Night-Prowler build

How she sits as of 3/31/18

Highlights/Featured shots:​

When I bought her in March 2012:


Purchased (financed) her in 2012 from a small auto dealer. Was my first "real" truck, and first time financing. Paid her off in April '15. Owned a variety of vehicles (stock 94 T-100 manual 4 banger previously, but nothing compared to the Tacoma)before settling into my Tacoma and have since been obsessed. Discovered TW and have been pretty active lurking/otherwise since. It's been fairly slow going with upgrades and mods. With the exception of my somewhat extensive lighting setup, which I became obsessed with and was my object of attention for quite some time shortly after getting the truck, heh. I am still invested with lights and constantly want to upgrade/add more, just have other pressing matters that need tending to such as maintenance and suspension upgrades that I feel cannot be ignored any longer.. But a LOT of this thread will be mostly focused on my lights and output shots. I am completely engrossed with all things light related. And will hopefully have that "perfect" setup, just the way I want it.



A few of my write-ups:

01-04 valence 8" led bars in turn signal spot +20"+dtrl's with mesh inserts[installs]

Spyder tail assemblies- 1156 led bulb replacement comparisons

Restoring faded plastic with heat gun works! My review.

Headlight Filler Panel led turn signals & misc led dtrl's (bolt led's)

Bed exit Borla exhaust! '01 3.4 ext cab

4.5" vision x led cannon clones




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Current mods/upgrades

Wheels/Tires/Lift/Shocks-

• -NEW: 17x8.5 scs brushed golds with 33x12.5 Centennial Dirt Commander MT's. 1.25" spacers all around.
• -OLD: 33x12.5 bfg ko's on 15x10's (not sure on brand, previously installed. Think they were Alcoa.)
• -5100's and eibachs
• -Dakars
• -ome greasables shackles
• -daystar greasable main eyes (need to install)
• -Camburg uniball UCA's

Engine/Performance-

• Volant CAI kit with R2C off road air filter
• DC Power Engineering high output alt. 180amps. 120 hot idle amps.
• Denso rewound high output 250a alternator (from vendor BamaToy1997)
• BIG 3 upgrade(from vendor BamaToy1997)
• Custom Exhaust from Y-Pipe back: (Install was done by Redline Performance Manufacturing in Chandler,AZ):
  • 2.25 mild steel (mandrel bent)
  • Magnaflow high flow cat
  • Borla Pro Xs Muffler (Center/offset)
  • Ultra quiet Resonator
  • Exited out the bed side w/3inch tip and custom trim ring.

• Two 8" Electric fans in front of a/c condensor (didnt really help efficiency, removing)

Interior-

• Cobra 29 lx lcd radio (mounted in place of rear view mirror)
  • Wilson Superflex antenna-4ft (mounted on driver side led bar bracket w/quick disconnect)
• Orange Electronics Tire Pressure Monitoring System (live data w/digital screen)
• Torque obd dongle/app
• Digital temp gauge for a/c temp monitoring
• 5% rear tint/25% front windows
• 5% windshield visor strip
• AUSDOM A261 dash cam

Stereo-
-Pioneer double din. fh-x700bt
-Older model 5.25" pioneer premier component system.
-6x9 pioneers
-12" 2000w pioneer championship sub in ported box wired 2ohm, 600rms. TS-W3003D4
-Autotek ata1200.1 amp 600rms
-Cheap Capacitor(doesn't do shit)


Exterior-

• Custom bedside stickers (TRD off road. night prowler edition) from RuggedT
• TacomaWorld sticker
• large "TRD" sticker on windshield
• Plastic Bedliner

Maintenance (of note) & Upgrades-

• Timing Belt/Water pump kit from aircabinman (ebay)
• TOTAL CHAOS cam tab gussets
• Poly rack bushings
• Moog LCA bushings
• New oem wheel bearings front and rear (pressed by NAPA)
• 
  
• reconditioned/cleaned camburg ucas
• Re-manufactured steering rack (NAPA)
• oem LBJ's
• tie rod ends (Oreillys)
• NGK spark plug wires(blue)
• Radiator(Oreillys)

Brakes:

• Tundra brake upgrade. (Callahan)
• Oem drums/centric ceramic shoes/all new hardware and cylinders
• Replaced master cylinder (oem)

Lighting-

• Spyder 1-piece Headlight housings w/Mini H1 5.0's
  • Triple halos (all have been disabled due to issues)
  • Powder coated Metallic blue passive demon eyes
• (Have new 6.0's w/halos and new headlights waiting to install. Housings are crap, but determined to make a quality set out of them)
• Spyder smoked led tail assemblies:
  • JDM astar amber led turn signal bulbs
  • led projector reverse bulbs
• Led license plate light (stainless down firing led housing bolted to top of license plate)
• Smoked led third brake light
• Amber led's in corner lenses
• Amber bolt leds (aka 'led eagle eye' on ebay) for turn signals, mounted in headlight filler panels (7 each side)
• Led panel dome light
• Under hood led strip lights

FUTURE lighting upgrades/additions-

• dual 20" double row vision x bars roof mounted
• Baja Designs Squadrons to replace 4.5" cannons
• Rear/reverse lights: Two more 8" evo prime clones in flood, flush mounted in rear bumper.
• Custom built light rack that extends around all four corners on roof. Will hold:
  • dual 20" double rows above windshield
  • 8" single rows above doors facing out to the sides
  • dual 8" single rows above rear window facing back
• New bolt leds in headlight filler panels
• Possibly dash cluster led conversion(if/when any oem burn out)
• courtesy lights
• puddle lights

FUTURE mods/investments/plans

• Ome coils
• New window felt strips
• New window tint for front windows (after felt strips are installed)
• Finish my second retrofit
• fix wheel fitment issue w/ bolt on spacers (story behind this

When i first bought her, there was a couple studs stripped from P.O. as there was not enough thread grab due to the backspacing of rims, and the 1/4" washer/spacer they used to clear the calipers. I went ahead and purchased extended length studs from a lexus and installed 6 each side up front. I realized a while later that I could've bought bolt on spacers, but was a noob at the time and didn't know much about my truck. But that had to be fixed asap was all I knew.​

• Top end rebuild: Have tiny coolant leak in valley under manifold, suspect heater bypass tube. Also suspect leaky injectors.
• All aluminum radiator (If current fails again)
• new plug wires (NGK)
• Maybe new coil packs? Don't know anything about the life/performance of these
• New wheel bearings
• All new brakes/rotors/calipers (maybe tundra upgrade if I get 16's or 17's) needs done soon.
• U joints
• PVC Train horn
• Custom CAI using volant or afe kit, custom routed to fender w/sealed air filter canister for powercore filter (straight-thru, waterproof design)
• backup cam

BIGGER investments (hopes)-

• Custom roof light rack
• Bed rack and Roof Top Tent
• Winch
• Relentless bumper FRONT
• Relentless bumper REAR
  
• All associated gear for camping/wheeling/recovery
• Maybe new wheel/tire setup. Either Method NV Wheels/KMC XD Addict ( matte black & machined look)
• On Board Air setup w/aux tank- one line for train horn, other for tires.

Dream Investments-
New/rebuilt motor w/supercharger and LT
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LED LIGHT BARS!!!
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Some recent/random pics over last few years:
























CB setup:







Exhaust:

 

DTRL/Misc

 

Few videos I've taken of misc things.


Led eagle eye (bolt led) turn signals
https://youtu.be/Cda8vTi6ZG8


Jdm astar 1156 rear turn signal comparison
https://youtu.be/xItLQtmlQEg


Borla exhaust sound vid (have more vids of this, drive by's and such)
https://youtu.be/YozGeff-pQE


Led light bar night driving(does not do lights justice at all)
https://youtu.be/Thx9Knqgp84


4.5" led cannons
https://youtu.be/HhYkWzK00-c

 

Nice rig man!

 

Thanks mang!

 

Subd. Love your Tacoma and your crazy lights. I've also never seen an exhaust that cut through the body, so bonus points for the creativeness.

 

Thanks!
And a little story behind that actually.. The bed exit exhaust is done quite often actually, but mostly just on true trophy trucks, as well as street rods/dragsters/turbo setups, on a variety of cars. I've seen it done on very few tacos though... The shop did amazing work and had it all buttoned up in a few hours. Paid more than I liked, but was worth it. They mostly work on high end, high power vehicles there. Saw quite a few nice rides including a firebird drag car that had the exhaust exited out the side of the front valence/skirt. Was pretty sick. And kudos to them for the idea because I went in wanting a simple system dumped at the axle, and the fab guy was drawing a circle in the side of the bed with his finger when they were checking out the undercarriage, and I was like, what is this guy doing? Lol. The owner goes, oh he just loves doing bed/body exit exhaust jobs. Then it went from there as I couldn't resist when they brought that up... But yeah, love it

 

Found a good spot for output shots close to home. Old abandoned property. Just my 42" and 20" single rows

 

Man that's a pretty impressive setup. Could probably see your truck from space. I do have a question for you. Is the washout from your camera or some of your lights? It was intermittent so I wasn't sure. And what was the green light?
Thanks.

 

Truck looks awesome. Does the bedside exhaust mess with the paint in that area?

 

You mean the washed out hot spot directly in front of the truck on the ground? That'd be from the camera. No getting around that without a dslr I think. Idk, still don't know a lot about cameras. I just got the lg v10 phone and it has a pretty good dslr-like camera. Seemed to work a little better with that in that last shot I took. But not as clear as an actual camera. Still playing with it.
Its very hard to get good shots of the lights. Takes a lot of patience. Trial and error. Unless you know exactly what you're doing with cameras, and I dont, lol. Basically keep playing with the settings and taking over a hundred shots when I go out, and filtering out all the bad ones. Ha... I don't think I'll ever get the best captures without investing in a high end dslr. But that's a little too technical, and pricey, for my liking. Did pretty good I think, in capturing them as best I could. Still only capturing about, idk, 85% of actual output perceived first person.
And what green light?? The one in the cab? I have one down below the ashtray which is a digital temp gauge for monitoring a.c. temps. The little ones to the left of steering is a small lcd screen for my tpms..

You mean from the heat? Nope. I mean, trophy trucks run them like this. With fiberglass fenders. So yeah, no problem there. At least I hope not. Time will tell I guess. But not a big deal if so, at the moment anyways, until I get a new paint job eventually. Then I might watch it closer. But I really don't think it gets all that hot to worry about. But now that you mention it, I think I'll take my IR thermometer one day and get some temps. Curious now. Ha...
Stays pretty clean too. I've seen a couple pics of some exhaust buildup on the bedside from others I saw while googling. But mine has stayed spotless.

 

Yea I was talking about the hot spot.I was just wondering if it was a certain type of light that you were using that caused it.
your video you turn on something and it starts out green and then goes away.outside at 2:50 on your led cannons vid. It happens twice.

 

Ohh, lol. I haven't watched that vid like since I took it. Ha. That would be the mini H1 projectors warming up. They kinda appear greenish right when you flick them on if they're not warmed up.
And gawwwd that was a horrible video. Lol. At least the driving part was. I need a gopro, heh.

 

Ahhh gotcha. Thanks.

 

Hi,
I'm thinking about adding a LED light bar in the bumper area where yours is in. Do you have a DIY or thread on it? Maybe some pictures or details on the install? Thank you.

 

Some pics here:
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/1st-gen-led-light-bar-ideas.346488/page-4#post-10153948

There's other ways too. Look through that thread

 

Have to say, this new design from vision x is pretty sexy! Can't wait to test it tonight. This is actually a clone. But same exact housing and optics.

 

Single row led bar comparison/review:
[3d vs 4d---10watt vs 15watt leds]
[Plus new Vision X XPR clone 12"]

These are clones/reproductions of the vision x evo primes. Both are 20".

They are pretty much the same design as far as the housing goes, with a few minor differences. Not gonna go into too much detail about those differences, which are basically just slight changes in the mounting options. If you have questions feel free to ask regarding that.



-1st bar(currently installed)
10watt cree xml T6 leds
10amps/120 watts/10,320 lumens
3d optics
Combo beam
Diffused ends for flood

-2nd bar(Will be replacing current)
15watt cree mkr2 leds
7.5amps[?]/180 watts/17,100 lumens
4d optics
Combo beam
Fluted ends behind fisheye projectors for "flood"



Evo Prime Clone 3d:



Evo Prime clone 4d:



LED Types:
This is the one and only bar (the newest 4d one)I have seen that has 15 watt leds. The evo prime clone uses 10 watt cree xml t6's. Whereas the new bar contains 15watt cree mk-r2 leds. I'm not an expert in led tech, but I do know the basics. And that sometimes overseas manufacturers can be misleading in their products. Such as lying or exaggerating the facts. So I've inspected the leds as much as I could without taking the bar apart, just to see if the leds were in fact the type they specified. I took some pictures as good as I could of the leds through the lenses. They are in fact the type they claimed to have. When I purchased the new 4d bar I had my doubts that it did contain 15 watt leds so that's why I was curious to find out, and be sure they didn't have the same 10 watt xml t6 as the evo prime clone with 4d optics in front to hide that fact. This is all just for peace of mind too, as far as the type of leds being true to their name, and not being lied to about these facts. I'm not sure what leds are capable of as far as efficiency and voltages/amps goes. Trying to research into this subject more.. But reviewed some info from cree.com regarding these specific leds, and found some curious facts that I'm still trying to make heads or tails of..

One thing I noticed, is that the 4d with 15watt leds, requires less amp draw. Says it's rated at 7.5 amps. Versus the 3d bar with 10watt leds draws 10 amps. But looking at the details of the mk-r2's on cree's site, if i'm understanding it, is that they are designed to be more efficient and use less draw. Quote:"The high-voltage MK-R2 LEDs enable smaller and more-efficient driver circuits than standard-voltage LEDs"
Just a neat fact, If I got it right. And seems to help (even if only a little) with the efficiency of an already somewhat "extensive" light setup I have (working on it anyways). And may be a sign of things to come. Plus I am on the verge of needing a second battery and I thought this bar might just tip that scale. Might still, will have to see how it all performs once I get all my other lights reinstalled and finally finish my setup... Had to replace some, and taking some off, and adding more.. heh.

XML led in the 3d bar:

MK-R2 led in the 4d bar:




My thoughts on 3d vs 4d: this upgraded version in 4d is pretty amazing. Pictures arent going to do it full justice. But I got it close as I could. And the area I took pictures wasn't the most ideal, but really didnt feel like moving the truck, ha... Only thing I can't fix is the huge hotspots the camera picks up directly in front of the truck. I could probly mess with them in some photo editor, but don't have the patience for that crap. So just ignore the hotspots. Does NOT look like that in person.. But between the 3d and 4d, there's a HUGE difference in output. Just as I suspected, the 4d is a CRAZY narrow spot beam. It has a couple "flood" leds on the ends, but it's more of a "spill" of light than flood. But the amount of light coming out of this 20" with just 12 leds!! It's insane. I could not believe how bright and far throwing this spot beam really is.
With 3d, you get a TON more usable light. Nice and wide spread. Pretty much a big circular pattern of light. Like say, 30-45 degrees of spot, and like 120 degrees of flood, and like 160 degrees of spill light. All applies to horizontal AND vertical planes. (Keep in mind that it doesn't "appear" to be 3 sets of beam patterns. I just put those numbers down to help better understand the spread of light you get. With 3d, it all blends together and appears to be a huge flood bar. But it is more intense in the center, just more noticable when you capture it in pictures.)
With 4d, you get like, 10 degrees SEARCH LIGHT spot beam. In this bars case, it's a square for the beam pattern, not circular. Yes a square. And a rectangular pattern for the "spill" light. Which is like the same height the square spot beam goes. And as far as height goes, it's also about a 10 degree vertical and horizontal beam. And the spill goes out to about 160 degrees too like the other bar, but not as bright. And not as high. I'ts like a 160 degree horizontal spill, with 10 degree (maybe 20) vertical beam (again this is SPILL). It's a bit more subtle. And it's probly gonna get washed out with my other flood bars so this is all a 10 degree spot beam in my eyes.

So most importantly, the flood optics really are flood optics in the 3d, and give lots of usable side lighting. Helping it blend in nicely with the spot optics in the middle. Certainly not as much distance as a 4d optic bar, but still really good distance. I wanna say something like 1000' of distance. Idk.. And the 4d? Let's say that it probably doubles that. lol. But you get like NO side lighting at all. I was never a fan of 4d optics, but really wanted more distance down the road. I have some 4.5" vision x led cannon clones, but they really dont throw that far, and are pretty much completely washed out with my other lights on. So those will be coming off. I'm hoping that the 4d will still blend in with my other lights, because as it stands now, having all the same type of 3d evo prime clones, I have a very EVEN spread of light and it all blends together. NO hot spots/dim areas. And I have a feeling that I may have too much of a hyperspot/pencil beam in front, which would be annoying. I think anyways. Will have to wait and see once I get the new one swapped and drive around. Will also take more shots of ALL my lights on, and try to capture my "total" output.



ANYWAYS... enough rambling about that.. On to the output pictures/comparison!


[Again, ignore the hotpsots on ground. pay attention to the detail of the top of trees/satellite dish/ telephone pole/and the intensity on the metal fence behind car, as well as on front of car. This shows how intense the 4d bar is. And shows the bigger beam pattern of the 3d spot reflectors. Doesn't show it the best as I'm too close, but again, didn't feel like moving the truck..]


!!!Made a mistake on the xpr pics. They are 12"! not 6". ha. with 6 leds!!!
[4d on top, 3d on bottom in first pic]


SCENE 1






SCENE 2






SCENE 3 (no 4d in this scene)

 

Updated OP With additional light info, including lumen counts and specs of all lights.. added tons more pics too.


Hope y'all enjoy my light shows,and product reviews........