How To Change The Oil on a 2nd Gen Tundra with MotivX Tools & OEM Toyota Oil Filter (Part #04152-yzza4)
Oil is the lifeblood of your engine and changing it can be intimidating. Doing so requires you to get up close and personal with some pretty major vehicle components. Hopefully, after reading and using this as a step-by-step guide, you’ll have the confidence to tackle this job the right way!
Ask any Toyota owner at what interval they should change their synthetic oil, and you’ll be sure to get at least 10 different answers. To that, I’ll say do what’s comfortable for you. I chose to change the oil in my 2021 Tundra at about 8,000 miles, as I was headed on a trip the following week and didn’t want to roll over the factory-recommended 10,000.
Performing an oil change in any Toyota truck is mostly the same whether it be a 4Runner, Tacoma, FJ Cruiser, land cruiser, etc. Unsurpsinginly, a Tundra with the 5.7L V8 is no different! Keep reading to save both time and money by learning how to change yours too!
How To Change Oil In A 2nd Gen Tundra
Table of Contents
Tools required
You’ll want to first start with gathering your tools and materials. There are quite a few items needed to perform an oil change.
Specialty Tools
- Motivx Filter Housing Wrench
- OEM Oil Filter (with new o-rings and filter housing bleeder valve)
- Oil Drain Plug Gasket
General Tools
- Metric Socket Set
- 14mm socket
- 13mm Socket
- 12mm socket
- 1/2″ Torque wrench
- Plastic Interior Trim Removal Tool
- Roll of Shop Towels
- 8 Quarts of 0W-20 Oil
- 3/8” Impact Wrench (optional)
- Bucket or Oil Drain Tub
- Vehicles Ramps (optional)
Step 1. Warm the truck up.
I started by turning my truck on while I located my ramps. Once found, I got the ramps into position and drove the truck onto them. With the truck still running, pop the hood and get your tools ready for the next step. Total run time should be around 10 minutes to heat up the oil just enough to drain but not burn you.
Step 2. Remove Skid Plate
Now with our engine and oil warmed up, it’s time to start removing components that block the oil drain and filter. Start with removing the factory skid plate unless you have an aftermarket one with access doors.
For the skid plate, use a 13mm socket to remove the 4 bolts holding it in place. Next, simply unhook the skid from the aligning tabs located at the front of the skid. After the skid is removed, go ahead and remove your oil cap from the inside of the engine bay as well.
Step 3. Remove Oil Cap
To prevent a vacuum from happening while draining your oil, you will want to unscrew your oil cap from inside of your engine bay.
Step 4. Drain Oil
With the skid plate off, it’s time to drain the oil. You’ll first want to locate your oil drain plug located at the bottom of the oil pan. This can be found directly behind the first bar of the front cross member. Once you’ve located the drain plug, use a 14mm socket and unscrew it with an oil pan/bucket underneath.
Once you get towards the end of the bolt threads, remove it by hand and be prepared to move out of the way quickly as warm oil is going to come shooting out pretty quickly.
With the oil draining, clean up your drain plug and set it somewhere safe. If you’re like 99.9% of other guys changing their oil, your oil drain plug gasket (the blue ring) is stuck to the oil pan as pictured. You need to remove and replace it with a new one. Take extra time to remove it very carefully.
It is suggested that you use something plastic so as to not mar the bottom of the pan, as doing so could cause leaks and other issues. I used a plastic interior trim removal tool to knock it loose after the oil was finished draining.
Step 5. Reinstall Drain Plug
Now that the oil is done draining, clean up the bottom of the oil pan, attach your new blue gasket to your drain plug and reinstall.
Once everything is cleaned up and reinstalled you’ll want to torque your drain plug down to 30ft/lbs.
Step 6. Drain Oil Filter Housing
Now that all of your oil has been drained and the drain plug is reinstalled and torqued to spec, it’s time to replace the oil filter element. First, locate the oil filter housing. It is a large black plastic cylinder as pictured and it sticks out like a sore thumb.
Start by removing the bottom drain tab with your 3/8” ratchet extension to fit into the square slot. Once removed, grab your plastic bleeder valve from your oil filter box and stick it up into the filter housing. You will need to press quite hard.
Once that oil is done draining, grab your Motiv-x tool and attach it to your 3/8” extension and break the filter housing loose.
Once removed, replace your filter with your new filter (it should go on snug).
Replace the o-rings on the drain valve and along the threads, applying a little bit of oil to lube the o-rings up.
Once that is complete go ahead and hand tighten your filter housing with new o-rings and filter back in place and then torque to 18ft/lbs. Finally, reinstall your bottom cap and torque that down to 9ft/lbs.
Step 8. Pour new oil in
Now with your oil drained and filter replaced, we are ready to pour in new oil! The manual calls for 8.4 quarts, however with the assumption there may still be .4 quarts stuck on the cylinder walls, I’m choosing to start with 8 quarts. Grab your funnel and start pouring!
After you’ve poured in 8 quarts, go ahead and start the truck and let it run for about 10 seconds while you or a buddy sit under the truck checking for any oil leaks. Assuming there are none, let the truck warm up some more and check the oil level after a couple of minutes.
Add more oil if needed to get to a comfortable level on the dipstick, and pat yourself on the back, because you have just changed the oil in your Tundra!
Step 9. Reset maintenance light
To reset that pesky maintenance light, use your steering wheel controls to locate the vehicle settings on the center dash display.
Once at the vehicle settings, scroll down to maintenance reset and click that.
Boom, the light is gone for another 10,000 miles!
Final Thoughts
The desire to change my own oil came from having something messed up at the dealer one too many times. The satisfaction of knowing that the job was done right is totally worth it to me. This is an easy job and feels so good to have done right. My buddies and I will usually all do oil changes the same day and it’s fun to make a day out of it. So get out there and get your hands dirty!
