engifineer

I too am going to at some point have a setup for more serious off road (not "Serious" but more serious than the occasional jaunt down a muddy trail). One reason I kept our 01 4Runner when we bought my wife a truck was that. We also will probably start doing some light off roading in her newer vehicle which is a '13 TRD Off Road Tacoma. We both love to camp, and are seriously looking at some of the truck top tents like the one shown in the post above. Being able to take some easy/medium trails out to a location and camp is something we want to start doing. My issue is fitting in another hobby budget besides autocross and snowboarding!

I missed a very good deal on an OG 4 runner about 10 years ago and still kick myself. Was in very good shape, owned by a local autocrosser and he wanted $2000 for it. I had no place for it then and still hate that I missed it. Would have been a fun little vehicle!

engifineer

One thing that is tougher with IFS is making it reliable enough to handle it. Sand, grit, maxing the CV angles, etc can make it tough for them to survive super heavy use. Although some are doing it. I forgot his name, but there is a guy that has been doing pretty well in the "rock bouncer" class running a custom IFS setup. That may help drive production of some better IFS systems for off road... but will be $$$$

I think for most of us though that are more interested in a street vehicle that can do some trail running, we are fine with IFS for the most part.