Toyota really wants buyers to use and abuse its new Tacoma pickup truck. For the 2017 model year, Toyota unveiled a TRD Pro version of the compact truck to joins the TRD Pro Tundra and 4Runner to create a three-model family of vehicles that are the most capable off-road machines you can buy from the factory with a Toyota badge.
The unveil happened at the Chicago Auto Show this year, and Toyota seemed pretty proud of this new truck. If your eyes just lit up with dreams and hopes of finding a supercharger under the hood of this new truck, I hate to disappoint, but there have are zero performance improvements as far as the engine is concerned. This package is about style, suspension, and rolling stock. There is a new TRD exhaust, but Toyota says nothing about horsepower or torque improvements.
On the visual front you will find Toyota’s angry looking “heritage” grille that is on the TRD Pro 4Runner, complete with a colored surround and black center. Black also covers the hood scoop, headlight bezels, taillight bezels, and lots of new badging around the exterior. The one new piece that isn’t painted black is the aluminum skidplate mounted under the front of the truck. The new 16-inch TRD wheels are painted black, and they come wrapped in Kevlar-reinforced Goodyear tires.
To add just one extra little flourish of style and usability to the nose of this beast, you will find LED foglights straight from Rigid Industries tucked into the bumper.
Inside the changes are far less drastic compared to a normal Tacoma, but you will still find a TRD shift knob, TRD floor mats, and TRD logos stitched into the black leather seats. Toyota did add some new features and gauges, like tilt and incline angles, to its infotainment system to make off-road driving a little easier.
The real meat of the TRD Pro is tucked under those blacked out fender flares. Toyota turned to Fox, to fit a set of 2.5-inch internal bypass shocks. Those shocks have been tuned specifically for the Tacoma by TRD, and they are matched with TRD springs up front, and a full TRD tuned leaf spring setup in the back. The whole shebang adds about an inch of lift.
Rounding out the whole package is bucket load of electronically controlled hardware and software pieces to tackle any trail. Crawl Control, locking differentials, Active Traction Control, and 4WDemand constitute just a selection of the various acronyms and systems that come standard with this truck.
In short, if you want to climb anything you point your truck at, the Tacoma TRD Pro should get the job done.
