97 Tacoma Partial Restoration Engine/Paint

Changing out the shims is not too difficult. All you need is the basic tool to help out. I found mine at Advance Auto Parts. Schely tool

The only reason I am thinking of not buffing, but re-clearing again is that I have been told by MANY body men, that if I do buff it out after wet sanding, that I will have to ALWAYS buff again every few months for the life of my truck. I don't want to have to polish my truck every few months for the next 10 years.

 

This is not exactly our trucks, but it is close enough. the procedure is the same, and it IS a Toyota product!
Not getting the video to post right...trying to fix....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEfTV34Tceg

 

Well we are at close to 3k miles on the truck. The engine seems to be running just fine, though I am still fighting a knock sensor code. I think I may have a broke wire, but I have very little time to have her down for the work. This is my daily driver. The first off-road trip was fun as hell, and she got lots of pinstripes on her. Not worries since I still have to take care of the cut and respray of another set of clear coat.

 

Finally after a long period of time I was able to fix my paint!

 

Looks sexy!

 

^Looks really good.

 

Thanks for the compliments everyone! Right after getting the paint finished I installed the front gears (Went with 4.56) and went wheeling that weekend in the mountain area of NE Alabama with some fellow TW members. Ended up breaking not one, but BOTH of my front CV shafts! I prefer to break them rather than gears or other more expensive parts! When I finally get around to swapping them out (I already have the new parts) I will post pics of the damage!

 

It has finally happened. The day I dreaded, and the day that ALL of Tacomaworld was patiently waiting for has arrived. The day that they all get to snicker at me.....

WHEEL BEARING FAILURE!!! I noticed a little while ago that tell-tale noise that we all dread.... The subtle hum-whoop-whoop of a wheel bearing going south. So yesterday I pulled her into the garage. I was already planning to get her in yesterday anyway, so that I could replace the broken CV shafts, but a bad bearing was not what I wanted. Fortunately I still have spare parts from the shop in Alabama so I didn't have to order anything. And heck, since that nice, shiny new header from LCE Engineering has been patiently sitting in its box, I figured WTH! Let's do this before the weekend!


WE CAN REBUILD HER!


WE HAVE THE TECHNOLOGY!


WE CAN MAKE HER BETTER THAN SHE WAS!!!


BETTER.....STRONGER.....FASTER!!!!!!

Sitting on the jack stand getting worked on...



With the right front hub removed. Note the broken CV shaft! I see something shiny in the engine bay!



Don't she look PURDY!!! Just waiting on some slightly shorter bolts tomorrow!

 

Sweet man!

 

Thanks Dave. Money going into the truck is going to slow down now for a while while it shifts to the Bike for a little bit. lol.

 

What mods are you planning for it?

 

Well I already have a custom cluster for it. The Road King comes without a tach, so I am getting an electronic cluster with a tach, as well as LED backlighting (obviously!) that can be changed on the fly. You can choose from 16 different colors, and can have the backlighting blue, and the needles red, or you can go with green background and amber needles, etc., just by pushing a couple of buttons.

I am going to replace my mirrors with some taller ones that have parking lights integrated into them. I am already converting all of the running lights to LED.

Later on (much later) I am going to get the fenders and fuel tank repainted. I am seriously considering painting it the same color as the Tacoma. I like the blue. either way, I am going to change the pewter color it is now.

That's all on the list at the moment. lol

 

Sounds awesome!