Tacoma 6 speed solution?

Haha, well I will say I am in between the two of you.

My truck will not shift fast.. its a truck. It will shift fast enough for 2nd definate and 3 sometime gear chirp. But i rarely drive that hard.

If at a high RPM at all it will not shift into 5th, I have to rev match that one or it will grind aignificantly.

1st, probably because of the low gear and high idle likes to play hard to get.

If i drive like a grandma, it does not like it. If i bang the gears it does not like it. I have to shift it deliberately.

In contrast to my 85 that likes it slow and smooth (its a 22re so there is no fast) vs banging the gears.

My 92 has been run hard, soley in mud drags and it responds well to banging the gears but rejects 3rd on occasion.

The 2008 i used to have shifted great at all times. It is possible.

 

Mine had a terrible bump grind into 3rd. Redline fluid helped some but it still would do it. I changed to a TRD short shift and that issue went away. The shift is notchy but it doesn't grind anymore. I've been running this way for just about 1 year. Sometimes getting into 1st can be a challenge but a quick double clutch and it slides right in.

 

Sometimes I can't engage 1st when I'm stopped at a red light. I usually have to quickly shift to 5th then back to 1st. If I just give it some gas, sometimes 1st will engage, sometimes it'll grind.

I used to get the slight grind from 1st to 2nd, I also use Redline and a short shifter, which definitely helped.

 

I forgot to mention a quick double is how i get it in first as well. I should tell my wife, she complains about it eveey time she takes my truck.

 

2011 V6 MT with 98K. Same boat here, only issue I've ever had is at a stop neutral to first. My normal is "neutral-2nd-first" Pretty sad I'm so used to doing that I forgot until reading this. Otherwise I love all other gears and power/rev, I don't pull with my truck so its never under a big load.

 

1/3 or so of the life of my truck is working hard.

 

They are little work horses...I've heard of other people talking about this before, just never had issue other then 1st. I installed 5.29 gears (have not drove it yet) and I'm dying to see the rpm in 6th.

 

Oh man me too now haha. I plan on 4.88 in the future. Would like 4.56. I plan on running 33's or 34's later. With 3.73, supercharger and 31's it pulls great, 4.10 would be even better I think. The last trip i took i went from Iowa to the mountains with my 2004 tacoma on a car hauler behind my truck and it ran 10 over (except in illinois work zones.) Without ever dogging down. There were only 2 or 3 hills in the mountains i had to touch 3rd to maintain the speed limit.

My 85 is 4.88 on 31 and runs great. Race truck is 4.88 on 34 and runs hard as hell.

I dont know that i could run 5.29 now as i do run 85 or more from time to time

 

Older thread I know, but I had some ideas about this recently.

The way I see it, the Tacoma manual transmission has had four primary issues, three of which relate to the clutch. You've got the pedal squeak, the release bearing squeal, the quill wear, and shifting concerns. The pedal isn't necessarily related to the transmission and had issues with three different engines and four transmissions, so it's less relevant to this discussion.

Toyota more or less solved the release bearing squeal issue with the TSB, and aftermarket suppliers have been releasing some solution'ish products for the quill wear, but Toyota seems to have more or less given up on the RA-series transmission at this point and is saying it is what it is.

Toyota used more or less 4 transmission variants behind the 1GR. The RA-series, the H-series, and two variants of the R-series. These transmissions would all bolt up to the engine in the 2005-2015 Tacoma V6 4x4 without any issue, but as far as the transfer case, shifter, and mounting is concerned the R-series is potentially the simplest solution - the main caveat being that nothing aside from the RA-series was sold in the North American market, so that brings us back to the RC62F.

If moving away from the RA-series transmission, there are definitely options as far as ratios go, but I think too many people get hung up on overdrive this or that without considering final drive. Your transmission gear ratios from a purely numerical standpoint don't really matter. I mean of course the ratios matter, but having an extra overdrive vs. not could potentially result in the exact same driving experience if your final drive is also changed - which is what Toyota did when they moved from the RA to the RC in the Tacoma. The RA60F uses a 3.727:1 final drive while the RC62F uses a 4.300:1 final drive. The difference in 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th gear between the 2015 and 2016 Tacoma is 2.4%, 3.3%, 2.2%, and 3.1% respectively. Instead of spinning at 3060rpm in 5th, you'd be at 3000rpm, and instead of 2600rpm in 6th at 75mph, you'd be at 2520rpm.

That's not to say that it's good or bad, just that even though Toyota added an extra overdrive to the transmission, the actual gearing for 3rd through 6th only changed by an average of 2.5%, basically nothing. You can achieve the same "extra" highway gearing by simply choosing your final drive appropriately. That said, first is shorter by 10% and second is shorter by 6%, so a bit more to write home about there. The overall spread for the RA60F is 79.7% from 1st to 6th while the RC62F is 82.1%.

So what did I mean when I said there are options? Well, if you look at the R-series option, the R150F has a 78.1% spread, the R155F has a 79.5% spread, the R151F has a 80.6% spread, and the R156F has a 81.7% spread. But if you're really looking to have a nice crawling gear for 1st while maintaining nice highway cruising, the RC60F and RC61F may be decent options with a spread of 86.6% (the RC60F would be my choice).

Carefully selecting the transmission ratios in combination with your final drive ratio will work to get you what you really want, and moving from the RA-series to either the R-series or RC-series can also solve some of the other concerns that people have reported with the RA. Note here however that for shifting quality and overall reliability I would potentially say that going with the R-series may be a nice option due to being in continuous production for well over 30 years - getting numerous updates during that time. For the best gearing though, I think the RC-series is likely the way to go.

All of the transmissions being discussed here are manufactured by Aisin. The Toyota R-series is the Aisin AR5, the Toyota RA-series is the Aisin AY6, and the Toyota RC-series is the Aisin AC6.

In general there are 2 transmission bolt patterns used for the GR-series engines. In the past only the 1GR used the larger pattern while all others uses a smaller pattern. That said, the Tacoma 2GR block has a few significant differences compared to other 2GR engines, and the transmission bolt pattern is one of them. The Tacoma 1GR and 2GR use the same transmission bolt pattern, flywheel size (though with a different bolt pattern), and clutch diameter (though the 2GR uses a heavier pressure plate).

Additionally, it does appear that the transfer case bolt pattern is indeed the same as well, so it very well could end up being a somewhat simple swap. Of course to get the gear ratios we were discussing earlier you may want to find yourself an RC60F from overseas with a 2GR/RC62F bellhousing. Running something in the 4.78:1 for a final drive would be a nice option I think for a stock tire size truck. You could comfortably drive around using 2nd through 6th like you would with a 5-speed car (with a taller 6th gear than the stock setup) and get a nice short 1st gear for crawling.

Overall driveline ratios for a stock RA60F Tacoma, an RC60F/4.78:1 and the more accessible RC62F/4.30:1 and R156F/4.10:1:

RA60F / RC60F / RC62F / R156F
1: 15.55 / 22.86 / 17.12 / 17.68
2: 8.163 / 11.58 / 8.673 / 9.553
3: 5.546 / 6.894 / 5.680 / 5.888
4: 4.447 / 4.778 / 4.300 / 4.100
5: 3.727 / 3.712 / 3.646 / 3.239
6: 3.164 / 3.072 / 3.066 / -

I think people are interested.

Jeff

 

Which auto?

 

Maybe I’m confused. What do you want to achieve and what are you thinking of changing to achieve it?

 

That would be very difficult.

 

Aren’t you just stressing your synchros more? I’ve never noticed this but I also drive 18s, 13s, 10s, etc. for work…