What do I do with my buddies 2000 Tundra and the rusty frame holding it together. Sorta.

My buddy reached out to me as his resident car guy about his 2000 Tundra 4x4 crewcab. He took it in for brakes and got a diagnosis of "geez, surprised it made it in here in one piece!" It has extensive rusty holes in the frame behind the front passenger tire and generalized nasty rust on the rest of the frame and suspension. 160k miles, in decent shape otherwise.  A quick look around the internets says this is a common problem. What do I advise him to do? He has no mechanical leaning or desire to learn. The local mechanic is also a bit of a used car dealer and scrapyard. They are offering to keep it for scrap prices, or he can drive it (slowly) to the scrap yard, or I can nab it as a swap for??? Any parts worth anything on these? Scab it together for the great Wisconsin tradition of a "farm truck"? 

Tube frame, lots of suspension travel?

Realistically, the truck is likely toast.  The drivetrain may be worth something, as may be the non-rusty body panels and interior, but is that worth parting out to your buddy?

Tube frame race truck is the only answer.

Damn beaten again.

I’ve never been afraid to patch those up for myself wouldn’t do it for someone else.

How did it get past the recall?

When I asked my buddy about the recall he had never heard of it and I'm pretty sure that ship has sailed. He's had it for about 10 years so I don't know if he ever would have been eligible or not. The body is "Wisconsin clean", but does have a little rust starting and plenty of dings and scratched. The interior is decent, but nowhere near pristine.  Not much value to part out unless the engine and trans are worth anything.

A friend just went through that. He made cardboard templates of the frame from the cab back and had pieces cnc cut to box the whole back in. It took two weekends and it is sorted.

There are still people getting new frames approved through the recall campaign but it varies by dealer. Don't let him scrap that truck, have him call around and see if he can get a dealer to inspect it first! 

https://www.tundras.com/threads/early-1st-gen-2000-2003-tundra-frame-replacement-faq.54331/

Seen so many of these, damn shame.  Lots of farm folk buy them up and patch the frames.  The drivetrain lasts forever so they just beat them to death

Great idea bearmtnmartin! There is a local metal place around the corner from my work that would make pieces like that for me if I brought in templates for them.

That is interesting HopmanJones. When I looked around the relevant recall had expired and all I found were people on forums complaining about being refused. Might as well try the local dealership and see if they will play ball.

Put it on Craigslist or FB Marketplace and wait for some fool to come along and pay too much money.  Sooner or later someone will, they always do with Toyotas.

bearmtnmartin said:

A friend just went through that. He made cardboard templates of the frame from the cab back and had pieces cnc cut to box the whole back in. It took two weekends and it is sorted.

is that CNC file on the web somewhere ?

In reply to Fueled by Caffeine :

Great link. I'll get the VIN to look up. If it was never "rustproofed" we could be in luck.

Zachary said:

Great idea bearmtnmartin! There is a local metal place around the corner from my work that would make pieces like that for me if I brought in templates for them.

That is interesting HopmanJones. When I looked around the relevant recall had expired and all I found were people on forums complaining about being refused. Might as well try the local dealership and see if they will play ball.

I wouldn't have believed it myself but I am on the first gen tundra facebook group and there have been some recent posts about guys getting approved. I think it would be especially helpful if the truck was never brought in for inspection and the recall was still open, but approval does seem hit and miss. Worth a shot, though.

Who at the dealership decides ?

and what brand of wiskey does he drink .......

Shove it on a boat and send it east to Ludington or Muskegon and I’ll take it from there.

In reply to HopmanJones :

My uncle somehow was able to get the frame replaced in his Tundra earlier this year, so can confirm it is still happening. Just be warned, it may take a few months to get the work done.

My parents, on the other hand, got the short end of the stick on theirs. Bought their '00 Tundra in probably 2012/2013 and took it in for the recal assessment within the first year of ownership, but it wasn't bad enough at the time to qualify for the replacement so the dealer just slapped some undercoating on and called it good enough. A year or two later it failed inspection for a rust hole just aft of the passenger front wheel well at the same dealer. Since the truck had already gotten the undercoating, they were SOL on full replacement, but dad did talk them into patching it on their dime. It's been holding up ok since, but we all know it's a matter of time until the tin worm prevails.

It's a shame really that these things are plagued with such an achilles heel, they're otherwise nearly perfect half ton trucks, IMO.

Seems the VIN says is it was in for the recall and got the "undercoating rust treatment" applied because the frame wasn't bad enough yet to warrant replacement. This closes the recall and my buddy is SOL.  I am going to go take a looksie at it to see how bad it is and determine if burning something like these on would be worth it. 

https://www.autorust.com/product-category/toyota/tundra-2000-2006/

site sells frame pieces for the tundra looks like just the front sections though.

I think the Frame from toyota is $5200 plus shipping.  Honestly you just need the front stuff and then box section the rear.

I'd try the dealer. Your friend might get lucky, and Toyota might still replace the frame on the recall. It doesn't hurt to try, and I've heard of people getting their frames covered recently.