PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

@PapaBear

I did not 100% forgive the Doylestown police until almost three years after the March 2013 photography incident, one rainy night in October 2015, when I was hit by a drunk driver...

It was 9pm on a Wednesday night and I had just left my second job as a delivery driver at a pizzeria. I really had to take a piss, but the bathroom at the pizza place was occupied (and more than likely getting blown up) by another employee taking a dump. My primary job at the time was barbacking at a bar that happened to be right around the corner from the pizza place, technically within walking distance but it was pouring rain. I hopped in the Tacoma and drove to the bar where I worked to use the restroom, but while me and my Tacoma would end up making it there, my poor Tacoma would not make it in one piece. I stopped at a 3-way intersection and looked both ways. I probably should have double-checked, but I was thinking with my full bladder at this point. I made a left turn, and an older Mercedes E320 sitting at the stop sign to my left, waiting to go straight. The Mercedes was stopped, and looking back I believe the guy either zoned out or passed out and was brought back to reality by the sudden presence of my truck. As I was making the left turn, the Mercedes floors it. I had just been rear-ended in March 2015, and that accident freaked me out because like most rear-end collisions, I didn't see it coming. That was not the case with the guy in the Benz...

I was looking right at that car when it started to move, and I said to myself "Oh fuck, he's totally gonna fucking hit me!" And then, "CRUNCH!"

The following picture was taken as evidence for my insurance company the morning after the accident...



My response was to immediately jump out of the truck and start swearing at the guy, who turned out to be a 70-year old man, and he immediately accused me of running the stop sign. I had no idea he was drunk at first, and I was ready to kick his ass for (A) fucking up my truck, and (B) trying to blame me for something that was clearly his fault. Ironically, he called the police.

I called my parents, because it was taking every bit of self-control I had not to pound this guy; I wanted someone to talk to, someone to act as a witness and listen in on what was going on until the cops did show up. Honestly, the only reason I didn't put the Benz driver on his ass is because he was an old man and I did not know he was almost double the legal limit a the time. If I'd known he was not only drunk at the time he hit my truck, but a repeat offender who'd killed somebody while driving drunk in the 1980s (more on this later), I probably would have decked him...

Keeping myself from knocking his teeth out became even harder when I told my mom over the phone that I would not be taking responsibility for this accident, and I found out that the old fart had been eavesdropping. In response to me telling my mom I would be taking no responsibility for the accident, he was like "Oh, you're not?" I just gave him a homicidal glare and said "No, I'm not."

I don't know who he thought he was fooling when he called the cops, but a single officer showed up at first and started getting information from both of us. The first cop showed up before my parents were able to arrive, but I forget whether the second cop showed up before or after my parents. The time between my parents showing up and me finally getting to leave is a blur, but the next thing I knew the old man was being driven away in the back of a police SUV. Neither cop questioned whether or not I'd run the stop sign, because guess what?!?! I was sober! Obviously they're going to believe the guy with the clean record over the drunk convicted felon.

Oh, and by the way, I spent well over thirty minutes by the side of the road dealing with that accident, and I held it the whole time. I resisted the urge to relieve myself in the nearby bushes (or the gas tank of the drunk's Mercedes, once the cops and my parents had left of course). My truck ended up having over two grand in damage, but it was purely cosmetic and the truck was driveable. My parents wanted me to just go home, but the bar where I worked was closer and I wasn't about to hold it all the way home.

So yeah, my faith in the Doylestown police was renewed when they believed my story and not Sir Drinks-A-Lot's...

Also, that case dragged for more than six months. The old man's insurance company ended up refusing to cover the damage to my truck because he stuck to his story about me running the stop sign and they believed him, even though he'd previously killed somebody while driving drunk years earlier and had gotten a DUI this time around. I was getting pissed and wanted my truck fixed, so my insurance company (USAA; They're awesome) paid to fix my truck, waived the deductible, and didn't raise my rates. The accident happened on October 28th, and it was almost Christmas when my truck was finally fixed. My insurance company went after the drunk guy's in court, and for some stupid reason they decided on a draw, which meant that my insurance company would eat the cost of fixing my truck at no consequence to me and his insurance company would eat the cost of replacing the totaled Mercedes. I am 99% sure that Benz got totaled; It was a 2002 E320, so it was 13 years old at the time; In addition to front left damage, the drunk had trouble opening the front driver's door all the way, which was indicative of severe frame damage. Believe it or not, the Benz was driveable. The airbags did not deploy, and the police report listed the car as driveable. I'm guessing he spent a few hours in jail and then drove it home.

The old man only lost his license for a year and got 40 days in jail, to be served on weekends, but I got a nice restitution check which I used to buy dashcams so nobody could hit my truck and lie about it ever again. Karma's a bitch...

 

So, my interactions with police go like this...

May 2006: Pulled over while getting a driving lesson from my dad in a hospital parking lot because hospital security thought we looked suspicious and called the cops (incident annoyed me for maybe a day at most but doesn't bother me in the slightest now).

March 2013: Only non-driving incident; Stopped for taking pictures in a residential area (Traumatizing, humiliating, and still a sore memory for me today).

March 2017: Encountered a DUI checkpoint for the very first time (and hopefully the last time; I think DUI checkpoints are bothersome at best and unconstitutional at worst, and believe that they are a violation of our 4th amendment rights).

May 2017: Pulled over for going 43 in a 25 MPH zone; First time I'd ever actually been pulled over since the 2006 incident and I was not happy about it. Was an asshole to the cop and got a $180 ticket that would have netted 4 points on my license if I'd simply paid it. The owner of the bar where I used to work is a really good lawyer, so I hired him and fought the ticket. At the courthouse, I apologized to the cop and explained the whole Aspergers thing. The ticket was reduced to 5 MPH and I got no points on my license.

September 2017: Driving 40 minutes home from my Grandma's on Labor Day Weekend; It was almost midnight and I was less than 10 minutes from home. I came to a 3-way intersection where the straight lights and the left turn arrow operate separately. The lights to go straight were green, but the left turn light was red. I was stone cold sober but super-tired, and I just wanted to get home. There was nobody around (or so I thought), so I checked for oncoming traffic and went left on that red light. A cop followed me for over a mile before pulling me over. I was polite and effectively BS'd my way through the encounter; Got a written warning and went on my way. Ironically, this took place AFTER the May 2017 incident, but BEFORE the court date for that incident! I really got lucky that time!

January 2019: A girl I know got kicked out of her apartment and showed up at the bar where I worked with all of her worldly possessions. A friend of mine was known for letting the downtrodden crash at her house, so I called her up and got the okay to drop the recently evicted girl with her. We loaded up the Tacoma with all of her stuff and off we went. It was midnight, and I'd had a few non-alcoholic beers but no real alcohol. I am 6 feet tall and weighed over 250 pounds at the time, so I was SOBER. The problem started when I went straight at an intersection where I was used to making a left turn. I'd had a long day at my other job (Detailing cars at a dealership; Got fed up with that job and finally put in my two weeks last month) and I was REALLY tired. I also had a somewhat-drunk woman in the front seat yammering in my ear, so I was a bit distracted. I stopped at a red light, looked both ways, and proceeded through the intersection essentially treating the red light like a stop sign. I did not blatantly "run" the red light. There was nobody around, and it was an accident. No sooner had I gone through the light than a van with flashing lights was right up my ass. I turned to my passenger and said "What the fuck did I do?" She thought I was being stopped simply because we'd just left a bar. It was a sheriff's deputy who initiated the stop and not a real cop. What I mean by this is that in Pennsylvania, sheriff's departments are separate entities from police departments. The former is responsible for courthouse security, prisoner transport, backing up the police in certain situations, and other stuff. They have no authority to write tickets. Deputy asks me if I know why he stopped me and I answer truthfully, "No." He tells me that I ran the red light and I honestly did not believe him until I reviewed the front dashcam footage when I got home. The rear dashcam footage shows that I did not nearly cause an accident, and that he was nowhere in sight until I was a good block or so away from the intersection. So, the deputy took my license, insurance, and registration back to his van, and made me and my passenger wait for like 20 minutes until a cop could show up. He then proceeded to tell the cop that I almost caused an accident, and the cop wrote me a $140 ticket without even getting my side of the story. The cop also tried to intimidate me into just paying the ticket by saying that he and the deputy would be there in court if I chose to fight it. This had the exact opposite effect, as I called my employer the high-powered attorney the next morning and had a plea of not guilty entered within two days. My attitude was "If you're gonna be dick to me, I'll be a dick right back." I don't like bullies, simple as that. My lawyer was pretty much friends with the cop who wrote the ticket and arranged some sort of deal with him and the deputy where I would agree to a lesser charge that would not get any points on my license and they wouldn't have to appear in court. The court date was less than a month after the traffic stop, and another officer (not a sheriff's deputy but another CBRPD officer) showed up in the guy's place as a matter of course, and I pled to some obscure charge with a $25 fine and no points on my license. I admit I was wrong, but if you'd been there with me, you'd agree with both me and my dad that the actions of both the deputy who pulled me over and the cop who wrote the ticket were less than professional.

 

The May 2006, March 2013, May 2017, and January 2019 incidents all took place in Doylestown Borough. This should tell you something...

 

So yeah, I figured that instead of being frustrated with LEOs in general because of a few unpleasant experiences, I should maybe work with LEOs and first responders to make things easier for both them and the special needs individuals they work with!

 

With the new AMLO guy as president, the corruption within the government forces is actually going down. He deployed the Guardia Nacional, or National Guard in English to the US Mexico border. Federal Police seems to be doing more effective damage to the cartel organizations, and the economy itself is doing great.

 

That's an old Hilux. The new ones look better than the Ford Ranger, and Chevy Colorado.

 

There's a public education system, but it totally sucks. Everybody within the public school system also receives most of their college tuition paid for only at public university institution. My brother didn't go to the public system, instead he went to a private "colegio" from K-2nd grade. The private schools are much better, and English learning is mandatory.

 

Before we continue, I would like to point out to obvious contributors to this...

It has been abnormally hot here in Southeast Pennsylvania, and we are currently in our second heat wave. In my experience, engines tend to be less efficient when it's really hot out. Combine this with my prolific A/C use during said heat waves, and you've got a recipe for disaster.

Another contributing factor is more than likely the fact I will sometimes idle for 10 to 30 minutes with the A/C on while waiting for DoorDash orders to come in. This no doubt uses gas and makes my mileage seem worse. For example, I'm at a little more than one quarter of a tank right now and my trip odometer is saying less than 170 miles since my last fillup. Considering that I've gone over 300 miles well before hitting empty in the past, this sucks!

My 4-banger/slushbox Taco always seems to average around 18-20 MPG in normal driving, and I've observed 25-28 on the highway in the past. By my estimates, I'm able to get 280-300 miles out of a single tank of gas, but I've never run out of gas and I've only gotten the warning to come on once in the nearly 10 years I've had the truck.

I will not lie: I do have a bit of a leadfoot at times!

My truck has almost 101,600 miles as of this posting, and I have been running full synthetic since 79,500 (Mobile 1 since 84K or so). The oil was just changed at 99K, and all fluids have been changed in the last 10,000 miles. The owner's manual says my truck will not need spark plugs until 120K.

So, should I be worried about anything here...?

 

These twatwaffles still haven't responded to me, even on Instagram!

 

I am currently at almost 101,600 miles. The oil was changed at a little past 99K, and all other fluids have been replaced in the last 10K miles. The owner's booklet calls for replacing the spark plugs at 120K. Should I replace them sooner?

 

tire size?

 

Factory was 215/70R15. I'm running 225/70R15 Cooper Discover AT/3s on the factory wheels...

 

Yes. Yes and yes. How long can they last isnt the question you should be asking. It’s are they performing at the same level as when new. In your case the answer is no way. Plugs are cheap and (relatively) easy to change. No reason not to do it. Plus, the longer you between changes the larger the chance that you seize the threads.

 

What brand should I get?

 

OEM Denso plugs. No reason to run anything else.

 

whats the difference in weight of the AT3 tires and what it came with stock?

 

I have no idea, about for years I ran 235s with aftermarket 16-inch wheels and didn't notice a huge difference.

 

increased tire weight increases rolling resistance which will decrease the performance and MPGs especially in the 2.7l engine, my guess is the AT3 tires weigh a lot more than the stock All season tires it came with

 

True!!

 

at 120k miles as rec'd by the owners manual, they should be an Iridium plug