Hodakaguy's Overland Tacoma Builds - on to new adventures.

Radio reception is fine. Doesnt seem to be affected.

 

What steps did you go for? The Rubbermaid from wallmart fit perfectly on passenger side at back of camper. They also double up as a good seat.

 

Did you take tail gate camera and loom out? I did this and mounted it below rear door, works a treat and very simple to take camera out of tailgate. Just youtube it. Loom is just click and snap so very simple. Also cheaper than buying another camera

 

I like the bat wing. Wish we had a need for it up here in Canada!

 

I'll be running a receiver hitch step, I still have it from our last FWC.

Hodakaguy

 

Not yet, I think I'll get another camera and make a custom mount for it as I will be removing the camper once in a while and re-installing the tailgate.

 

Installed the fridge to run it for a couple days and test the battery system, should be able to run for several days with no external power with the dual batt system. I'll be installing 240W of solar soon then battery power shouldn't be a issue.




With the top down on the camper there is still plenty of room to get into the fridge at rest stops ect without having to pop the top. I'll be installing mounting straps to keep the fridge secure in this location.




Next up fabricate a rear guard for the solar charge controller to protect it from items stored inside the cabinet.

Starting out with a piece of aluminum plate.




Cutting the piece down to rough size.






Corners trimmed.




Marking out the locations for the air vent holes.




Air holes drilled and beveled.




Using the finger brake to bend up the guard








Fabricating some hidden mount tabs from some scrap pieces of stainless.








Factory trim pieces cut down to size and re-installed.




Test fitting the guard in place.






Guard painted and installed in place. Should keep the controller well protected.








Hodakaguy

 

More awesome work! Lots of watts for accessories.

It’s looks to be a great place to keep your beer and/or liquor cool.

Are you installing another refrigerator for food and snacks? ;-)

 

How tall is the FWC when closed... from the bottom to the top?

I'm curious... mostly wondering if I could manage to get one in my garage if I took it off my truck in the driveway and wheeled it into the garage. I don't think I could get in the garage with it ON the truck (stock ride height)... I think the garage entryway is only 82" at my house. Pathetically small garages on houses these days.

 

With tacoma stock suspension the ground to top of hach is 7 feet one and 3/4 inches
I know because by garage is 7 ft 2 inches and I sneak in just!

 

OMG! What great builds. Thanks for posting!

Taking appointments?

 

Lots of progress today......Picture Heavy!

Started this morning by installing a 110V NOCO power plug on the side of the camper. This port will connect to a IOTA 15A AGM onboard charger (to be installed soon).

The NOCO power port - Available Here: CLICK HERE




I'll be sealing the port to the camper with Sikaflex 221....Good stuff.

Sikaflex 221 available here: CLICK HERE




The port will be going into the battery compartment just aft of the vent.




Pilot hole drilled....committed now lol.




2" hole drilled.




And power port installed and sealed.










Next up install the Hypertech inline speedometer calibrator. This is a small unit that goes behind the instrument cluster and allows you to correct the speedometer for larger tires. Drives me crazy seeing the speedo off from the GPS

The Hypertech unit.




Installing the unit. I routed the USB cable down under the dash and stored it up out of the way, if I need to make tweaks to the calibrator to get the speedo spot on with the GPS I can just plug in the computer and easily make the changes without having to remove the dash again.










Time to install the new SSO (Sothern Style Offroad) Hybrid bumper. Here I've installed the Baja Designs 30' light bar and the winch fairlead.




Installing the synthetic rope on the Warn Zeon 10S. The anchor setup to the spool is pretty slick.








We connected the winch to temporary power and with my dad pulling on the cable spooled it in. Once the assembly is on the truck we will properly tension the cable.




Mounted on the bumper.




Now the fun part....trimming the plastic. Grill removed and laying out the cut lines.






A cheap HF Die Grinder and a skinny wheel made quick work of the cutting.






Nice and clean.




Edge trim installed.




The factory bracing for the lower edge of the plastic bumper. This portion of the brace will interfere with the solenoid pack on the ZEON winch, other low profile winches will clear without modification but I wanted the ZEON unit. I really don't want to remote mount the solenoid pack so I decided to cut out this portion of the brace and fabricate some replacement braces that won't interfere.




My father starting to fabricate the new braces while I get ready to cut out the middle section of the brace.




Brace section removed.






New braces built and painted.






And braces installed. Lots of room for the winch now






With the center brace gone I supported the wiring harness with a snap tie.




Bumper in place, trim came out pretty good.






Running the winch wiring. I split some rubber hose and placed it under the tie points for the wiring. Drilled two holes and ran the electrical wiring out behind the drivers headlight assy.










Outside again










More to come.....

Hodakaguy

 

Awesome setup!

-Bailey, Baja Designs
www.bajadesigns.com

 

Starting to install the Switch Pro wiring unit and dual battery wiring.

I'll be running a Switch Pro unit that has 8 programmable circuits for electrical accessory distribution. First up I mounted the Switch Pro onto the PowerTray mount.

Switch Pro available here: CLICK HERE
Blue Sea Fuse Holder available here: CLICK HERE






Local ground installed to the Switch Pro, Blue Seas fuse panel and ground buss bar.








Fabricating 1/0 battery cables from high quality welding cable. These cables will connect the truck battery to the aux battery through the ACR (Automatic Combining Relay).








Running the batt cables.






I places loom over the section passing by the battery tray and added a piece of rubber hose as an anti abrasion guard.






Next up I will splice into the factory wiring harness and extend it over to the smaller passenger side battery, this battery will become the truck starting battery. The larger drivers side battery will supply power to the Winch, Lighting, Camper, Air Compressor etc. The ACR will keep both batteries charged up while allowing me to manually combine the two battery banks for higher amp loads when winching or for jump starting a dead truck batt off the aux batt.

The temporary red fuse holder going to the camper will be changed out and cleaned up before it's finished. Still need to add the rest of the lock nuts on the ACR tie down bolts as well.






More to come...

Hodakaguy

 

Time to finish up the battery wiring.

I'll modify the OEM battery connector to work with the new style terminal. Here's the OEM unit.




Cutting the OEM unit apart and re-shaping. Camera got bumped into art mode in this shot.






And connected.




I removed the temporary red fuse holder that connected the Aux batt to the Four Wheel Camper. The wiring is re-routed to the Blue Sea fuse panel. I'll be using printed heat shrink wire labels to identify all wiring and make future troubleshooting and identification easier.

The wire label machine.




Camper wiring labels printed.




And installed.










Running fused power to the Blue Sea fuse panel and SwitchPro unit.




Factory positive terminal




Here I've cut off the factory battery harness end so I can extend the harness about 6" to allow connection to the ACR.




Splice completed.




And all wired up. I installed a 300 amp fuse on each end of the 1/0 positive cable connecting the two Batteries, this will prevent a vehicle fire if the cable ever grounds out for any reason while allowing enough amperage for jump starting a dead starter battery from the Aux unit.

As it is connected now the Group 35 passenger battery is the truck battery and connected to the starter/alternator. The Group 31M drivers side battery is the Aux battery and provides power to the Winch, SwitchPro (Lighting, Air Compressor, Front Locker, Etc) and camper connection. When the FWC is removed from the truck the Aux battery will also supply power to the ARB fridge.

I still need to fabricate some guards to protect all exposed positive connections.












300A fuse on the Passenger side main batt.




More to come.....

Hodakaguy

 

I wish I knew more things about electrical stuff...I'm pretty dumb in that department lol

 

That looks really good. You guys don't mess around. I really want one of the campers now.

Do you have some sort of circuit protection or switch for the winch cable? My neighbors Jeep started on fire because winch power cable shorted to the body.

 

Those are some sexy rewelds!

 

Are you doing any sort of auxiliary fuel tank or increasing the capacity of the current fuel tank?

 

Just practice and research....and tools. Nothing overly complicated with it, just learning the right techniques.

Hodakaguy