If you were a Toyota designer... what would you change?

[lauren01]

Actually I have another one. On the 2nd gen, don't know about 3rd Gen, the rear seat bottoms folded forward into the foot well and then the seat back would fold down flat where the seat bottom used to be. This created much more usable space on a hard plastic flat surface. This did not require any mechanism either to hold anything in place. Why was this setup abandoned? It was far superior in my opinion.

Did not know that…I would dearly love that.

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[lauren01]

High air intake on Trailhunter that is safeguarded from excess water intake when it is raining or otherwise carelessly blasted by water (pressure washer, car wash).

This is a design flaw that I hope and pray Toyota is addressing so my truck doesn’t go into limp mode again and strand me while driving through moderate rain.

 

[TacoFreak]

Did not know that…I would dearly love that.

I would too. That would solve the problem of nowhere to put stuff inside the cab because of the lack of under seat storage in the hybrid. Maybe an aftermarket solution?

 

[CharlotteBlue]

Fix off road premium packaging. The power tailgate isn’t necessary, leave it for the Limited “grandpa trim”. In exchange, give me some combination of the nicer headlights from the Limited, padding on the door cards in place of the hard plastic (like Pro and Trailhunter), or a lower package price.

Air vents for the back seats. They may not be people sized, but my dogs want some air.

Larger gas tank (of course).

Swap the wireless phone charger for a MagSafe one (or offer a kit to do so) and add a small fan for cooling it. The regular one just overheats my phone.

Add a button to kill the parking sensors. I don’t want them screaming at me every time I put a bike carrier on the hitch or go off road.

Make the six foot bed available with the Off Road hybrid. There’s clearly no technical reason not to since you can get it on the Trailhunter.

 

[maxx075]

Adaptive headlights. Big miss

 

[lauren01]

I would too. That would solve the problem of nowhere to put stuff inside the cab because of the lack of under seat storage in the hybrid. Maybe an aftermarket solution?

Yeah. I like Goose Gear although 4G Tacoma early adopters have reported it’s letting loud sound into the cabin. So IMO it needs to be reworked with cracks filled and all around sound deadening.

For our use case, we have a big dog who often needs help getting in and occupies 70% of the rear seat space. Goose Gear would make it harder for her to get in with its slick surface.

We’ve considered making a simple L-shaped platform from HDPE for our ICECO APL35 fridge/freezer for times when we want to run it in the rear seat in very hot weather, plugged into the 120v in the center console.
My thinking is, the unit has to work hard under the black tonneau cover when plugged into the 120v by the tailgate. It would also have a softer ride in the rear seat. I assume stuff packed by the tailgate gets banged around quite a bit on some of our offroad camping trips.

 

[lauren01]

Fix off road premium packaging. The power tailgate isn’t necessary, leave it for the Limited “grandpa trim”. In exchange, give me some combination of the nicer headlights from the Limited, padding on the door cards in place of the hard plastic (like Pro and Trailhunter), or a lower package price.

Air vents for the back seats. They may not be people sized, but my dogs want some air.

Larger gas tank (of course).

Swap the wireless phone charger for a MagSafe one (or offer a kit to do so) and add a small fan for cooling it. The regular one just overheats my phone.

Add a button to kill the parking sensors. I don’t want them screaming at me every time I put a bike carrier on the hitch or go off road.

Make the six foot bed available with the Off Road hybrid. There’s clearly no technical reason not to since you can get it on the Trailhunter.

Agree on all this.
The lack of 6-foot bed kept me away from the ORP. Had to go big $wise although I’m glad to have the TH.

 

[Sagebrush]

Probably make the cab wider and the roof taller

They did, and it's called a Tundra.

 

[lauren01]

Improve the design of the AUX switches. I'm average height at 5'9" and from my seat position I cannot see the labels on the bottom rows without contorting my body while driving. Just as bad is that I can't see the darn indicator lights telling me what is and is not on because they are located near the top of the switch which is obfuscated by the lip of the row above it. Just put the light at the bottom of the switch so we can see it more easily. It has happened that I unintentionally bump a switch or forget it on and then only figure it out after other drivers start flashing their lights at me. I'm actually considering getting a completely different switch setup just to solve this issue. THIS is where the switches should be for anyone who really uses them!

Right on, I’m 5’1” and have to dip and squirm to see what’s on. Did I turn on the 120v switch…better stop since it takes a few seconds to turn on, and I don’t want to distractedly head-on collide with oncoming traffic.

At the Overland Expo, I had the pleasure of visiting the Diode Dynamics booth. Great folks to talk with about my recently installed ditch/driving lights, and I got some covers for them (and fun swag). Got to play with their version of switch panel, the D-Switch, which I had only seen online previously. They had a little bread board type situation set up so I could play with the items hooked up to it.
Works as good as any and has nicer features than the Aux 8-gang on our Outback. But it sure is pricey…$600 full price, yikes.

 

[gmalkmus]

They did, and it's called a Tundra.

It doesn’t come with a manual, so irrelevant in my eyes

 

[redlimitediforcemax]

Change the shape of the front passenger glove box. It intrudes into the knee so much that if you raise the seat at all it bumps into your knee. And below that, the footwell comes into the cabin too far. I get they are trying to be ergonomic, but for taller passengers it pushes the knees up right into the protruding glove box.

Add 2 inches to the cab and take 2 inches away from the front bumper to give us more legroom in the back of the cab. Come on toyota, this is easy!

Sunroof needs to pop up and out (my old 1989 acura integra did this lol) when it retracts instead of going inside the cabin above the headliner area. You will get 2 inches of headroom front and back.

Go back to the drawing board with your transmission and engine tuning logic! That stupid 1st and 2nd gear torque limitation neuters this truck badly. My custom tune fixes that and it pulls like a bat out of hell from a stop. We all can agree the transmission tuning needs to be reworked especially for the hybrids. There's so much drivetrain vibration due to engine lugging at low rpms and hard shifting during cold start driving. Why not program the transmission to shift at higher rpms and hold 1st and 2nd gears longer when the temperature is below operating temps? Sport mode does this already so again, this is an easy fix! My custom tune has eliminated this problem almost completely that it's not even noticeable anymore. gear shifts drop rpms above 1500 rpms. Anything under 1500rpms tends to causes engine lugging and vibration. My truck when I bought it new lugged around badly!

 

[Lando]

Agree will you, especially about the cab and front of the truck. I’ve said that since I first saw them. 2” more leg room and even drop 3-4 from the front. @redlimitediforcemax

 

[TrailAdventurer]

The power tailgate isn’t necessary, leave it for the Limited “grandpa trim”.

I was actually very surprised by the powered tailgate. But, I come to find I use it all the time. Would I specifically pay for the option? Not likely. But since I have it with the TH, I do find I like it. Once you have it, it's amazing how often you get something out of the bed, using both hands, and can just bump it with your knee, or elbow to the button, for it to close. It's definitely a YMMV kind of thing.

Air vents for the back seats. They may not be people sized, but my dogs want some air.

Yes, our dog Freyja was just telling me the other day, she was jealous I had the A/C all to myself.

Larger gas tank (of course).

Yup. Single biggest miss. In my opinion, its #1 to be addressed. I'd even pay for a factory retrofit for 3-4 more gallons. You'd think I was driving a 70s muscle car...gas stations are your friend.

Swap the wireless phone charger for a MagSafe one (or offer a kit to do so) and add a small fan for cooling it. The regular one just overheats my phone.

Another agree. On long road trips it a) cannot keep up with the power draw when using GPS (means all the time). b) will overheat, causing phone to stop charging; see a).

On a long trip, it's not uncommon to plug a USB-C cable in the bottom of the phone and put it in the charger spot, upside down. I don't know if it's a limitation of the standard as to how much wattage can be supplied or not, but it's an issue.

Add a button to kill the parking sensors.

Yep. Or, at least give me an easy to toggle option in the menu system that's not 24 levels deep. TH is supposedly designed for overlanding and offroad use. By definition, turning of the half-dozen beeping doodads should be readily available. Maybe even controlled by the 4WD switch: Put it in 4L, disable doodads.

Thank you for building a solid list.

 

[jackvz]

Improve the design of the AUX switches. I'm average height at 5'9" and from my seat position I cannot see the labels on the bottom rows without contorting my body while driving. Just as bad is that I can't see the darn indicator lights telling me what is and is not on because they are located near the top of the switch which is obfuscated by the lip of the row above it. Just put the light at the bottom of the switch so we can see it more easily. It has happened that I unintentionally bump a switch or forget it on and then only figure it out after other drivers start flashing their lights at me. I'm actually considering getting a completely different switch setup just to solve this issue. THIS is where the switches should be for anyone who really uses them!

Spot on, I have great difficulty in seeing those Aux buttons also. I am 6’2”…

 

[JCNFLA]

1st bigger gas tank, 2nd fender flares that attach to truck not velcro, 3rd option for two tone paint for all models

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