The used 100 Series market has gotten competitive. Prices are up. Good trucks get snapped up fast. And because demand is high, there are a lot of trucks being sold with problems that aren’t obvious on a test drive or visible in listing photos. I’ve seen the outcome of this more times than I can…
I get calls from people who are looking at a 100 Series with 220,000 miles on it and want to know if it’s too high. My answer is always the same. It depends on zero things about the mileage and everything about the maintenance history. 200,000 miles on a Land Cruiser is not old. It’s…
What they do, why frame-mounting matters, and what to look for. Rock sliders don’t get the attention that a lift kit or a winch does. They’re not the flashiest modification you can make to a Land Cruiser. But on a truck that’s going to see any real off-road use, they’re one of the most practical…
There’s a version of this story I hear regularly. Someone buys a 100 Series, drives it, and thinks it handles well enough. Then they come in for something else, we replace the suspension bushings as part of the job, and they call me after they pick the truck up to tell me it drives like…
Most 100 Series trucks over 200,000 miles have at least one oil leak. That’s not a criticism of the platform. It’s just what happens to seals and gaskets on a vehicle that’s been running for 20 years. The engine expands and contracts with every heat cycle, seals age and harden, and eventually oil finds a…
Most Land Cruiser owners have heard of timing belts. Most have at least a passing understanding of head gaskets. Wheel bearings on the 100 Series? Most people have no idea there’s a service interval at all. That’s not their fault. It’s not on the standard maintenance schedule that most shops follow. It’s not something Toyota…
Most of the things that can go wrong on a 100 Series are things owners have at least heard of. Timing belt. Head gaskets. Oil leaks. People know those words, even if they don’t know the details. Heater T’s are different. I bring them up and most owners look at me like I said something…
I’ve owned close to 20 Land Cruisers. Most of them got modified in some way. And the question I get more than almost any other is some version of: I want to do more with this truck. Where do I start? The 100 Series is an incredible off-road platform right out of the box. Toyota…
I’ve had this conversation hundreds of times. Someone buys a 100 Series, loves it, drives it for six months, and then the engine locks up. They call me after the fact. And almost every time, the answer is the same: nobody replaced the timing belt. It’s the most important service on the 100 Series. It’s…