single axle and I use it to hunt and weekends. Have no plan for a long expedition trip. What think you Taco owners? MTG

 

[bkg]

you're going to get dozens of opinions...

Would *I* do it? Nope. Especially coming from a heavy 1/2 diesel.

 

[jim65wagon]

We tow with a 2014 Tacoma. We live in an EPro FD19. It is a 19 foot travel trailer that weighs 3200 dry and about 4200 loaded. Our Tacoma has had no issues pulling or stopping with the trailer. Going up steep hills can be a little slow, but I'm never in a hurry so I can deal with that.

Sent from my SM-G960U1 using Tapatalk

 

[Josh41]

I tow with a 2021 4Door Long Bed automatic Tacoma. Little power, slow on the highway, 10-13mpg. My trailer is 1300lb and small (Intech Flyer Chase). You will likely need airbags or HD springs as well.

 

[calicamper]

You’ll hate it coming from a 1/2 ton with decent modern power. If your worried about reliability and just jumping to the most extreme reliability perception ie Tacoma to feel your reliability concerns addressed?

Get a 5.3 Sierra and move on. Cost you less than the over priced HS kid Tacoma, give you great towing performance and simple reliability probably for less $ too. Not to mention better fuel range and more passenger comfort.

If you want to get crazy. Get a F150 with a little more modern stuff ?

Sadly the Titan diesel was a weird and orphaned last ditch effort made when Nissan was going through major drama and nearly closed up shop. You ended up with the worst possible combo of things all wrapped into one vehicle. The diesel Titan was a mess for many reasons making it near impossible to fix.

 

[helenandtoby]

Go for it!
But two gotchas:
You will spend a lot of time in the right lane, cruising at 60 mph in 4th gear.
Also, you will need to watch your automatic transmission temperature. Any vehicle that tows with an automatic can easily overheat the trans. You won't notice anything until the trans fails at 150K.
So, get a Trans cooler and a Trans temperature Guage. A Scanguage will tell you the actual temp of both the Trans and the engine.
If the tran or engine gets hot, just slow down and downshift.

 

[Buddha.]

Or you could get a Ranger and go as fast as you want. Every new Ranger is rated for 7500 towing and ~1500 payload. Transmission cooler is standard equipment…

 

[GeorgeHayduke]

Why not a Tundra? 2nd gen Tundra V8 and 4.30 gears is an old school but very reliable drivetrain. Probably same MPG as a tacoma when loaded and obviously more interior space.

 

[AbleGuy]

Or you could get a Ranger and go as fast as you want. Every new Ranger is rated for 7500 towing and ~1500 payload. Transmission cooler is standard equipment…

or you could get a new Colorado, with its best in class tow rating of 7,700 lbs!

 

[Buddha.]

or you could get a new Colorado, with its best in class tow rating of 7,700 lbs!

Is that with the diesel? I doubt OP is looking for a new diesel.

I do like the longer bed and 21 vs 18 gallon gas tank over the Ranger. It’d be a sweet truck if they use their 2.7 4 banger turbo in the next generation.

 

[calicamper]

Is that with the diesel? I doubt OP is looking for a new diesel.

I do like the longer bed and 21 vs 18 gallon gas tank over the Ranger. It’d be a sweet truck if they use their 2.7 4 banger turbo in the next generation.

Diesel is dead
GM has a nice 2.7 also

 

[jbaucom]

It’d be a sweet truck if they use their 2.7 4 banger turbo in the next generation.

That's exactly what GM is doing.

 

[tlrols]

Why not a Tundra? 2nd gen Tundra V8 and 4.30 gears is an old school but very reliable drivetrain. Probably same MPG as a tacoma when loaded and obviously more interior space.

Two votes for the Tundra. Aside from the Tundra you will find that Toyota doesn’t really offer great towing rigs. I recently picked up a V8 4Runner to tow an A-liner type trailer. Wow…what an upgrade from my V6 4Runner! Might I suggest you start with torque specs and look for something that delivers > 300 ft-lbs at the lowest RPM. There is a huge difference between “it will hack it” and towing with ease.

 

[calicamper]

Two votes for the Tundra. Aside from the Tundra you will find that Toyota doesn’t really offer great towing rigs. I recently picked up a V8 4Runner to tow an A-liner type trailer. Wow…what an upgrade from my V6 4Runner! Might I suggest you start with torque specs and look for something that delivers > 300 ft-lbs at the lowest RPM. There is a huge difference between “it will hack it” and towing with ease.

27yrs of Toyota SUVs this ^.
Having said that the 4.7 in the 4runner is a great combo. However!! The 4.7 is still older design that doesn’t really put down power till 3000+ rpm. I liked it in my 07 Sequoia. Interesting little thing about the 07 Sequoia. Toyota turned up the wick on the 07 even has a unique note about using 91 in the owners manual which I found was needed in highway trips but slow around town stuff it was fine on 87.

Another thing to be aware of. The V8 4 runner uses the same exact ABS system as the V8 AMG SLK. Its a known problem that baffles Toyota dealers as this ABS unit has a strange flaw that can result in loss of braking ability and most Toyota dealers struggle understanding how to fix. They tend to over charge to fix it and many technicians don’t know how to diagnose it.

If your curious what to look for and what’s involved search Youtube on SLK ABS failure. This is unique only to the V8 SLK not the v6. So keep that in mind. A buddy had this v8 4runner and had this issue, 5 visits to different dealers no fix 4 trips resulting in a tow and rental car mid trip. In the end three of us neighbors while drinking whiskey figured out the ABS system was identical to the SLK and once we figured that out there was plenty of good info on how to address the issue. We fixed it while hanging out and he decided to sell shortly after. He has a Tahoe now loves it for family space no issues or trips ended by loss of braking and rental cars?

 

[plainjaneFJC]

You’ll hate it coming from a 1/2 ton with decent modern power. If your worried about reliability and just jumping to the most extreme reliability perception ie Tacoma to feel your reliability concerns addressed?

Get a 5.3 Sierra and move on. Cost you less than the over priced HS kid Tacoma, give you great towing performance and simple reliability probably for less $ too. Not to mention better fuel range and more passenger comfort.

If you want to get crazy. Get a F150 with a little more modern stuff ?

Sadly the Titan diesel was a weird and orphaned last ditch effort made when Nissan was going through major drama and nearly closed up shop. You ended up with the worst possible combo of things all wrapped into one vehicle. The diesel Titan was a mess for many reasons making it near impossible to fix.

The new 5.3 is garbage- we have a fleet of them, guaranteed valvetrain issues by 50k miles.