i owned a 2000 tacoma sr5 3.4 4x4, i loved it traded it in (for a ranger)with 165k on it and it cost me 1 part thats it. (air fuel sensor)

i like them both i saw the quality in toyota with having that many miles on it and still driving/riding/h.p, was still the same as it was like it only had 50k on it.

 

well the great thing about the "dated" look is that my '93 really doesnt appear to be that old. some vehicles , no matter what make are problems, others are quite great. my '88 ranger with 200,000 miles was alot less troublesome than my current '93 that just turned 106k. my dads '89 bronco was a better truck than the '96 bronco, both were bought new. yes the toyota's seem to hold more resale value, real bummer when your a buyer, good thing if your selling. seems like the early toy's were more rust-prone. replacement part prices are something to consider, if its less expensive to maintain the ford and parts are more available, thats something to think about. nothing is ever completly troble-free. i'll probly drive my '93 until the body rots off, or i can find a "cute-ute" that gets 25 mpg and will tow 4,000 pnds. closest thing i have found is the chevy equinox-----but the ford is paid for. that 25g's in payment would buy alot of fuel, even at 3+ a gallon.

 

I dont know too much about Toyota trucks (although I have owned many of their cars in the past and found them very reliable) but here is a true story of my experience with one Toyota truck....

I live on a farm in the Ozarks, and it is very hilly land, at the bottom of the hollow between us and my neighbor is a couple of 3+ acre ponds, with great fishing, so a lot of people ask to come, or are invited onto the property to fish.

One evening, my son-in-law comes up and tells me a buddy of his is stuck coming up the hill from the pond, so I get into my Ranger 4L,4x4, 5spd, and run down to the lake and sure enough, here is this truck almost off the road. In fact, it is so close to the edge, he cant back down the road again, and in a foot or so, it will be sliding off the road into the lake.

I hook up a cable and pull the thing up away from the edge, and he backs it down the hill, gets a running start, and comes on up onto a flatter road section, and we stop and talk.

I say, "how did this happen?", he says " I stopped to look at the lake and couldnt get it to go forward any more, it just slid down." I say," too bad it doesn't have 4wd"
He says,"It does". I say, "did you use it" , He says, "yep!"

Obviously, this could be a driver issue, but I cant envision how the Ranger could get in this predicament. I have used it to retrieve my other Ranger when it slid off the road during a snowstorm (2.5L, 2wd) and have gone into the pastures to retrieve my ATV, when it's gotten stuck.(kaw mule 3010) My thought is the Toyota must be way too light in the rear end for the 4wd to be effective.

Anyway, that's what I wanted to share.

 

good story, thanks for sharing, I enjoyed reading that.
bpf

 

like i have said before, i love my 1994 ranger with 166k miles on her............................................but you CAN'T beat Honda or Toyota Quality...................and if you could.................the UAW would not be in the situation they are currently in.

Point Simple, Point Blank.

I mean look at the new tundra........what a beautiful beast.

 

Huh? The one word I can think of to describe the new Tundra is "Yuk".

Beauty, as they say, is in the eye of the beholder.

 

I wouldn't hit a dog in the butt with a toyota, "japanese junk". Buy american and live long and prosper. At ford, quality is job #1. I've driven fords all my life and I have yet to walk, or had any major repair that wasn't self inflicted at the local deag strip. When better cars are built, ford will build them, "BOLLD MOVES" !!!!!!!!!!!

 

cant beatem for quality, to each there own on opinions though.

but fact is trade in value and resale value you cant touch toyota

loved the story about the 4x4 on the toyota

fact is ford can go where the tacoma can go and vice versa

 

Fresh out of college I bought a brand new '95 4X2 SC XLT in Cayman green metallic. Whomever tells you that chicks don't dig a young guy with a sharp-looking new pickup is talking out of his ***. But anyway, I chose the Ranger because it seemed like a better value than the equivalent Toyota, and I preferred to "buy American." By the time that truck had two years and about 42K on it (booty calls, mainly), it had proven trouble-free aside from two recalls involving the electical system. But what was becoming apparent as it aged was that it was showing a "looseness" that my friends' Toyotas (or even Nissans) didn't have at twice the mileage. At 42K it felt older than a buddy's '94 Taco with 110K, and that truck had been used to drive up and down stairs at a major university (long story. .. .ah, youth!). Little pieces of the interior were starting to break or wear. That was annoying on a vehicle with 3 years of payments left to make. Despite the looseness, the recalls, and the sluggishness of the 2.3L (even with the 5-speed), I intended to keep that truck and pay it off. Some amped-up idiot in a Dodge Neon decided otherwise for me when he ran a red light and t-boned it, totalling it out at 42K. Looking back, all I can say is "you get what you pay for". That "feeling" of quality that makes you happy to send in your payment coupon every month even after 50 or 100K just wasn't there on the Ranger, but probably would have been on the Tacoma. The Ranger worked fine as value-priced transportation, but didn't really satisfy in the long run, and if I had it to do again--and this is coming from a "Ford Man"--I'd probably have bought a 2-year old Toyota. My $0.02.

 

Wendell, that was Buick's slogan for 40 years. "When better automobiles are built, Buick will build them."

Since David Dunbar Buick invented the process to adhere porcelain to cast iron, ppl used to say: "When better bathtubs are built, Buick will build them!"

Considering some of the land yachts Buick used to make, that line fits.


Ford Prexy Petersen was asked by a reporter at a news conference once: "If Quality is Job 1, what is Job 2?"

He stood there dumfounded...he had no answer!

 

Actually, the Ranger does beat 'em, a least it did in '06, according to JD Power's 2006 Vehicle Dependability Study.


Seems that our trusty ol' Ford Ranger (which hasn't has a substantive re-design in almost 15 years) beat out the latest and greatest version of the Tacoma, as well as every other brand of "midsize" pickup truck. To me, that says a lot.

 

While Rangers have been restyled over the years, the last major structural change was in 1984, when the Super Cab was added. The basic design was introduced in 1983. The Ranger is almost as old as the Crown Vic, which has had only one major styling change (in 1992). The basic design of the Crown Vic dates to 1979.

 

Hard to argue with you on that. Although one might contend that the changes that 1998 brought were a little more than just tweaks:

- Standard cab wheel base stretched from 107.9 inches to 111.5 inches

- Fully boxed front frame

- SLA front suspension (no more TIB)

- Torsion bar front springs on 4WD and Edge models

Point is, the Ranger's design is a lot older than the Tacoma's, and yet the Ranger still gives it a run for its money dependibility-wise.

 

Somebody should sneek over to the Tacoma forum and post that JD Powers chart and ask 'WHYYYYYYYYYY'...... hee hee

Fred

 

Its really not fair to debate about how long the interior's last from truck to truck. I would keep mine looking brand new for probably over 100k. I have a buddy that could make a 3 day old truck look like it was 40 years old on the inside in about 2 hours.

Alot of factors go into how a vehicle handles after high miles. Speed rating/load range of tires, shocks (brand, style, etc) bushing condition, etc...Our ranger has 130k on it and still feels pretty tight to me. I can tell you this. Working in a shop, i would rather work on a ranger any day of the week.

I guess the main reason I like my FORD is because it always seems when a honda/toyota comes in, its usally either owned by some rich college boy who's parents buy them everything, or a ricer, who has the aftermarket strut tower bar, k&N cone, 20's, and does not know how to check their air pressure. Just seeing that turns me away from them. I'm a ford guy through and through.