new hiace owner from Portland!

Hi everyone, I recently bought a 1991 hiace super custom from vanlifenorthwest. Took it out for my first night camping last week and planning and longer trip next week. Love the van so far!

Thanks for all the valuable tips and discussion in the forum. Have a few random button/related questions:

* My fog lights button has two toggles - the top one turns on fog lights on the front, what is the bottom one supposed to do? Couldn't figure it out and no lights go on...
* I have a weird button on my radio that looks kind of like a sideways wifi symbol. When I press it the radio says 1420 but nothing else (and no other buttons do anything once in this mode) - what is this?
* Are people able to play US CDs? I tried to play one but it didn't work. Wasn't sure if this was a restriction on CDs or my CD player is broken...

Hi and welcome!
Can't help with the fog lights; others here with those on their vans will be able to answer that, hopefully.
The button on the radio: isn't that frequency 1420 the Civil Defence frequency over there (or was it from Japan)?
Edit: Now I think about it more I think the US uses or used 640 and 1240 for that purpose so it probably is Japan's frequency. That button will be to switch to the C. D. frequency easily in an emergency, like an incoming missile from Korea or similar .....
Audio CD discs are the same world-wide so that won't be the issue, but DVD's do have regions and two types of encoding. You're not trying to play a DVD are you? If it's a standard CD does the machine take the disc in? If so it may just need the laser pickup cleaned; I think you can buy cleaning discs of dubious performance but best to open the unit and physically clean the lens with a cotton bud soaked in Iso-Propyl alcohol. If it won't even take the disc in you probably have a worn or broken rubber drive belt which would need replacing.

@joeh - Welcome to the forum, I love the graphics on your van! My Super Custom has a fog light switch on the right-hand stalk, it's a ring-type switch that just turns them on or off. You have to set it to on, then turn the main headlight switch to at least the parking lights for the fog lights to come on. It's pretty awesome that you can run just the fog lights without the main head lights on. Most if not all US market cars I've driven will only engage the fog lights if the main head lights are already on.

I don't have a CD player in my van, and not sure if I have the radio button you mention, will check later, though it makes sense what AgathaAlice is saying

Is the CD player definitely an audio player? My 91 model, direct from Japan, had some kind of CD ROM based navigation system.

Welcome!

My fog light switch is on the right side of the dash.
I switched out the stereo as soon as I got it with a nice double din DVD player.

Best buy a new double-din radio for it, but don't do what I did and completely change the speakers and add tweeters as it takes ages LOL.

Hey joeh. I’m looking at getting a super custom from vanlifenorthwest. How was the experience- are you happy with the condition of the van and their service? Any advice you can offer would be greatly appreciated.

Hey Firstchair! Danny @ vanlifenorthwest was great and very helpful. I would highly recommend. Mechanically, the van has been working perfectly - taken it on two longer trips so far with lots of forest road driving and had no problems. Having someone who's already done work on the van that I can take it back to for maintenance and any other problems make me sleep easier at night, especially when I'm sleeping in the van =).

The only thing that I wish I'd know earlier is expectations about the timeline. The whole process can take up to 6 months, depending on the van, when it will be imported, and how busy they are. So it is good to know that going in.

Welcome to the forum Firstchair!

I'll second Danny as an extremely knowledgeable and competent resource/mechanic on these vans. I imported the van myself (took 8 months from the first auction searches to delivery in Tacoma), but I had Danny do some of the bigger jobs that I wasn't comfortable tackling. The van runs great and I have learned a lot from him (and this forum). He does stay busy though, I had to wait a couple months before I could get in for the big jobs, but it was worth the wait. For smaller jobs, it's always been within a week that he can get to me. Dean's Car Care and Green Drop Garage are also options, as they have been doing work on Hiaces for a bit now.

AAA or the like is also something to consider if your alternator dies or something else major breaks on a road trip, as some parts are not shared with any other US-market Toyotas and must be ordered from outside the US. Danny does stock alternators, and I've been considering picking one up from him just so I have a spare on long trips.