Toyota Just Launched the Ultimate Overland Tacoma

Show Notes for Episode #144
Toyota Just Launched the Ultimate Overland Tacoma

Summary:
Toyota has just announced their 2024 Tacoma available in SR, SR5, TRD Pro, and the much-anticipated Trailhunter packages. The list of capabilities is impressive, including 33" tires, factory lift, OME suspension, ARB bumper, integrated compressor, 2,400 watt inverter, and even a front swaybar disconnect. There are now three motor options, with torque as high as 465 lb-ft. Toyota has brought their A game and all the goodies to the new Tacoma, and we can't wait to get behind the wheel. 

Transcript

Scott Brady:  Hello and welcome to the Overland Journal podcast. I'm your host, Scott Brady, and I'm here with my co-host Matt Scott. And for this week we are super excited to talk about the new. 2024 Toyota Tacoma. This vehicle is all new from the ground up and they've addressed all of the things that we saw as cons about the vehicle in previous podcasts. This thing is gonna be available with up to 1700 pounds of payload, 33 inch tall tires. It's gonna have a trail hunter package built specifically for overlanding. The list goes on and on and on. So please enjoy this wide ranging conversation about the all new Tacoma. With Matt and Scott, this content is brought to you by Overland Journal, our premium quality print publication. The magazine was founded in 2006 with the goal of providing independent equipment and vehicle reviews [00:01:00] along with the most stunning adventures and photography. We care deeply about the countries and cultures. We visit and share our experiences freely with our readers. We also have zero advertorial policy and do not accept any advertiser compensation for our reviews. By subscribing to Overland Journal, you're helping to support our employee owned and veteran owned publication. Your support also provides resources and funding for content like you are watching or listening to right now. You can subscribe directly on our website@overlandjournal.com. Hello and welcome to the Overland Journal podcast. I'm your host, Scott Brady, and I'm here with my co-host Matt Scott. And we are all smiles and excitement this morning.

Matt Scott: Yeah, Toyota's back.

Scott Brady: Because, because the Tacoma is back. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. Yeah. So, man, where do we even start? 

Scott Brady: I mean, I mean, there's a lot to talk about. [00:02:00] This is.

Matt Scott: Ground up, ground up, refresh. So, you know, I think we were all big fans of the second generation Tacoma.

Scott Brady: And the first gen of course.

Matt Scott: And the first gen, the third gen. You know, honestly, there's nothing wrong with it. It just, that's where, I'm not gonna say that Toyota was asleep at the wheel. But you really started to see the competition come into that segment. You know, you started to see the Colorado z R two that was like, In my opinion, kind of mind bending for the segment. And now Toyota's responding.

Scott Brady: They, they really are.

Matt Scott: In earnest. Like they're out for, they're out for blood in their own little Toyota way. Scott Brady: That's what I think. That's what it feels like. It feels like they've taken it so seriously and it's almost like they listened to the podcast. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. I mean, I mean.

Scott Brady: It's because we've been, we, we are both, we've both trusted our lives to toyotas, around the world. But the Tacoma slowly became less appropriate as a tool with. The limitations of the frame limitations was the payload. 

Matt Scott: I never thought it was enjoyable to drive. You know, I.

Scott Brady: Third gen, we're talking about.

Matt Scott: The third gen. [00:03:00] I mean, that, that motor was a little weird. In just, in how it operated. The whole Atkinson cycle thing.

Scott Brady: And then the six speed and the very, very high first gear. It needed to be, you know, at least a 4.5 to five or a five to one first gear was a very high first gear. So it just kind of made it terrifying. 

Matt Scott: You had to put like four 80 eights in it or something to make it, drive right. And, and there were issues. But boy, I mean, I don't even know where to start on this, so. I know, I do know where to start this trail hunter thing. I think the name's a little tacky. 

Scott Brady: Yeah, the name is an interesting one. It's like, it's probably just that they couldn't find another good name because it, there's so many names that are, that are locked down now. Matt Scott: The design guy's last name is also Hunter, so wonder if you'd like

Scott Brady: Oh, got it.

Matt Scott: Worked his.

Scott Brady: Oh, there we go. 

Matt Scott: Worked his way into that. 

Scott Brady: In, into perpetuity. 

Matt Scott: But it's really cool. I mean, if, if, if we were to sit down a couple years ago and say, what would the ultimate aftermarket and OE collaboration be? Yeah. I mean for me it would probably still be [00:04:00] aev and RAM or something. But number two for me would be ARB and Toyota. I mean, they are just, I mean does a 70 series at. Not get an ARB bumper at some point in its life. You know, I mean, they are, they're, they're so hand in hand. And this, this trail hunter truthfully, kind of was co-developed by a R b, I mean, they had a r b engineers. Working at Toyota. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. Which is so cool. And a r b has, it's in many the way. Same ways that a E V does is this is a brand that we have all trusted. We've seen, yeah. We've seen just consistent quality performance. Durability. They do a lot of the same kinds of coatings and finishes as the OEM does. So you know that the ARB bumper's gonna last yeah. A while without being corroded. A corroded mess. Yeah. And then of course they have the, the capability of integrating with the safety systems of the vehicle. So you can see on [00:05:00] this trail hunter how much ARB is integrated. So you have actually labeled old man immune suspension. On the trail hunter.

Matt Scott: Which is so cool. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. So, and then clearly ARB would've also been involved with some of the spring tuning, which this is one of the questions that we don't have answered yet based upon the information that we have. I have asked Toyota and they kind of skirted the question in their reply, but we don't know what the Payload is gonna be on the trail hunter. There is a lot of good things to talk about around payload with these vehicles cuz it's a huge improvement, but we actually just don't know where that one's gonna end up at. But if ARB had anything to do with it as far as the spring rates, it's probably gonna be well suited to some higher payload numbers. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. And, and I think it's really brave of Toyota to kind of split the market between the go fast desert crowd and the over landing crowd. Because. I mean, I mean, myself included there, if you wanted [00:06:00] kind of that somewhat factory prepped off-road truck. Let's, let's go down the lines of Z R two Raptor. T R X. You know, they, they worked for the Overland East style travel and it was nice to have those things done from the factory, but that wasn't their actual purpose. And there were so many people taking these desert trucks. And trying to make them overlanders and throwing away all that suspension tuning and throwing away everything that went into it for the Go Fast side of things. I think it's really cool. 

Scott Brady: I agree. And they actually are quite different. And that was actually one of the comments in the long form press release was that Toyota was very intentional about segmenting the different models. So they have an affordable SR model that you can get a manual transmission in. They have an SR five, you can get a manual transmission, you can even get, still get the extra cab, and that gives you 1700 pounds of payload. There's some unanswered questions around that. Like, can you still get the t rd [00:07:00] package? They traditionally had like an option check of, I want the T RD package, which gave you the rear locker, some slightly different shock absorbers and things like that. There's some unanswered questions on if you can still do that with the extra cab. But if you wanna maximize payload, you can get 1,709 pounds with just. Ever so slightly beats out the six speed manual gladiator by nine pounds, which is kind of funny. 

Matt Scott: It's kind of a little, yeah. 

Scott Brady: Like I like I know Toyota well enough where it's almost like they, it's, I think it's just a coincidence. I don't really think that they would be like, oh, we're gonna beat 'em by nine pounds. I think that it's probably what it came back at. Because Toyota isn't, you know, they're not, they're not that way. 

Matt Scott: They're a fairly conservative company. Yeah, there's, there's a lot of different you know, I guess specs and, and levels that you can get this truck in. You know, I'm just looking at, at the Limited, and since I'm a slut for NICE Interiors, heated and cooled seats in a Tacoma. [00:08:00] 

Scott Brady: Well, and and it even gets, it even gets more interesting because you get it, you can get with the I Force Max with an all-wheel drive transfer case.

Matt Scott: Oh, that's kind of cool. 

Scott Brady: So you end up with this luxury mid-size truck that has. Think of your kind of, especially with the I force Max where you have a, a, you know, the advantages of it being a hybrid at high elevation. So, you know, you got your ski mountain ski town. Got your heated seats. You got your heated steering wheel, you've got your all-wheel drive. You got, 465 foot pounds of torque, I think is what it, it's.

Matt Scott:  I mean this, this is the, you know, the large leap forward that we've been hoping and praying for coming from Toyota. I mean, if they. It, it would've been very bad news had they taken the third gen and thrown a different motor in it. It, that platform was just getting old and it couldn't keep up with, with the competition that was out there. I mean, if you think about it, in the last couple months, what we've seen, 2024 Ranger. [00:09:00] And Ranger Raptor, GM and Chevy, Colorado and Canyon. Geez. And, and then this, yeah, I mean people are like, this segment is really, really heating up and I think that that's really cool.

Scott Brady: And the big shot across the bow of the segment was of course the gladiator, which had big numbers to begin with. But this was interesting. I'd been doing some research for this podcast around production numbers and the Tacoma is still by far the most sold, mid-size at over. 

Matt Scott: There's a lot of brand loyalty there.

Scott Brady: Of over 200,000 units. But the second. One in line is the GM product. So they came in at 111,000 units and so they came out of like last place to second place within a matter of just a few years. But gladiator numbers are off a little bit, but they're still lot 80. 

Matt Scott: A lot of competition going for the gladiator. 

Scott Brady: 80,000, 80,000 units of the gladiator. So the mid-size truck segment is just very popular. And there's a [00:10:00] lot of great capability in it now too.

Matt Scott: I'm, I'm very excited to see what, you know, I know this podcast is focused on the new Tacoma, but you know, we know that there's upgrades coming to the Gladiator in the next couple years. They just announced that they're gonna do the two liter four by e power train, which I think is really cool.

Scott Brady: My, one of my favorite power trains on the planet right now. 

Matt Scott: And then they have that hurricane straight six coming that's eventually supposed to make its way into Gladiator Jeep, and all of these things. Really, really, it's, it's gonna be really fascinating. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. I mean, look, what a great ta time to be alive is an overlander.

Matt Scott: I mean, yeah, we're getting mid-size trucks with some payload. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. And I think that, One of the things that stood away from me when I read all of this on the new Tacoma is it feels like we're finally getting the hilux back. Yeah, and I'll, and I'll explain to a couple reasons why that's the case. So this vehicle is built on the new F series platform, which is what they build [00:11:00] the Land Cruiser on. This is gonna be redimensioned of course, for it being a narrower vehicle, but it is. An extreme duty to, excuse me, this is an extreme duty frame that it's fully boxed, has additional frame members, cross members, so you're going to get away from that frame limitation that we've had with the Tacoma for so long. It's also gonna have. Disc brakes in the rear, it's gonna have heavier duty axles. You can see it in the photographs. These are heavy duty axles. 

Matt Scott: I'm very interested in, in this kind of parts swapping environment between Tundra, Sequoia, Land Cruiser, Tacoma now.

Scott Brady: And you had an interesting comment earlier about these wide track Tacomas in these photos.

Matt Scott: Yeah. So T Rd Pro and Trail Hunter. You know, I, I guess it's important to say that, We don't have all the information at this point. We're recording this a couple days before. 

Scott Brady: Embargo lifts.

Matt Scott: Embargo lifts. You know, so some of this is [00:12:00] interpreting what we're seeing and it should be taken as opinion or speculation. But the Trail Hunter and the Trd Pro are three inches wider than the standard, you know. 

Scott Brady: That's right. Variance SR five. 

Matt Scott: Yep. And you can't get that through wheel offset as as a manufacturer. That's just too much. It, it really makes me wonder if these, if these vehicles are getting the tundra front end on it, are they getting a tundra rear axle? You know, cuz then, then you're thinking gross axle weights for their rear and actual payloads and, and, and things. Maybe they could, maybe they could feasibly actually get some decent payload under display.

Scott Brady: It would, it would have to be wider front control arms. So if you've got a narrower frame overall than the tundra and then you put the tundra. Axles and control arms on there, you end up with this slightly wider version of a Tacoma. Yeah. So your, I think your thoughts are very.

Matt Scott: It would be interesting. I mean, it, I mean, you know, we've seen that, [00:13:00] happen in the aftermarket. Like you could take the Titan stuff and swap that onto the, the frontier. It, it would all maybe seem to work. I mean, heck, you could do that on the Land Cruiser too, where you take the Tundra, front control Arms, put 'em on the, the 200 series Land Cruiser, and it was like a factory long travel kit. Like that's, that's interesting. You know, I think while we're on the subject of this trail hunter, it doesn't have arb front bumper. It has arb rear bumper and they really hype it up and it looks great. 

Scott Brady: It does. And the, and the recovery points. 

Matt Scott: And I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna give 'em some grace on this and I think that everybody else should too. It is really, really hard to get, you know, pedestrian safety and. Certifications for this kind of stuff. You have to, you have to be looking forward and having reserve capacity for the legislation that's, that maybe manufacturers know is coming. You know, so, we knew that this Trail hunter concept was [00:14:00] kind of coming out. In my mind, I'm like, oh, it's gonna have, you know, the ARB bumper on the front. Well, I think you just do that aftermarket and you throw away the plastic bumper that's on there, which does look different and kind of cool. 

Scott Brady: And given ARBs involvement with the package, they probably already have it in boxes ready to go. 

Matt Scott: That probably is so.

Scott Brady: So we may even see it at the Overland Expo this next week.

Matt Scott: The rock rails look pretty cool. 

Scott Brady: They look and they're frame mounted, so they're very durable rock rails. 

Matt Scott: So, I mean it kind of.

Scott Brady: Do we want to kind of go through the Trail Hunter specs? 

Matt Scott: Yeah, yeah. Why don't you.

Scott Brady: So it looks, it looks like that the trail hunter's only gonna be available in the I Force Max. You're gonna get maximum fuel economy, but you're only gonna get the automatic, so you're not gonna be able to get a manual transmission. The one thing I found most interesting, and this is there's a bunch of nuggets kind of. Deep into some of the copy on the press release, but you can get the trail hunter in a double cab long bed. So that's gonna clearly be the overland variant. So you have a six foot bed for a full length gro go fast [00:15:00] camper or some other lightweight camper system. You're gonna end up with a lot of storage space overall. You end up with two and a half inch diameter old man emu mono tube position, sensitive shock absorbers. And they do have piggyback style remote reservoirs on them. You've got the, the trail hunter forge aluminum upper control arms. They're bronze color. That's what I was laughing at. Matt Scott: Yeah, that's a little broy. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. Well, you know, People like that stuff, apparently. But then you have a locking rear differential. Super key. This is a, this is a big update. 

Matt Scott: Ooh. Ooh. I know what you're gonna say. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. Say it.

Matt Scott: Front Swaybar disconnect. 

Scott Brady: I know it's such a big deal. 

Matt Scott: I should say that in a sexier voice Front Swaybar disconnect. 

Scott Brady: There you go. Slowly, Matt. Slowly. But it's like what we just tested on the new Grand Cherokee where you have this driver activated, front swaybar disconnect.

Matt Scott: It's very cool. 

Scott Brady: And. This is what's interesting to me is I suspect that this is only gonna [00:16:00] be available with the five link rear end. And what we saw in the tundra was less articulation out of the rear end with the five length than we saw with the leaf springs. And that's because of the positioning of the shocks. The shocks are positioned outside of the frame, which limits packaging, and because it's further outside the frame, they'd have to be much longer in order to provide the same amount of articulation. So, You probably have less articulation with the five link rear, which means they had to address it somehow. And they did it by adding the swaybar disconnect in the front, which according to the literature, says you get a 10% increase in ramp travel index. 

Matt Scott: I, and I think that that's super cool. It also.

Scott Brady: Super cool And it should, it should ride a lot better too. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. I think that's.

Scott Brady: Less head toss.

Matt Scott: I think that's, you know, having experienced this on Jeeps that I've owned, That's the real, you know, ticket thing here is.

Scott Brady: Ride quality improves.

Matt Scott: It's four wheel drive boom, you know, turn that front sway bar off and it's just, when you as an occupant, you can feel it. When you're off-road.

Scott Brady: You're not getting tossed around. Yeah. It makes a big difference [00:17:00] in off-road ride comfort. 

Matt Scott: So auxiliary DC switches is kind of cool. You know, we've seen that historically from, you know, I think Ford really, was the one that led that. And Jeep and Ram and all of those guys came along super cool because, Like anybody that's modifying their truck lights, whatever, can take advantage of that. And I, and I really support it because I, I have seen too many trucks burn down from sketchy wiring. And that's really started to change in this Spod Switch Pro, trigger system kind of era. And I think that those things are fantastic. I just noticed heated and cooled seats on, on Trail Hunter and Trd Pro. It's just kind of a nice thing you It is know.

Scott Brady: It is. I mean, yeah, like you think, you think that cooled seats are ridiculous until you try it and you're like, oh my God. 

Matt Scott: I'd almost rather, I mean, living in Arizona, Cooled seats are, they're a big thing. 

Scott Brady: They're so good. Well, and 33 inch Goodyear territory tires, which I have found to be a nice hybrid tire. They're not, they're kind of mud terrainey. They're kind of alterrainey, [00:18:00] they're, they're really a nice balance and 33 inches in diameter. The one thing that's a little bit of a hmm is the 18 inch wheels. So we've talked about this on the podcast before, but you want the tire wheel package to be as close to. As possible. The tire's being twice the diameter of the wheels. So with them being an 18 inch wheel, you're, you need to have a 36 inch diameter tire in order to hit that optimal yeah, balance. So it could be something to do with the brake packaging. It could be something we're not sure.

Matt Scott: Something that's also solvable in the aftermarket. 

Scott Brady: Right. You know, and hopefully so 17 inch wheels are a better choice. I can see the 18 inch wheels on the T Rd Pro cause it's very much a go fast truck now.

Matt Scott: It's the brakes. Right. Yeah. I mean, and we're probably seeing a lot of tundra components. Again, this is very early days. Yep. But I would have to think Toyota has this history of, you know, parts sharing and not redeveloping products that are already developed. [00:19:00] Components, I should say. Ooh, heads up display too. 

Scott Brady: You liked, you liked the, the rigid white amber switchable, l e d lights.

Matt Scott: Yeah. That was interesting. I think that that's super cool. Because you know, the yellow's obviously nice for when it's severe fog. Or rain or, or whatever. I mean, you can, you can have a little bit of individuality there. Mm-hmm. Um, and it's just a, I mean, I think it's just a different, you know, chip that goes in there that is switchable. So I think that that's a kind of a cool. Innovation. 

Scott Brady: And it does come, actually.

Matt Scott:  I would love to see that stuff more in the aftermarket and it's cool to see that happening here. So I'll definitely be watching rigid.

Scott Brady: And there's an integrated l e d light bar in the grill. This, the trail hunter has the frame mounted rock rails. It has an a r B steel rear bumper. The recovery hooks are, they look to be full gross vehicle weight rating, if not higher rating. It looks like they run down the frame members, so [00:20:00] they've gotta be just, and it looks like they're super heavy duty a r b aftermarket, recovery points, which have been legendary for quality. The, the bed utility bar, not really digging that. You can see it in the photos. We'll put those into the podcast, but.

Matt Scott: Oh, yeah. Kind of trx like, it, it's very like nineties. 

Scott Brady: I get it on the t Rd Pro, but it doesn't make any sense on the trail hunter. So that would end up being.

Matt Scott: I did read that they're gonna have a, a kind of that Baja bar style thing and then they'll have a full length option.

Scott Brady: Oh, that'd be, maybe that's an option. 

Matt Scott: You know, but think about this, like, if I was, you know, I'm, well, I am in the automotive aftermarket for work. I'm looking at this and I'm like, you know, yeah. People are probably still gonna mess with them, but we're getting a truck that out of the box, like, I mean, from the dealer you can get an, you know, an engineered bedrock, you know, the, just all of this stuff. You know, I mean, there's.

Scott Brady: And put it all into your payment. Put it all into your warranty. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. [00:21:00] I mean, it, it'll be interesting. I mean, definitely. You know, from, you know, people that we've talked to in the, on the OE side, like they're, they recognize how much money they're losing by not having that stuff, you know, go out of their door versus, you know, the aftermarket and.

Scott Brady: We're seeing 'em do it. Across the board. 

Matt Scott: Like I'm, I mean, I'm looking at this and I'm like, boy, like Tacoma 30 threes, like, yeah, maybe 30 fives and a little lift and whatever, but. Like, do you actually need to anymore? 

Scott Brady: Not really. 

Matt Scott: You know, does it become more of a matter of personal styling at, at that point? 

Scott Brady: Maybe. On Jeeps, that's still very much the case, but yeah.

Matt Scott: Yeah. Should we hop over to T Rd Pro?

Scott Brady: In one, in one moment. Cause there's one more thing I wanted to talk about, which was interesting. So, from the overlander perspective, oh, because it's the I Force Max, it has a 2,400 wat inverter in the bed. So when you've got your camper system, you have a 12 volt outlet in the bed, and a 2,400 wat.

Matt Scott: The 12 volt outlet I'm super excited for because, [00:22:00] well it, it's a pain to have to do that in the aftermarket. And if you wanna put a fridge back there or whatever, It's already done. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. So the fact that it's, and it's got this gigantic battery pack. So what I'm curious of is, does the hybrid battery pack, it's like 1.8 kilowatts? I can't really tell.

Matt Scott: It's a nickel metal, high dried battery pack. 

Scott Brady: Yeah, it is. Yeah. One it's, it's a 1.87. Kilowatt hour. 

Matt Scott: I think the Jeep's doing that on the four by E now, but it's AC only, it's not 12 volt. 

Scott Brady: But that's the, that's the cool thing. You could have this 2,400 watt inverter running off of the built-in batteries. That'd be in the high. Pretty cool. I mean.

Matt Scott: If you think about it, that's, that's your Honda generator bring with you. But you no longer have to, you could.

Scott Brady: Well, think of the stuff that can run off of that battery pack. That's a big battery pack. You could run an air conditioner for a period of time off of that, you could run compressors, you could run, do all of your charging of your [00:23:00] electronic devices. You could at 2,400 watts, you could run an induction cooktop. Yeah. So you could integrate all of that with just the factory system within the truck, which. Think about it, it doesn't add any more weight.

Matt Scott: It would be really, it would be really cool if I could run off of that. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. So those are some hopeful insights. So now you wanted, you're, you're digging the T Rd Pro a little bit. 

Matt Scott: Well, actually the thing I just noticed too is integrated high output air compressor in the bed. On the trail hunter. Again, it's like one less thing that you have to do. Just buy the thing and go use it. Yeah, the, you know, the trd pro, yeah, it, it interests me, you know.

Scott Brady: I mean, it seems like the seats are of real interest to you. 

Matt Scott: Yes. Okay. So there are, what I'm gonna make sure I enunciate this correctly. ISO dynamic performance seat. It looks, interesting. It's like, I get it. 

Scott Brady: So it's probably gonna work, right? 

Matt Scott: So much with the chassis and if you're trying to improve ride quality. And you only have so much within the [00:24:00] packaging in the vehicle. You can only get so much wheel travel. You know, I mean, just like unimog do, commercial trucks do, I mean, you know, like guaranteed the UPS or FedEx driver that delivers your packages has a, you know.

Scott Brady: A suspended seat.

Matt Scott: And a suspended seat. So it's interesting to see it in this, I hope that people realize that. That it doesn't actually make your car go any faster. It's just.

Scott Brady: It's gonna be uncomfortable.

Matt Scott: Comfort thing. And it looks a bit, it's, there's some, a bit like 1990s Fast and the Furious, so I guess early two thousands. Yeah. Like it, it.

Scott Brady: It's very fast and the furious and even has little gauges on it. Probably that show like the amount of travel that you're, so, like imagine your poor passenger in the back that's trying to monitor that. 

Matt Scott: So there's gonna, the, the, the problem with all of this is that now when you go to like cars and coffee or whatever, you know, yeah. Basically I have a trophy truck. You know, like I've only got 10 inches of travel. But, you know, I've got these. ISO dynamic seats, [00:25:00] and it's basically a trophy truck. You know, it's trophy truck technology and, and, and people aren't gonna shut up about it, and that's gonna be really.

Scott Brady: Well, and then they're gonna drive it like a trophy truck.

Matt Scott: Yeah. They're gonna, it's still a Tacoma underneath. Yeah. Like.

Scott Brady: Which is not to take anything away from the car. It's not a trophy truck. It may keep 'em out of the hospital possibly. Yeah. But it's not gonna save the truck. 

Matt Scott: It's, it'll be interesting to see if. With this, people start to overdrive them. Could be be, you know, all of a sudden it, it would require some careful marketing. 

Scott Brady: So it, it's an interesting addition. Yeah. I, I think.

Matt Scott: It might work really, really well. But it is at this point a little left field. Yeah, maybe, you know, the, the trd pro.

Scott Brady: Just as long as somebody comes up with like some thoughtful little covers for it, so you don't have to like stare at the, it looks, it looks like the T series, like Arnold Schwarzenegger, like his neck shots or [00:26:00] something.

Matt Scott: I mean, like, they're, they're. They're interesting. Yeah. And I'm sure people will geek out about it. The juries. 

Scott Brady: No, it's a, it's a cool technology. 

Matt Scott: Like I said, Unimog use that. Yeah. Kind of same, you know, different, different application. 

Scott Brady: I get it. It's just, it is different. It's such a unique thing. I mean, I guess, but it also, like you said, it, it further differentiates T Rd Pro as the go fast vehicle. And it's three inches wider. It's an inch and a half to two inches taller than the standard. Tacoma, 33 inch tall tires. So it's, it's clearly meant for, and Fox internal bypass switchable shocks, you know.

Matt Scott: These shocks that would be very similar to what's on the, the current new generation Tundra. You know, it's interesting, a lot of the stuff kind of parallels the trail hunter. You still get the a r b steel rear bumper, the fog lights and, and a lot of that kind of thing. 

Scott Brady: But it is, it is [00:27:00] interesting cuz they have an aluminum front skid plate on the T Rd Pro and a hot, hot stamp steel skid plate on the trail hunter. So they're trying to, yeah, they're to have some differentiation in, in actual functionality, which is.

Matt Scott: It's just like the TRD Pro has become in inherently less interesting to me.

Scott Brady: Yeah, cuz the Trail Hunter really solves it. Yeah, I mean they, they, in their, in their documentation, they actually refer to it as their, their overland vehicle. So they, what is, lemme see where it's at here. Trail hunter. Yeah, it's a factory developed overlander straight from Toyota. Yeah. That's Toyota's words so clearly, and we heard it at SEMA last year with the VP of marketing saying Toyota is all in on over landing. And it's very clear that they're all in on overlanding. And this is the part when.

Matt Scott: The like 10 page press release. You know, you could play a game every time Toyota says overlanding, take a shot. You [00:28:00] won't make it to the end. 

Scott Brady: You wouldn't make it to the end, which is a good thing. And it, this is when I, it's so funny when people will say like, we're at peak over landing. We haven't even started right now. The OEMs are actually getting into overlanding, which of course it can make it very.

Matt Scott: I think, I think we hit peak bolting stuff onto your truck for no purpose. Maybe, you know, I think there's a lot of, a lot of board people during the pandemic, but so here's what I want to talk about on TRD Pro and Trail Hunter. Cause I do want to dedicate. Time to TRD Pro Sport TRD offroad because realistically for most people those are gonna be the best buys.

Scott Brady: SR five T RD offroad. If it's available, it isn't clear that it is, so we still don't know.

Matt Scott: Yeah, there's nots, a full build spec sheet available. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. We just don't quite know if you can get the I Force extra cab. SR five with the T R D package, which would include the rear locker and a manual transmission. If you could, that would be the Scotty Spec. Yeah. White truck extra cab, [00:29:00] 1700 pound.

Matt Scott: And I'm looking at this T Rd offroad, but here's what I want to talk about. I just tried to buy a Tundra T Rd Pro. Okay. They end up being, you know, I, I think there's 69,000 in change. MSRP, but here's the problem. Dealer markup, and this is something that is seriously gonna affect this new Tacoma. Obviously we know a lot of people are interested in them. It is a, a significant upgrade. So there's gonna, there's gonna be a lot of interest. These days pretty standard. If there's interest in the truck, you're looking anywhere from a five to $15,000 markup. I wouldn't, it wouldn't surprise me if the first one's on the lot, you know, in Southern California are even selling for more of that. So this is where I want to go. Why I like the TRD off road is you're probably not going to pay a, a dealer markup. On a TRD off road, um, the TRD Pro, the trail Hunter, you know, they're gonna be more expensive. Pricing, to be very [00:30:00] clear, has not been released yet. But to me, these seem like trucks that are gonna be in the, you know, high fifties, low sixties range by looking at, you know, competitive comparisons. Where the current vehicle is priced. So, you know, at high fifties, low sixties for this trail hunter. Cool. Great, but it's really gonna be probably seventies or eighties and that is just a reality of where we are right now.

Scott Brady: At what point do, do like consumer advocacy groups. Come in and put some pressure on these dealers to stop.

Matt Scott: I mean, I mean, they're just so bad. Like.

Scott Brady: Well, they're just abusing consumers. It's not Toyota's fault. Toyota sets the msrp.

Matt Scott: My Toyota dealer. Like, I'm like, okay, cool. You know, they told me 2,500 to 3,700 over sticker was their local thing. And I'm like, okay, cool. Like I'm fine with that. And then I get the, you know, the, out the door price and you know, there's a $10,000 thing thrown [00:31:00] on there and a $2,000 tint package and a this and a that and whatever, and it's like, it's predatory. I mean, like buying a car from a new car dealer. 95% of the time really, really sucks. Yeah. It's like there's so many pain points at so many different things and then there's not even the interest market.

Scott Brady: It's almost like it's their tactic. They abuse you so much that you finally like.

Matt Scott: I would love to just go online and be, and cuz you're, everybody's building trucks these days anyways because of the lead time. So you get exactly what you want, you know, cut the dealers out of it. Yeah. Like, let 'em service cars. Cause that's where they make their money anyways. And you know, it's like the people that couldn't become cell phone salesmen be 99% of the time become car salesmen. Like there's great ones out there. 

Scott Brady: Oh, absolutely. And there's great dealer experiences. Like, like if you go to Lexus dealer, you have a different experience.

Matt Scott: Yeah. But it is so bad. 

Scott Brady: Or, you know, Ford has been enforcing [00:32:00] these pricing gouging, trying to no?

Matt Scott: No. I, the other truck I, I tried to go and buy was a tremor. You try and buy a tremor right now. $20,000 over sticker is what I was getting out of Phoenix. And the dealer here in Prescott, I mean, we're talking about like all the, the tremor. Yeah. It's got some unique front springs and it's got, you know, yeah. Tuned gas shock absorbers. Yeah. Like, I mean, it, there's maybe a thousand dollars of value there. And you're, you're charging the winch. Yeah, the winch is, $3,999 after market. Got it fitted at the dealer, not on the assembly line. My point being is at msrp, these vehicles can be great value. I think, I mean, to have it just all done is really, really cool. And then you make your little tweaks and stuff from there. But again, how much of this stuff are you gonna be taking off anyways? And then if you throw that five, 10, [00:33:00] $15,000 dealer, you know, added markup on there. 

Scott Brady: Well, so then we do, they.

Matt Scott: Do they actually become relevant because that truck at 70 or 80 doesn't feel like there's somebody that's gonna be driving a TRD off road at four in the forties, solidly equipped.

And then you ask yourself, Hmm. Is it worth 30 or $40,000 extra? Because that's what it ends up being. And again, we don't know final numbers, but. If Toyota's listening, that's gonna be a pain point for consumers.

Scott Brady: Well, and what we can do on the podcast cuz of the size of the audience, if anybody knows of a dealership that doesn't gouge their customers, that sells at msrp for a Toyota dealership, let us know. Yeah. We'll put it out there. We'll give that. We will gladly support that dealership. 

Matt Scott: A hundred percent. And, and I think, you know, while I'm on my soapbox. Looking at that Tundra T Rd pro, I mean you could like grab the front grill and move it. It was so plasticy. So I really, really [00:34:00] hope that with the Tacoma, they have listened to their traditional customers who are saying, oh man, the styling, and that's a little bit weird. The build quality is a little bit weird. I mean, for the first time we're seeing Toyota having reliability issues when they launched it. How much of that is just pandemic supply chain chaos? Whatever. I don't know, but you know. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. Any reliability issues are gonna be short run for Toyota. I hope so. Yeah.

Matt Scott: But these vehicles are getting up there in price. And again, when you throw the reality of the current market with these dealer ADMs, I hope that the build quality is worth the squeeze. You know that they're asking for price.. Because you know, I know that a gladiator, for example, the build quality is actually really, really good on it. I know on the, you know, the Chevy stuff, the build quality has improved hugely. Hugely is not a word, but, we'll see what.

Scott Brady: And then they've also done well on some of the [00:35:00] reliability rankings recently. 

Matt Scott: Yeah, exactly. So people are, people are nipping on the toes, interested to see where it goes. 

Scott Brady: But the Tacoma that we're looking at right here is, I mean, I'm looking at the photo of it right now. I think. It's just, it's just, I mean, hey, listen, raised air intake, it looks like a princess style rack on the top. It's like 33 inch tall tires, skid plates, rock rails, lockers, like sweet.

Matt Scott: Like everything that you would need. 

Scott Brady: I mean, seriously. Cool. But I do hope you're right. And I think this is the way that I feel too. I really hope that we can get that 1700 pound payload. Extra cab. SR five with a locker and a manual please. Toyota. Like give us the Scotty spec. That's what, that's the truck that I want. 

Matt Scott: So let's, let's go on to this trd off-road. I'm gonna read some of the specs from the sheet. It gets the I force engine as standard. So we actually really haven't talked about that. 

Scott Brady: The I Force Max. 

Matt Scott: Oh. [00:36:00] No. 

Scott Brady: Are you saying TRd, off road? 

Matt Scott: TRd. Off road. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. Okay, got it. 

Matt Scott: So 278 horsepower, 317 pound, feet of torque and a manual transmission is available. To me that's really exciting.

Scott Brady: Super exciting.

Matt Scott: I love the idea of, you know, kind of that base. Tacoma that's just charming and cool and works. And you can take it anywhere. You can get the I Force Max. That obviously comes with the eight speed automatic. That gives you more power. That's 326 horsepower and 465 pound feet of torque. It's worth noting you lose a couple horsepower and a couple pound feet of torque when you go to a MA six speed manual.

Scott Brady: Yeah, just a couple.

Matt Scott: Yeah. It's, it's not that big of a deal. It's probably tuning related or something like that. T Rd Off-Road gets you for the first time, remote reservoir shocks, Bilstein’s. Again, for most people that's kind of cool, but you're not also then paying a bunch of money for, you know, the Fox stuff.

Scott Brady: If you don't need it. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. If you don't [00:37:00] need it. Yeah. Although I will say if the T Rd Pro and the Trail Hunter do come with those wider front control arms, and, and wider rear axle, like that could maybe steer me towards that, that those vehicles, but. Sometimes you don't, you just don't need the wheel travel and you don't need, I wouldn't want it.

Scott Brady: I wouldn't want the width or the like.

Matt Scott: Cuz then you're, you're talking full size truck in a mid-size platform. Which is, believe me, the amalgamation of parts. Really cool. Available 33 inch tires on the T rd off-road. I think that, that's really cool. 

Scott Brady: 17 inch wheels. You can get that on the trd. 

Matt Scott: 17 or eighteens. Yeah. You know, electronic rear locker. Front stabilizer bar disconnect. I mean, it just seems that to me. Yes, the Trail Hunter is cool. The T Rd Pro is just kind of a continuation of a model that we already know, but this T Rd off road has all of the exciting kind of elements to it. Ah, man, that's, that's thing. 

Scott Brady: Except for, [00:38:00] the only thing that throws me off is it just says double cab only. And it's like, can you get the T rd off-road in the extra cab? 

Matt Scott: Well, right here it says double cab only. 

Scott Brady: Yeah, I know.

Matt Scott: So like, see for me, for dog people double cab's, the only consideration. 

Scott Brady: My, my thought is, can you just get, can you just option in the rear locker? Can you just like click the option for the rear locker on an SR five extra cab.

Matt Scott: So I think. Yeah. I mean.

Scott Brady: It doesn't say it.

Matt Scott: On the, so on the SR five, it looks like the only way that you can get the multilink rear suspensions of the five link is on the double, it's gonna be Tundra Land Cruiser esque is on the double cab. So I do like that they're still offering, you know, like the landscaping truck. You know, I think that that's really cool. 

Scott Brady: That's the truck I want. 

Matt Scott: That's really cool. 

Scott Brady: I want the manual transmission SR five extra cab. 17 inch wheels. 

Matt Scott: I mean, there's, there's a huge, a huge range of stuff here which is pretty cool. 

Scott Brady: It's very cool.

Matt Scott: You know, and for the PreRunner guys, there is a [00:39:00] t rd pre-runner if you're gonna build it into a little, a little go fast truck on your own. And they did keep the leaf springs on that, which is gonna to just be easier to get more travel out of and cheaper to do so, with these multilink coil rear ends, you're, There's, there's packaging problems on, on, on trying to get too much wheel travel out of it usually. But, you know, I'm, so, I'm, I'm really excited about the engines. That that, like, was it a three liter V6 that they had? 3.5?

Scott Brady: 3.5 Yeah.

Matt Scott: I, it, it did its job, you know, in stock form. It was pretty fuel efficient. Like.

Scott Brady: It was literally the first gear in the automatic that killed it. Yeah. 

Matt Scott: Once you’re going, it was fine, but like.

Scott Brady: It was fine. 

Matt Scott: I, I mean, I'm so excited that the aftermarkets huge for the Tacoma and. I like messing with stuff. And you know, I can't help to think, but, you know, COB or, or some of these engine tuning companies, you know, with Toyota being fairly [00:40:00] conservative, 2.4 liters, producing 278 horsepower. Boy, like Yeah, I imagine, imagine some boltons that could get you reliably 30 or 40 horsepower. Now I again.

Scott Brady: Or you just do the I force max and you're at 326 horsepower. That's crazy numbers. Those are crazy numbers out of a mid-size. Yeah. Crazy numbers. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. I mean, I guess they have to, because this EV wave is coming and you know, I mean, look at the rivian, like, yeah. Zero to 60 in three seconds or something. Electric is just really quick. 

Scott Brady: The one thing that I noted was with the, with the I force Max that the, the torque is nearly double what the outgoing Atkinson cycle motor is. Like it's, it That's incredible. 

Matt Scott: It'll be good. And you know, the Tacoma we're obviously really big here on, on sticking within that gross vehicle weight. We know. Through experience that that is where vehicles perform the best. 

Scott Brady: Well it just keeps you from getting in a bunch of trouble if you get in an accident. Matt Scott: Yeah. But [00:41:00] people do overload the crop out of their tacomas. I mean, historically speaking, they take it. Yeah. You know, I mean, anytime you see a slightly built Tacoma with a four wheel camper on the back, they're probably, you know, 50 to a hundred percent over their G V W R and it just works. So now we're getting, in theory, a redesigned, stronger chassis shared with Land Cruiser or Tundra, et cetera. More horsepower. More torque. 

Scott Brady: Bigger breaks. 

Matt Scott: Bigger breaks. Like all, all of these things that.

Scott Brady: They're addressing it like handily addressing our feedback for sure. 

Matt Scott: Like I am, I am so glad. That I don't have to make the Tacoma the bottom of my jokes anymore. Now, I don't know about Tacoma people, you know, the, they'll no.

Scott Brady: They're the nicest people. Some of 'em, well, you just don't, I don't know. I don't think.

Matt Scott: There's gonna, there's gonna be a guy out there that's gonna tell you about his iso dynamic performance seats and that's all. 

Scott Brady: But, but that'll be a new, that'll be a new customer to Toyota that was not like a traditional Tacoma buyer. Yeah, that'll be some. 

Matt Scott: I mean, they're not making STIs anymore, so you know, that whole crowd's going there. [00:42:00] 

Scott Brady: Well, so let's talk about payload real quick. So, and towing. So, The maximum towing has now moved to 6,500 pounds. Yeah. Which is, it's gonna meet the needs of most towing requirements. It is less than some of the competition. So Gladiators 7,500 pounds. And then the.

Matt Scott: It's, it's super important to remember too, that towing capacity, payload capacity, like all of these things, while we like them, they do actually. Inhibit a bit of off-road performance. You're attaining that through larger rear axles, which have, you know, bigger ring in pinions, which means less final ground clearance and you know.

Scott Brady: Less articulation.

Matt Scott: Usually less articulation. Payload and towing generally comes at spring, the cost of a higher spring rate. Which, you know, sacrifices, ride quality, articulation, all these things. So there is a sweet spot. And full size trucks do exist. You know, but we're not talking 800 pounds of payload anymore. We're [00:43:00] talking 1700 pounds of payload.

Scott Brady: It's a big, it's a big difference. And for us, we have always established that our minimum, like expected payload out of a mid-size truck is 1600 pounds. And they've beat that. So Toyota has beat it. They've, they've hit the numbers that we think are important. And Yes to 6,500 pounds and it says here that the I Force Extra cab grade maximum payload increases to 1,709 pounds on the T R D off-road.

Matt Scott: Which is really cool. That means four wheel drive. 

Scott Brady: I would think so, because otherwise they would call it the T RD PreRunner. So it says if you can get a T RD off-road, At 1,709 pounds of payload, like, good job Toyota. That's incredible. 

Matt Scott: Like, I want one. 

Scott Brady: I know.

Matt Scott: And that's weird. That's weird.

Scott Brady: I, I totally, I mean, yeah. Maybe it'll just be like I bring it all back to the white Tacoma. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. There's something so charming. About the concept of the [00:44:00] Tacoma Reliable, yes. Has a great residual value. I mean, speaking of residual values, I don't know if you've looked at what used Tacomas are selling for right now. 

Scott Brady: Oh yeah. Like people are retiring.

Matt Scott: People are retiring. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. Like yeah, Paula's gonna sell her Tacoma and she's gonna go live in Spain for 25 years.

Matt Scott: Like, I mean, we're talking $50,000 used Tacomas. With 30, 40, 50, 60,000 miles on 'em. We're talking a hundred thousand mile trucks for thirties and forties, and. They're not that much less new. Or more, I should say. They're not. 

Scott Brady: Yeah, no. You want to but that, that, that's why we're seeing the dealer market. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. So, you know, again, I think Trail Hunter, it's so cool to, I'm just gonna read this out loud on Toyota's press release, all new Trail Hunter is a factory developed over landing rig built from the ground up with the latest integrated off-road equipment from arb, old man IU in rigid. That's really cool to see in a Toyota press release. 

Scott Brady: No doubt. 

Matt Scott: Because this is historically like a company [00:45:00] that has been very conservative, and you know, kind of gave everybody what they needed, not what they wanted. Now we have a Tacoma that has needs and wants covered.

Scott Brady: I mean, Matt Scott just says he wants one. So that's, that's saying something. 

Matt Scott: I mean maybe, we'll see, I mean, I love the idea of a small little truck cuz trucks are getting so big that they're getting really, really hard to park. I mean, if you drive it every day, You'll, you'll know what I'm talking about. Like try and park an F two 50. It, yeah.

Scott Brady: They're the real deal. They're, they're big. 

Matt Scott: Well, and, but then all vehicles are getting so big now due to crash safety and people just want bigger stuff, and we're in this huge economic boom, you know, or coming off of it, or whatever we wanna say. The parking spaces haven't gotten any wider and it's, it's really cool to, yeah. You know, I'm, again, I'm looking at this trail hunter and I'm like, boy, how great would that be to, to literally buy that. Throw like an AT camper on there from AT Overland and just go. Like you don't have to modify, like it even has nothing. 12 volt in the.

Scott Brady: Yeah, [00:46:00] it's ready to go.

Matt Scott: In the bed already. 

Scott Brady: Yeah, it's ready to go.

Matt Scott: You know. Super cool. But it's the TRD off road. That is actually the one that I think is. I, yeah. And I'm looking at it and I'm like, the 30 threes, you know, it's got, it's got some skid plates, the front swaybar disconnect. It's got a lot of the gadgets with that multi train select that honestly, I don't really pay that much attention to. Boy, that, that seems like a really great kind of realistic option. That should be pretty popular. 

Scott Brady: What do you see for potential downsides, cons.

Matt Scott: I'm, I'm worried about build quality, to be honest. You know, a, a lot of the touchpoints on the, on the new Toyota truck stuff, just, I hope that they're meeting the competition in that area. I mean, I know you can't have everything, but the, the build quality on the tundra that I was looking at [00:47:00] wasn't, I know it's gonna run forever. Like the, like there's a difference between like, Reliability and build quality. Like Toyota's never.

Scott Brady: Yeah. Durability, reliability, and build quality are all three different things.

Matt Scott: Yeah. So I, I'm worried about the build quality on this because, you know, the last generation tundra was very basic, but it worked. And it didn't rattle. And it didn't squeak. And when you slam the door, you know, you were slamming the door. 

Scott Brady: Even 200,000 miles later. 

Matt Scott: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. So, you know, A lot of the, the plastics and things that Toyota has been using lately, like, I, I can't help but compare tundra to this. There's, you know, there's chassis similarities and it's kind of that new design language was brought in with, with Tundra. So I hope that the build quality is there. Again I.

Scott Brady: I think we should make a trip. We should get a Tacoma. And drive it to the manufacturing plant in Wawa, Mexico. [00:48:00] I think we should just get like, get the nod, nod, wink wink from Toyota pr. And let us drive it down to Old Mexico and go check out the plant for ourselves in person. 

Matt Scott: There’s also an airplane. 

Scott Brady: Okay. You can meet me. You can meet me there. You can meet me there. 

Matt Scott: No, I'm kidding. That'd be a really fun drive.

Scott Brady: That would be a really fun drive. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. I, I, again, I think, I think big.

Scott Brady: Any other things? Any other things? 

Matt Scott: It's gonna be the dealer markups on these. Particularly in the Trail Hunter. I think it's really cool, but I think you have to consider, you know, it's kind of like the joke. I'm gonna use the Raptor as the example, you know, when the Raptor first came out. Yeah. It was really cool, but. You know, there was definitely the, the, the, the skeptics that were like, oh, well you're paying, you know, 10 or $15,000 more for shocks, wheels and tires. And then people were paying on top of that dealer markups. And then, you know, it's like, okay, it was worth it at the MSRP price increase. But will it be worth it at the actual selling price? That would be [00:49:00] my concern. And again, that's not Toyota, that's just.

Scott Brady: It's not Toyota's fault. 

Matt Scott: It's like car dealers. Yeah. Like, you know, maybe we can just get rid of them. So.

Scott Brady: There's been some efforts. Yeah, for sure. 

Matt Scott: And again, there's, there's good ones out there, but the.

Scott Brady: And that's the problem that the, that the, the dealerships are gonna have eventually, They'll put themselves out of business cuz they, you, you can only abuse people for so long before finally consumers say that's enough.

Matt Scott: Again with the, with the tundra, with the added, you know, ADMs and stuff that they're putting onto it for the t Rd Pro. You know, I don't know if I'll follow through, but I just went, I was so frustrated. I went and I put a, a deposit down on a rivian cuz it's, there's so much more truck there. For actually the same amount of money. Like.

Scott Brady: And you get the experience of like, it can be delivered here to the office.

Matt Scott: Yeah. And it's done. And I don't have to.

Scott Brady: And they'll walk you through the truck. 

Matt Scott: Any drama, like I don't have to get forced into the finance office where like, you know, another weirdo is gonna try and [00:50:00] fleece me for five points over their buy rate. Oh, by the way, car dealers do that. So if you're getting like a 5% interest rate, there's probably two or three points that are on the table that they're making. So there's just all of these pain points. 

Scott Brady: When you buy a rivian, you actually talk to a banker at Chase. It's like an actual bank. Not, not the finance person.

Matt Scott: So I think that that'll be a downside. But I don't think we know enough yet. I'm seeing a lot of positivity here on this vehicle. I applaud Toyota for listening to, to the market and yeah. It's gonna be, it's gonna come down to build quality for me. 

Scott Brady: The only thing that I can find so far, because there's some unanswered questions around some packaging, but it's the 18 inch wheel on the trail hunter. So that also comes back to your recommendation around the t r d off-road as opposed to the T Rd Off-Road Pro. So the 18 inch wheel, that's not a benefit in my [00:51:00] mind. When you can get a 17, but the pros. Like, we can still get a manual transmission. Tacoma. How amazing is that in, I take it, 2024 there, there's gonna be a, a six speed manual. Tacoma still available. 

Matt Scott: Turbocharged.

Scott Brady: Like what, what a miracle. So yeah, just a cool little engine. Yeah and I do like turbo motors a lot. And these turbo gas motors.

Matt Scott: It's where, it's where and how they make their power, which is down low, which is how you are actually using it on the street. And on the trail. 

Scott Brady: That's right. And they've completely addressed the power issue from the last model. In both the fact that they've added two gears to the automatic, so it's gonna have to have a lower first gear, cuz that was the Achilles heel, the other one. So it's gonna be way better. Load it up or pulling a trailer or whatever. Because it makes way more power and it has two more cogs in it. So bunch of different engine options. We only had one engine before that. Now we got three different motor options, depending on what you want to [00:52:00] get. And then Swaybar disconnect. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. So the swaybar disconnect is a bigger deal than people think. 

Scott Brady: Yeah. It just makes a huge difference.

Matt Scott: Which historically that has been reserved for the Gladiator, or sorry for the Rubicons. It is on the gladiator. And it's on the Wrangler now. It's on the four by e, Grand Cherokee Trail Hawk. It really does make a difference. Like if you're just cruising down a dirt road and you turn that off, like you're gonna have somebody in the backseat go, what did you just do? It it truth. 

Scott Brady: You feel it.

Matt Scott: Truthfully feel. So that's. I did not expect to see, to see that it.

Scott Brady: When I, when I was reading through the spec, I'm thinking this is unbelievable. Like, cuz Toyota, it's normally incremental. You see incremental improvements from them. They already make a great vehicle then they incremental, incrementally improve it. This is literally like Toyota said. We're either going to have to address this competition, which is coming at us rapidly. Or we're gonna face a lot of market share loss. And they addressed it.

Matt Scott: And everybody in the last couple [00:53:00] weeks has showed their cards. And you know, I'm not saying that Toyota's gonna come on top, but there is, there is this gut feeling within me that if you have the Ranger Raptor, you have the Colorado, and you have this, I mean you TRD Pro, Trail Hunter, I like the split from Toyota, but let's just say those things. You put 'em all out there. There's, there's something to the history and legacy of reliability and simplicity that Toyota has that would truthfully lead me to choose the Toyota product over, you know, the GM or the Ford product. Because again, like we said, like we've been in so many sketchy places in the world, and when you're in a sketchy place in the world, you grab the Toyota.

Scott Brady: Yeah. You want to, you want it to make the starting noise. And but what'll be interesting is.

Matt Scott: Not that the others won't be great options. 

Scott Brady: We those are, but to your point, none of this stuff is proven out yet. Yeah. But Toyota does have the legacy of [00:54:00] reliability. Yeah. That we should be able to continue to see. The one thing that'll be interesting though is like, Within moments we're gonna see now the bison. A e v Colorado on 30 fives with in with jounces. Like hydraulic jounces. And yeah. Winches. Just crazy, crazy trucks. 

Matt Scott: And that’s probably that’s the vehicle to compare to the trail hunter.  Which is where it then kind of ends up a little bit more Toyota, where it is a little bit more conservative.. It, you know, where the. You know, to GM's credit, they went wild.

Scott Brady: But look at it. I mean, just look at the fact that we can get a gladiator look at the fact that we can get a 35 inch tire on an A E V equipped Colorado with front and rear lockers.

Multimatic suspension. Hydraulic jounces. Like this is nutty territory. And the Tacoma is now like playing in nutty territory. 33 inch tires. Yeah. And big horsepower numbers.

Matt Scott: And on the GM you can get similar torque in the 400s. But without a hybrid system. 

Scott Brady: That's [00:55:00] true. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. So that'll be interesting to, to see.

Scott Brady: Yeah, no, it's gonna be fun to compare.

Matt Scott: It's super exciting. You know, we saw so much competition go into the full size space. You know, we love full size trucks, but they have size limitations. You know, for the way a lot of people are gonna use their vehicles in North America as this kind of, you know, rock crawling with roof tent kind of thing that over landing's kind of pushing towards this is really an interesting vehicle for you. 

Scott brady: Totally. So, and nice job. Toyota. Like this was fun to talk about. 

Matt Scott: Yeah. I have to find a new person to make fun of. 

Scott Brady: Just make fun of me often. I like that. 

Matt Scott: I’m too nice. 

Scott Brady: I’m too, I'm too nice. Well, there's plenty of things to make funny of me about though. I mean, start with my barber. All right. Well that was so fun to talk about the new Tacoma. We thank you all for listening, and seriously, if somebody knows a Toyota dealer out there that is not gouging customers, please let us know. We'd love to share that widely with all of you. [00:56:00] And until then, we'll talk to you next time.