One stupid thing leads to another....

[TxBowHunter700]

Glad my transmission fluid is no where near my oil pan.

[txfireguy2003]

The worst oil change I ever did was on a mitsubishi eclipse many years ago. I drained the oil, pulled the old filter, refilled the new filter and installed it, then refilled the engine. Cranked it up, backed it out of the garage and there were 5 quarts of oil on the floor! I thought, "Holy crap, I'm an idiot, forgot to put the plug back in!" So I shut it down, cleaned up the brand new oil from the floor, and pushed it back into the garage. When I crawled up under it again, the plug was where it was supposed to be! Some I'm thinking about where this oil could have come out at, and the only place I could think of was the filter. Did I forget to put the filter on? Not put it on tight enough? NOPE. The old gasket stuck to the engine, so I had screwed a new filter, with new gasket, onto the old gasket and the oil blew out between the two gaskets. Not as bad as your deal, but it sure was a mess to clean up.

[jsctx84]

good times

[Burnadell]

I'm still trying to get over the fact that you changed your oil with your dress clothes on.

[equin]

What year Tacoma do you have? Mine's an '03, and the transmission dipstick tube is on the right (passenger side) towards the back of the engine. I just did a trans drain and refill (about 4 qts) a couple months ago.

Anyway, don't feel too bad. One time, I replaced the trans on a 93 fullsize Bronco I used to own with another one I got from the junkyard. In the process, I decided to also replace the non-working electric t-case with a manual t-case. I had no gear shifter for it yet, so I guessed where the 2wd lever should be moved on the t-case after I put everything back together. Well, I thought I put everything back together, except I forgot to re-attach the rear wiring harness to the frame, leaving it dangling too close to the front driveshaft. Yep, you guessed it. What I thought was 2wd was actually 4wd, allowing the front driveshaft to spin, which in turn caught the dangling rear wiring harness and caused it to wrap around the shaft and rip it out of the front fuse box under the hood. It effectively killed the Bronco while I was in the center left lane of I-20 just south of Dallas with traffic swerving at 65-70 mph barely avoiding me. Luckily, one of those Sheriff/TXDOT courtesy patrols came along and saved the day by keeping traffic at bay while me and my cousin pushed it to the shoulder. So an $800 DIY trans and t-case R&R ended up costing me an additional $1200 to have a shop unravel the spaghetti-looking mess of wires under my truck and replace them all. But hey, at least I got the satisfaction of being able to say I did the work myself on the trans/t-case R&R - lol!

[Tylerbost33]

Hahaha man that's some rough stuff! Sorry to hear about your stuff ****ed thieves

[TICK MAGNET]

What year Tacoma do you have? Mine's an '03, and the transmission dipstick tube is on the right (passenger side) towards the back of the engine. I just did a trans drain and refill (about 4 qts) a couple months ago.

Anyway, don't feel too bad. One time, I replaced the trans on a 93 fullsize Bronco I used to own with another one I got from the junkyard. In the process, I decided to also replace the non-working electric t-case with a manual t-case. I had no gear shifter for it yet, so I guessed where the 2wd lever should be moved on the t-case after I put everything back together. Well, I thought I put everything back together, except I forgot to re-attach the rear wiring harness to the frame, leaving it dangling too close to the front driveshaft. Yep, you guessed it. What I thought was 2wd was actually 4wd, allowing the front driveshaft to spin, which in turn caught the dangling rear wiring harness and caused it to wrap around the shaft and rip it out of the front fuse box under the hood. It effectively killed the Bronco while I was in the center left lane of I-20 just south of Dallas with traffic swerving at 65-70 mph barely avoiding me. Luckily, one of those Sheriff/TXDOT courtesy patrols came along and saved the day by keeping traffic at bay while me and my cousins pushed it to the shoulder. So an $800 DIY trans and t-case R&R ended up costing me an additional $1200 to have a shop unravel the spaghetti-looking mess of wires under my truck and replace them all. But hey, at least I got the satisfaction of being able to say I did the work myself on the trans/t-case R&R - lol!

Ouch! I bet that made you sick! I wouldn't dare take on a job of that difficulty, but that sense of satisfaction you speak of sure does feel great when it all works out as planned.
Mine is an 06 Tacoma. We looked all over for the dipstick, and learned it didn't have one after a quick Internet search.