re: Popular Youtubers take new turbo Toyota Tacoma off road; the truck immediately breaks down

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People waiting for a hybrid GX550 just found this out. Pictures were just revealed showing a raised floor in the back that looks awful and thrown together.

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They have to put the battery somewhere because they need the hybrid electric powertrain to meet power and emissions targets. Sucks that they messed up the design like that, but I do think the Lexus GX is otherwise a good design when Toyota really needed a win. It seems to have a more polished, nicer design than the new Land Cruiser without costing much more at all. It also has a much more powerful engine and comes with a better dealership experience.

I like the design of the Land Cruiser until I saw the price for them. I know the new Land Cruiser has cupholders/arm rests for a 3rd row that doesn't exists, which is just a cheap oversight IMO. But that's usually not an issue except that some of those will cost $75,000 +. For that price, I'd expect something more "finished" and not just a retro rig that is basically just a modernized 4Runner/FJ. $75,000 is Land Rover Defender money, and you can easily get the most loaded up Ford Bronco for that (other than the Raptor) and a very nice Wrangler Unlimited. I'm sure the worst Land Cruiser will outlast even the very best Defender or Bronco, but the Defender is far better quality from a design standpoint. The Jeep and the Bronco are absolute beasts off road too, with a lot of established aftermarket suppliers. I was expecting something closer in quality to the Mercedes G wagon or Land Rover Defender, but what we got seems to be sort of just a newer Toyota FJ - which isn't necessarily a bad thing except for the price that they are asking for them is damn high (you can see the price now on Toyota's website).

The new Sequoia is a legitimate mess. It not only inherited the weird design quirks of the pandemic-era Tundra design, but it somehow isn't as roomy or as useful as a Tahoe, Yukon, Expedition, or even the previous generation Sequoia. But it's also far too low to the ground and clearly not built for off roading so it's not a real replacement for the full sized Land Cruiser. It's barely competitive with the aging Ford Expedition, and it's pretty far behind the Yukon, Tahoe, or Suburban. The Ford will be redesigned next year and the next gen Nissan Armada is also coming into the picture soon too. To make things worse - Toyota has had some pretty high profile engine and turbo waste gate issues with the new 3.4L turbo motor, and there is a lot of complexity under the hood that will probably result in far higher costs to keep it running than what most Toyota buyers are accustomed to. All that for nominal increases in fuel economy.

It's just not clear where they were targeting the Sequoia in the market other than to the Toyota faithful. If that was their plan, it would have been easier for them to just rework the interior of the old one and gave it larger, modern screens but keep the rest of the design intact. I know I'd have preferred that design with more classic Toyota styling, independent rear suspension, and V8 powertrain. Like the Tundra, the Sequoia SUV seems like it needs to be updated already to fix some of their strange oversights.