I picked up a 95 4runner with the 3vze in it for a song, barely ran with white smoke out the exaust. No biggie, I thought, I can fix this for under 500 and have a nice rig. (has a clutch forward replacement (engine... +) 20k miles ago). So thought I was good until I tore into it.

1. No oil in the radiator. just watered down coolant.

2. Foamy greenish grey sludge in the oil(coolant and lots of it).

3. heres where it gets weird. Air intake, throttle body, and everything back from there filled with the coolant oil mixture. To the point where when I unbolt the throttle body it goes everywhere. pulled the EGR out of the side on the intake, covered in that ˟˟˟˟˟.

4. Go to pull the camshafts and half the bolts are finger tight or just rattling around.

5. Figured I would continue with the tear down and worst case I need to replace a head. Get the heads off and the head gaskets are a little messed up but definitely not in full blown failure mode.

6. Heads look good, put a straight edge on them and that was good, no visible cracks or defects. (figure with aluminum heads I would be able to notice it pretty easily.)

7. Other weird thing is that 5 piston heads and valves are black with carbon (which I expected) but the drivers side rear is clean. no carbon, just slightly corroded aluminum. WTF?

So what do I do? I'm about to just put this thing back together with new timing, water pump, and oil pump as well as the new gaskets but I don't wanna have to break it back down again.

 

I have done alot of internet searching and come up with nothing. I have never seen anything with sludge coming out of the throttle body. Maybe on something with the plate style plenum but the 3vze doesn't have anything like that as far as I know.

 

I know the 22r much better than the 3.0. But my guess is that the gasket failed on the drivers side rear cylinder. I have heard that one of them in the rear is the first to go. Coolant is sucked in and pressure is pushed out into the coolant system. Coolant will make it to the crankcase this way over time.
One way to get rid of carbon rattling in the cylinder is to dribble water into the carb while running it. It will soften up and get pushed out through the exhaust. Sounds like it really cleaned up that piston.
I've heard that drivers side gasket is different than passenger.

 

The gaskets are the same on each side (but whether they last as long on each side, I don't know). As nordicwargod points out, water in a cylinder will clean up the pistons nice and shiny.

The water in the plenum could have come through the PCV. In any event, I'd replace the PCV and check that the hose is as clean as you can get it.

Or, you could have a crack in the head. In your case, I'd spend the money to have it pressure tested.

Be careful with cam bearings. They hold the cam down against a lot of spring pressure, so if some of the screws are loose they can rapidly tear the threads out of the aluminum head. You need all of those screws working together.

 

As far as the pcv goes, it's clean and passed a shake test, also there isn't any of that sludge in the pcv hose.

 

shake test? I thought there was more to it than that. Blow one way and there should be resistance, other way it should be clear. Go to the service manual for a proper test.
Sounds like water is getting into the oil but not vice versa. With that shiny piston it sounds like you have a hg failure.
More than one person has written that the headgaskets are different from side to side. I could be wrong. Get that factory service manual and do some reading. There are links on this forum for a free download.
Which cam bearings? All of them or the one's in the back on the side of the hg failure?

 

Exactly. I wonder how many shiny #6 piston heads there are out there.

If not a bad HG, I would almost guarantee that you have a cracked head.

Source: An idiot that bought a 3VZE with a bad HG 2 months ago and now thinks he's an expert on them.

 

Both sides had loose bearings, I would say there were 6 bolts less than finger tight scattered over both shafts

 

I have alldata but that hasn't helped me diagnose this

 

When I tore mine down, there were a few cam cap bolts that were loose. Maybe we should be using threadlocker on these?

 

Go and look at some of the "stickys". One of them mentions factory service manuals [FSM's] available for download. Between this forum and the manuals you will have lots to help you. Couple of utube videos to watch too. Research!
$500????? Hmmmmmm. Maybe if you don't need any new heads but as I have recently found out the little parts add up more than you think. Perhaps a little bit of money for head pressure testing? Check out the flatness of the block deck too with a straight edge and feeler gauge. If your block is not flat I would look for a new engine. I hear those 3vze's can be a pain to assemble.
Good luck