Supercharged Toyota 4Runner: Used Car Reminder
Posted by Doug DeMuro in Used Car Reminder on | 13 comments
The Toyota 4Runner is a pretty cool SUV. It’s reliable, off-roadable, and even family-able. Plus, if you buy one new today it’ll still be worth exactly what you paid in about seven years. This makes looking for a used one infuriating, since a 2008 Explorer costs about the same as a 2003 4Runner. Truly.
The problem is that the 4Runner has never really been very fast. Not that you’d necessarily want it to be, since it’s tall and somewhat narrow. But for those of you who do want a spry SUV, the 4Runner was hardly the best choice.
Or was it?
From 1996 to 2002, Toyota offered a dealer-installed TRD supercharged for the 4Runner. Supposedly, this option – which cost something absurd like $3,000 – brought power from 190 horses to around 250. That’s an enormous jump, though one might argue it really brought the 4Runner from bad to normal, given the SUV’s enormous lack of power before.
Either way, I think there’s something cool about an aftermarket supercharger for a car like the 4Runner. Apparently, Toyota customers agreed, because Toyota also chose to offer a blower on the next-generation 4Runner. And then, for the next generation, Toyota chose to offer a four-cylinder. For some reason.
Finding a used one is hard. But if you do, be sure to get set of “TRD Supercharged” badges on eBay. It’s a subtle way of telling everyone: hey, now I can keep up with traffic!
13 Responses to “ “Supercharged Toyota 4Runner: Used Car Reminder”
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The prices of used Toyota-whatever is pretty ridiculous. Although, I’m a Ford guy(having owned an F-series of some age/style since I was able to drive)I’ve always wanted a Toyota truck or SUV, but there’s no way I could ever justify paying the prices that they command used, even with a ton miles on them.
And wow, $3,000 dollars for a supercharger. Was that a dealer-installed option?
*nevermind, I should learn to read.
Believe it or not, I think the supercharger had the same cost on the Scion tC. The tC doesn’t hold its value quite as well as the trucks…
The supercharger was also available for the Tacoma (as you’d expect due to so much shared between it and 4Runner). Since you could only get the V6 Tacoma in an Xtracab, you can still get 4 seats just like the 4Runner
Your 2 add’l people would need to be dwarfs, but you’d still have 4 seats
Awesome! Never knew that. Bet the Tacoma was a bit faster.
The 2001-2004 Nissan Frontier and Xterra were also available with a factory supercharger for those keeping score at home.
Yes. For some reason, factory makes it that much more legitimate…
What about the V8 version? I test drove one eons ago, and it was plenty fast. Maybe easier to find used than a supercharged version.
Why not both? TRD currently offers a TVS kit (that is, the same type of supercharger used on the ZR1 and CTS-V)for the 5.7l V8 in the Tundra and Sequioa, bring power up to a rather alarming 504hp. All still under factory warranty too, presumably that kind of power in a bog standard pickup with the original leaf springs and brakes ensures that most owners don’t actually survive long enough to make any warranty claims.
And THIS is why I love car people. I never knew this. 504 hp in a SEQUOIA?? What does this cost?!?
No idea off the top of my head, but I’m sure some googling will suffice. What I *do* remember off the top of my head is that the guys over at motoiq have done a detailed documentation of their install process
http://www.motoiq.com/magazine_articles/articletype/articleview/articleid/1915/project-toyota-tundra-installing-the-trd-supercharger-part-1.aspx
One more note…I was thinking about this yesterday and couldn’t decide if my memory was playing tricks on me. Turns out, it wasn’t. TRD even offered a supercharger for the 4 cylinder Tacoma! It was built by Alpine, but since TRD sold it, you could get the factory warranty & dealer installed.
Too bad the S-Runner and X-Runner Tacoma models didn’t include the factory supercharger (like Nissan’s Frontier, as pointed out above). Toyota put on a lot of TRD goodies, but left out the blower.
Think used 4Runner values are high? Check a Land Cruiser. Assuming you can find one it will be an 80s version, have over 200,000 miles, cloth seats, manual transmission and STILL cost more than that 2008 Explorer.