I Have a 1996 Toyota Tacoma pickup with 2.7liter 4 cylinder 4 wheel drive. truck ran great on freeway came to a stop at light and started to hesitate and lack of power like the cat was clogged. cat, is hollow from past build up so i ruled that out. limped it home, was stumblingand hesitating really bad and truck shaking pretty hard at idle, took intake tube off and inspected for bad plug or blown out plug, inspected wires, one looks as if it has been nicked. took cap and rotor off rotor had green residue on copper contact points cap had corrosion on electrodes but cleaned off. scrape residue off copper, put it back together and started it up ran great for a few moments then went back to running rough and stumbling. it has a metallic clicking noise between tranny and rear of engine when running rough. when running fine it isn't therer.

Question translated from spoken English to written English.
Question moved to Toyota Tacoma.

There are some videos and various ideas in this link.

https://www.google.com/search?q=96+toyota+tacoma+starts+then+dies

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It is here

https://www.google.com/search?q=1996+Toyota+Tacoma+4+cylinder+2.7+Litre+firing+order

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Check the shifter cable at the transmission side and see tf the pivot on the transmission is not rusted and is not difficult to move, take your vehicle and shift to neutral, now turn it off, put on parking brake or block wheels so you don't run yourself over now you can feel the shift link on the transmission, lube it up as it may not be going in fully and causing to slip out, good luck..

no, you will tear up the differential.

seems that you might have some water in the gas tank. get some gas dryer and pour in the tank. 2 half pint bottles should do to a half tank of gas. good luck.

disconnect negative battery cable.remove upper & lower steering column covers.disconnect switch wiring connector. turn key to acc. release retaining pin through small hole in the side with a paperclip,slide key & cylinder out.re-assemble in reverse order.

Take it to an autoparts store and have them connect a meter to the car. It will tell you what area the problem is in. The autoparts store can sell you a part to fix it.

IT PROBABLY IS THE STARTER. CHECK TO SEE IF THE ENGINE TURNS OVER BY WATCHING OR HAVING SOMEONE WATCH THE FAN OR FRONT PULLEYS AS YOU TRY STARTING IT.

Found this solution and it worked for me on my 1996 Toyota Tacoma and fixed the problem you described...!!! Here it is --------"I Hope You All Appreciate This FAST and EASY Inexpensive Repair That Even The Toyota Dealers Dont Seem To Know How To Fix !!! The Problem Is The Air filter temp sensor. Look On The Left Side Of the Air Filter Housing and Disconnect The Plug Thats Attached To The Spark Plug Like Plastic Sensor Mounted on The Side Of the Air Filter Housing, Now Go Start Your Truck !!! Your Truck Will Start And RUN Fine Now ! Replace The Sensor Approx $59 at Autozone... This Should Fix 90% Of Your Problems If your In the other 10% and it does not Fix it , Email Me and Ill See If I Can Help ! People Have Spent Hundreds and into The Thousand Dollar Area Trying to Resolve This Intermittant Problem At Inept Shops with Illiterate Mechanics ! If Your Happy With This Fix, BE Generouse ! I Do Accept Donations at Paypal Send to [email protected] Thank You JOE Mechaniac"
The answer (above) came from this link and was posted by joe the mechanic on this thread
http://www.fixya.com/cars/t890232-1996_toyota_tacoma_wont_start_when

0 deg 09' +/- 12' (0.15 +/- 0.2 deg, 1.6 +/- 2 mm, 0.06 +/- 0.08 in.)