jyeager

I think you will find that to be a bad radiator cap.

I am not sure about this, but I think the blinking yellow light might only happen while you engine is misfiring. That is consistent with the symptoms you describe. Try replacing your distributor cap, rotor, spark plugs and wires.

Alex, great move putting the original coils back in. When you mentioned a new transmission, I was going to ask if that transmission went in when the new coils did because it could be the source of the vibration. But since you swapped your original coils back in, and the vibration is gone, that eliminates that possibility. Did you just change the springs or did you also change the front struts? I would like to ask the rest of the forum...does his 2004 have the automatic hubs? Such that they are engaged when he's in 4wd, but disengaged when in 2wd? That would explain why he has the vibration only in 4wd and not in 2wd.

No issue. I just wanted to have it fixed. Trying to keep the old girl in good working order. FYI, the local muffler shop only wanted around $200 for an entirely new exhaust from the cats back. The place was empty when I stopped by and I only waited 30 minutes. But if you want to buy a bolt-on to do yourself, first make sure you won't have issues with rotted/seized bolts or flanges after the cats and buy the Walker system. Walker makes good stuff that fits right and is fairly priced.

"Is there any reason that I should consider welding it back on or replacing it instead?" Only that dumping your exhaust out right there under the floor of your truck, paired with any holes in the floor of the truck, could lead to carbon monoxide in the cabin. Your truck looks clean enough that it probably won't have holes in the floor! You may smell your own exhaust when you are stopped and have your rear windows open. But I drove my truck like this for perhaps 6 months without issue.

Didn't you replace your factory head unit for an aftermarket? If so, it will probably be putting out 25 watts per speaker. If you put in an aftermarket speaker bypassing the factory 'amps' they should work fine. But since they won't be amplified, and the rear speakers are, you will need to adjust your fader to even out the volume front to rear. But don't forget the tweeters in your A-Pillars. If you want to keep those working you will need to route the signal there too. But it really might be worth buying a set of used original amps. Just get a guarantee from the seller that they work!

What bumper is that?

Are you referring to the transmission oil cooler, or engine oil cooler? Not sure you have an engine oil cooler...if you do, it was an option that was part of some heavy-duty package.

5 minutes for you...2 hours for me! I've never been in the cluster.

Yes, there is a tensioner and it's very easy to adjust. See if this video helps you. It's for a front wheel drive car, but the engine should be the same, just turned sideways. If that doesn't fix it, then the squealing is probably coming from the power steering pump. That's a separate belt you can only get to from the bottom and it adjusts separately, without a separate tensioner because it's the only thing on that belt.

That's affirmative. Got the mats for Christmas.

Well, everything was good for a week. Since your symptoms were consistent with air in the system, let's assume that when you finally filled it that it was fixed. Now, a week later, it could just happen to be a new problem. I would consider the possibility that your radiator cap is bad. It should hold something like 14lbs of pressure before venting to the overflow tank. If that feature has failed, it would blow coolant out like you described. Either pressure test the cap, or buy a new one.

I have the Weathertech stuff for my truck. front and back seats and cargo area. Everything is a great fit except the front passenger floor. It works OK, like a universal fit would. You could cut/trim it to fit better if you were inclined, but don't have to.

The only experience I have is with engine oil stop-leak. Didn't work. But my son's truck has a blown head gasket and a head-gasket repair additive that he put in his anti-freeze sealed it up going on 3 years now. You may as well try it. Of course, you need to figure out if it's the transmission or the transfer case first!

Like bushnut said... You shouldn't need to do anything. Put those tires on and go. I ran stock 15" rims with 31x10.5 without changing anything. The only rubbing I had was the corner of the tire's tread would rub the frame rail gently when I turned all the way to lock. If you have 1/8" clearance at the spring perch you are still fine.

And one more thing...a vacuum leak can show as a MAF error.

Like Jeff said, I would consider a vacuum leak in the emissions control. If it was just a full-time vacuum leak, your code-start idle would be really high, or else plain crappy. The EGR only begins to operate when warm. If you read the operating description for EGR, it will list all the conditions in which EGR is opened...if those conditions correspond to the conditions in which you have intermittently experiencing trouble, then it would be a pretty good indicator of where the problem is.

Fair enough. Very interested in seeing the new swap approach you settle on (ie. specific part #s). Thanks.

Is pigtail not the right nomenclature? At that one end where the coil diameter comes down to roughly half of the 5" diameter...For the last couple of coils. That part of the spring just will not yield the same rate as the rest of the spring. If that entire section compresses under the vehicle's weight at that corner, then and only then does the spring become constant rate. But you can't look at the spring's specs and plug those in to a spring rate calculator and get the correct answer on spring rate. You either include the full height in your calculation and it gets thrown off because part of the spring isn't the 5" diameter you are inputting, or you measure height as the free height MINUS the necked down coils in which case you get a bad result too... Never the less, after test fitting and measuring spring height, then adding a known amount of weight to the spring and measuring again, you could then have an accurate rate. And the spec's spring rate may be accurate in this sense. You just can't use the spec'd spring rate + free height + corner weight to predict your ride height. Does any of that make sense?

You probably did find those gears listed...and they probably do work for that front diff when it's in an Xterra...But the key difference for our trucks is that in our trucks, and only our trucks, the gears are reverse cut. Unfortunately a lot of sites will still list them as being for the R50 pathfinder because the model of differential is the same as the other applications, yet they don't work because they aren't reverse cut like ours have to be. You might be able to swap in a front diff from an Xterra though. I don't know if it's as simple as that, however...or all of us would have done it.

First comment: The 4Runner spring is a variable rate spring by virtue of the lower diameter coiling at the pigtail. That could explain the discrepancy you see between advertised spring rate and your experience....when you installed it and the vehicle weight compressed it, you were using that lower spring rate first. If you then tested the spring rate by adding weight above your axle, you might have seen something closer to spec. Second comment (actually question): Aren't there lift springs for the 4Runner you could simply swap in to this setup you have and get your desired lift?

It's very nice having all that light in the back. I've been happy with my super brite LED bulb upgrade, but I will now give thought to following your lead

Yes I see... I only have 4" of lift and don't have any noticeable vibration from the change to pinion angle, but if you are going for 6+", you very well might. So correcting the pinion angle sounds like a very good idea. Most people think that you need to point the pinion at the transmission's tail shaft, but you actually want your pinion angle to cancel out your slip-yoke angle. If one is 10 degrees, the other should be -10 degrees.

Great. I'm interested in what you learn about the rear spring options. The bottom-design strut spacer is an idea that I played around with. It seems like it would be simple and effective. Good for you pressing forward with it. Question regarding your new trailing arms....Why? I mean, I understand that the tires will visually be moved forward once you lift, but when the suspension compresses it would move back to center giving the best clearance in the wheel wells...but if you lengthen the control arms to make it look centered at the lifted ride height, you will rub the rear of the fender openings when you compress the suspension...? Or do I not reason that correctly? Also, how far can you stretch it out before you need to have the driveshaft lengthened?

If I'm understanding you correctly, the answer is no. There shouldn't be any movement. But you shouldn't seek to 'pinch' it tight between the mount with washers. Rather your bolt should match the inner diameter of the eyelet, or use a bushing to fill up the eyelet. (you did say fore/aft movement) But if you were referring to it being able to move side to side within the mount, sliding along the bolt...You probably could try to take up that slack with washers, but again, a properly designed bushing would do that for you too.