My awesome 1990 Toyota Pickup (6 cyl., supercab), fondly named Ol’ Rusty, has a measly 245,000 miles on it and still running strong. The one problem is that when it is very cold out such as this morning (-10F), I get a terrible noise coming from under the hood just in front of the steering column. It sounds like a belt rubbing, but I can’t find it. It happens when I start going faster than 20 mph and goes away once the engine is completely warm. When it’s happening, the speedometer jumps a bit. Interestingly, if I warm the truck up for 10 minutes or more so that the engine is completely warm, it still happens when I first drive the truck. Is this something I need to worry about or can I continue to ignore it like I have been for the last 3 years?
The speedometer cable is going bad. You can ignore it, but it will become increasingly annoying until it eventually breaks. Save your sanity and replace it.
+1 to Jesmed’s comment.
I think it is pretty clear that this aged truck’s speedo cable is about to go to auto parts heaven.
Replace it now and you will have a much more peaceful ride.
I can vividly recall riding at turnpike speeds in a friend’s Pontiac Tempest ('61 or '62 model year) when the speedometer needle suddenly began wildly fluctuating between zero & 120 mph, along with an…interesting…mechanical noise. After a couple of minutes of that wild action, the speedo cable snapped and the speedo then read zero until he got the cable replaced.