2013 Home made Raptor (sort of) Grill

I thought I would share some pics of a grill that I made up for my 2013 Tacoma and the steps taken - it took about a day, I am not patient, and dont have too many tools so this has to be a fast job otherwise I would get bored.

1. Buy a 2013 Tacoma
2. Buy a piece of aluminium perforated sotted sheet
3. Buy some rubber trim, some LEDs, and zip ties.
4. Take off the grill and chop out the middle with a saw, leaving some of the plastic attachments in place as those are going to be anchors for zip ties once they have been drilled with a hole in them, these will hold the new grill
5. Use a piece of card to create a template before cutting the aluminum to fit
6. With the card template lay it over the metal and cut it to size, then mess around with it trimming etc so it fits as well as possible, make sure the bend is clean using a straight edge.
7. Cut holes in the metal for the LEDs
8. Put the grill surround back on the truck and then cable tie the new trimmed and painted grill to it.
9. Include a pic of my seat covers that are really nice

This was a quick and effective job. Its on there temporary as I want to paint the chrome piece in body color and make the lower grill in the same way, just didnt have body color paint yet. I also need to wire the LED's to the DRL light position but did not get to it (or know how yet) as I ran out of time.

 

interesting

 

NICE! Sub'd for updates on paint and such...

 

Quick update - wired up the LEDs and installed some Halo Projector fogs, still gotta make my lower grill and maybe get creative with a light strip in it or maybe not as it might get a bit too christmas tree like.

 

Very nice. Well done!

 

So you didn't even cut it out perfectly or used bondo...hmmm

 

Where can you buy different types of mesh? I've been wanting to do this to my '13.

 

nice thats exactly how i wired up RADs grill lights...look almost identical

 

Kewl! I would also like to know where you got the grill inserts.

 

Thanks for the comments

So the cutting out of the plastic middle grill was very easy and I just used a hand saw. A key thing was to use a piece of masking tape to use as a straight line up the plastic, and leave pieces of plastic from the original center piece at the edges rather than cutting it out completely - the reason being that it then covers up parts of the lights that you would otherwise see through the grill. I never even split out teh chrome surround - that will get body colored when I get some paint.

No bondo or glue or anything - that would be beyond my skill and patience level and I wanted it to sit flush anyway without being recessed in any way.

A key thing was the rubber trim - you need that too get the right finish.

I bought the Aluminium perforated from a sheet metals supplier - $50 for a piece of 4x2. Dont get it too thin or it will buckle and dont get carbon steel or it will rust. The formal name for this stuff is slotted perforated aluminum sheet.

I cut mine with a hand saw - its a pain with basic tools.

Halo projectors are a Camry fit - $60.00 ebay. Not the best but good enough and different - takes a bit of modding to get them to fit, but they work nicely.

 

How did u attach it??

 

Where did you get the LEDs?

 

So the LED's came from ebay - they are holding up fine and the truck is used everyday with them switched on. They are called Maxima's - they are 3/4 size, white glass and glow amber. They came from an ebayer called randcarriages and I think that ebayer is still there selling them.

I fixed everything on using zip ties which you cannot see as they are black.

 

What kind of rubber trim did you use?

 

it came from customecargrills.com they do stuff which is just right for the job

 

sorry, drop the "e", it is customcargrills.com

 

Looks great! How much to make one for me? I have an '13 as well. Hate the factory grill. Great job, keep it up!

 

looks nice. I may have to knock these off

 

looks great