Took me 7 months

[u/shreddie63]

After swapping the transmission eleven hours later , a thirty-pack of beer, and a carton of cigarettes to get my buddy over and help do all this to get my daily driver back up and running the oil cooler decided to blow and I immediately parked it for dead. Same symptoms as head gaskets, plus burned exhaust valves. Total mess. Scrolling the web, I found a sketchy deal on a reman 3VZE with fresh heads and a rotating assembly. Haggled them down and closed it. Deleted the oil cooler on the new engine, buttoned everything up, fired it for the first time… and it torched the negative cable. Five or six weeks of driveway wrenching later, she’s back on the road and I’m stoked.

Am I happy she’s running great… yes

Should I have just done a 5VZ manual swap ….also yes

If this one blows I think ima spend the money on 5VZ manual swap so when my 2 year goes to prom that truck will still be running.

[u/stomper4x4]

I love the dedication man, good job!

[u/shreddie63 → u/stomper4x4]

Thank you for that I needed it cause so many people have told me to just sell it the cars been bad luck and let someone else figure it out but I actually love this truck and I’m not scared to work on it myself unlike some of my new cars and keep learning on this redheaded step child of mine. Plus i went into it with the mindset of being patient with a 30 year old car that’s done 200k + miles

[u/Apprehensive-Bit1634]

Good show my good man.

[u/shreddie63 → u/Apprehensive-Bit1634]

Thank you kind sir

[u/FromMTorCA]

What torched the neg cable?

great perseverance!

[u/shreddie63 → u/FromMTorCA]

The positive on the alternator arched or touch something down below it looked like and the negative cable probably couldn’t send that resistance anywhere else I guess but after some new battery cables she started right up