22RE Engine Half Rebuild

The 22RE engine in the 4Runner had a hard life. It was used to tow a 2000lbs. trailer for 60k. The original owner said he never went on hills, but that is still quite a bit of work. I drove it on and off-road until 115k.

There were several things that bothered me about the engine.

Here are some of the things that I did to the engine before the engine refresh:

The truck had relatively low mileage, so I was going to leave the engine alone even though it was an irritant. One day coming back from work, the engine pinged while going up a sligth incline, and smoke came out of the tailpipe. Pulling the plugs, the #3 and #4 cylinder had oil on the plug while the #1 was white hot as usual. The compression was still 175-180psi, so that was quite good. It was burning oil, so I decided to do an engine teardown. I don't want to spend the money to do a rebuild. My job was not stable as the company was downsizing. Wife was pregnant, so spending two thousand for a rebuild engine was not an option. I just want spend a one or two hundred bucks to keep it in good running condition for another 100k or so before I pour in the money for a complete quality rebuild. Hopefully, economy would improve by then. Here is what I did and found.

Results of the engine work: