Dear Scotty,

My family has a 1999 Toyota Tacoma 4x4 Pickup Truck.  It has the Toyota 3.4 V6, and a 5-speed manual transmission.  The old beast has been well car for in the 18 years that we have owned it.  We switched it to full synthetic lubrication for all lubricants before it hit 100,000 miles.  The old beast now has 188,xxx miles on it, and, strangely enough, it has not smoked its clutch.  Because of its age, I have started doing research on what clutch kit assembly to put in it when it does smoke the clutch.  The research that I have been doing has provided some pretty scary results.  For example, Aisin is now using plastic coil springs as dampening springs in their clutch discs.

What are some of your opinions on clutch kit assemblies for a rig like this one?  I would love to hear your feedback on some of these corporations.  

On a side note, what is your opinion of the Toyota 5VZ-FE 3.4 V6 engine?  It seems like these engines are going to outlive civilization.  

Thank you,

Paul