Ohcaltexscar's Rèiteachadh Làraidh

I like them so far! Happy accident!
I will do a chalk test soon, when I get chalk I'm still running at whatever psi the shop filled them to.
I'll take the extra tread and even if I hit snow in the mountains I doubt they'll falter.
We're hitting 107 here this week

 

I am currently attempting to sell my Mustang locally so I was cleaning it out this morning and found some goodies in the trunk that I had forgotten about!



The pocket jump starter is brand new in the box still, it's on the charger now. That'll be handy to have under the seat. Jumper cables and a trickle charger too! I don't know why I forgot about all this stuff.

 

So far the Ironman kit is performing well!
Took it up to the mountains this weekend and hit some trails. I don't have an air compressor yet so I'm just running street pressure and even with that it's pretty darn smooth over the rough terrain.
I will post pictures later.

But wait! The most important part of the trip so far is that as of right now we are stuck in the middle of the woods with a truck that will not run. Yes, I have one bar of service and I'm using it to talk to all y'all.
Turns over, sometimes, other times I just get a single click sound. When it does turn over it'll struggle to run for a few seconds and die.

I have gas, 3/4 tank. No codes. The stupid gulf states alarm is disabled, I think.

Could I have loosened up some crud in the fuel tank bouncing around off road and gotten something sucked up into the fuel pump/sock filter?


EDIT: We made it home!
Pictures of the trip!

Watching the rain roll in!

 

Well we "ceased to have a proper ignition sequence" at a designated camping area and we're just outside of town so we have signal for our mobiles thankfully.

When in Rome


I'll try it again in the morning after it's had time to settle and if it still won't start up we'll just have to tow it.

 

Id start with checking condition and connection of battery, look for corrosion, look for disconnected ground.

Any chance a critter chewed something under the hood?

 

Well first off, it started in the AM and we did make it home alright. Thank you for the response!

I was looking at the battery because the positive connection was already jacked up when I bought it, however it has been working so far. It still cranks strong so I didn't really suspect that connection.
This is when I first bought it, I cleaned off that corrosion. It looks like somebody tightened the connection down and then hammered it on to the battery terminal!


The lack of cranking in this case was due to the Gulf States Alarm System being stupid. I addressed that here;
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...-removal-that-little-red-devil-button.675634/

I checked electrical connections and wires for loose or chewed wires, thankfully nothing was amiss there.

I think I'm going to look into the big three wiring upgrade, that'll eliminate the battery and wiring as a weak point.

 

I tried using a pool noodle as a seal between the truck and bed cap to keep rain out when we have the slider windows open.



The initial install, I used a little spray wax to get it into place.

This is after about 200 miles of mixed highway and off road driving.

It seems to have settled into place well, I'm sure the wind buffering pushed it down some. Once the wax dried up it stopped moving.

We had a pretty good rain storm and it worked well! No leaks!

EDIT: 31/07/2020 - It's still there, the wind hasn't shifted it any further down. I don't know that this is useful to anyone, but there it is!

EDIT EDIT: 30/10/2020 - It's no longer there, it finally shifted and was pushed down by the wind from driving. I haven't put it back yet.

 

I was thumbing through my amassing "Tacoma Pictures" folder and saw a few that were from when I first bought it and I fixed the radio. I realized I hadn't covered that here, and while it's not exactly exciting or anything new I thought I'd still share.

The radio was aftermarket when I bought it, Jensen brand I believe. The volume knob worked intermittently and just jumped to random levels back and forth. Forget trying to lock in a radio station. The CD left in it is something spanish, I forgot to eject it before I pulled the radio.

I ended up pulling the Kenwood out of my Mustang, just a single din that would swap into the Tacoma bezel.

When I first pulled the Jensen and bezel out I was greeted with this;

I dislike hack jobs, and those twist nut things.
Oh and the earth wire was stuck into that steel bar in the dash behind the radio with a spade connector and tech screw.
https://youtu.be/rjeuL_Tk0E8?list=PLNq2_BmcMzJ0eEic0ul2Y9FdnHSsdOpLY&t=890

Here's a view of the earth wire


I cut all that out of there. The factory connectors were still there but the wires were cut pretty short, of course. I could have reused them though it would have been annoying.

I went to the local pull-a-part for some other odds and ends, they had one Tacoma and there was not much left of it. I found a few of the smaller things I was after.

I also happened to pull out the radio, now pay attention here because, this still baffles me, the entire factory harness from the dash was gone, the whole thing, except for the two connectors stuck in the back of the radio which they cut off and left a good 3" of wire.

Why is beyond me, no other connectors were left there in the same fashion.

Good for me though! I pulled those and was able to rewire factory connectors onto my harness and buy a proper radio adapter kit to wire to my new radio.

Much better!

The radio looks pretty standard, I tossed my scan-gauge in the storage pocket just below it.

 

So I bought a new positive terminal connector and battery today. I went to start it yesterday and it did the same thing, just one click. Multimeter indicated 8.2 volts.
I took it in to have it charged and tested, it was toast.
I went up a size to a 27F, Duralast Gold. I got a good deal through my Ford dealership buddy.

 

This is a review of sorts of the trip we took up to the mountains where we got stuck, it's from another thread but I thought it my be useful information here too.

We took it up to the mountains this weekend, about 400 miles round trip.
The highway speed limit was 75 mph.
On the way up I kept it around 70 mph (72.45 with speedometer error) and pulled 17.6 mpg (18.25 mpg with error) over the first ~120 miles loaded up with gear.

I didn't fill up again until I got back home so the other 280 miles were about half off road and the rest highway back. I drove 65 mph (67.275 with speedometer error) on the way back. The average with mixed driving was 20.4 mpg (19.07 mpg with error).

EDIT: After reviewing my mileage and fill ups and doing the maths and calculations I found that the trip was actually ~400 miles, not 450. I also did the calculations for my speedometer error with the larger tires, while it is not much of a difference it was still cool to crunch the numbers. It changed my mpg findings a bit and I have added those next to the original ones above.

Also for those who may be new or just interested,
I put together a bit of info for calculating the error % for tire changes to help with mileage and speedometer calculations.
If you are one who already does your mileage, or one who doesn't care to bother letting the thought of that ruin your day, this may not be interesting to you!
I like the numbers part of it more than anything, just figuring it all out. At the end of the day, I mean seriously, what are we driving here? T-rucks.
Don't all go crazy at once

So here;

Assumption:

1. The odometer “calculates” the distance based on the number of revolutions for the tire it is calibrated to, 245/75R16 in this case.
2. The diameter of the stock tire is 30.5 inches (245/75R16).
3. The diameter of the new tire is 31.61 inches (265/75R16).

Observations:

1. The revolution of a tire is equivalent to the circumference of the tire.

Fact:

1. The Circumference of the tire is equal to PI times the diameter.
2. 1 Mile = 5,280 feet.

Calculations:

1. The Circumference of the 31.61-inch tire is PI * 31.61 = 99.3 inches or 8.27 feet.
2. The Circumference of the 30.5-inch tire is PI * 30.5 = 95.8 inches or 7.98 feet.
3. Calculate the revolutions required to travel 1 mile on stock tires (5,280 feet with 245/75R16). 5280 / 7.98 = 661.65 revolutions.

Intermediate Conclusion:

1. For every 661.65 revolutions of the tire, the odometer will register 1 mile.

Further Calculations:

1. In 661.65 revolutions, a 31.61-inch tire will travel… 661.65 * 8.27 or 5,471.84 feet.
2. For each 661.65 revolutions, the odometer will increment by 1 mile even though the vehicle has traveled 5,471.84 feet. Therefore, a vehicle with larger tires will report less miles driven by the odometer.
3. By taking the rotations of the new tire, 638.45 and multiplying by the circumference of the stock tire, 7.98 feet, we can find how much distance the larger tire will cover by the time the odometer increments by 1 more mile. 638.45 * 7.98 = 5,094.83 feet. So then 5,280 – 5,094.83 = 185.17 feet.
4. The difference in distance is 185.17 feet for each mile driven. 5280 / 185.17 = 28.5. Actually traveling 28.5 miles will cause the odometer to be off by 1 mile.
5. The percentage of error can be calculated with (1 – 5,094.83 / 5,280) * 100 = 3.5%. That is, 5,094.83 / 5,280 = 0.9649, 1 - 0.9649 = 0.0351, 0.0351 * 100 = 3.5%.
6. More simply, 100 / 28.5 = 3.5.

Speedometer error an also be calculated with the 3.5% error from the mileage calculations.

Speedometer Calculations:

1. At 100 MPH the actual speed traveled will be 103.5 MPH.
2. To find the error at any other speed you take the given speed, 65 * 0.035 = 2.275. Then add that to the given speed, 65 + 2.275 = 67.275 MPH.

Conclusions:

1. For every 100 miles traveled you will add 3.5 miles for the tire error.
2. Over the length of 1 mile, this adds up to 185.17 feet.
3. After “actually” traveling 29.5 miles, the odometer will be “off” by 1 mile. It will read 28.5 miles.
4. At 100,000 miles the odometer will be short by 3,500 miles.

A Larger Jump:

1. A 2017 Jeep Wrangler that came with 225/75R16 tires moves to 275/65R18 tires.

2. 225/75R16 has a diameter of 29.3 inches, therefore a circumference of 92 inches or 7.66 feet and covers 689 revolutions per mile.

3. 275/65R18 has a diameter of 32.1 inches, therefore a circumference of 100.7 inches or 8.39 feet and covers 629 revolutions per mile.

4. 629 * 7.66 = 4,818.14

5. 5,280 – 4,818.14 = 461.86

6. 5,280 / 461.86 = 11.43

7. 100 / 11.43 = 8.75%

8. 8.75% means that at 65 MPH the actual speed is 71 MPH. It also means that at 100,000 miles the odometer will be short by 8,750 miles.


Final Conclusions:

1. If the error is small, like the 3.5%, the difference over time is obviously less significant and probably does not warrant a recalibration if you don’t want to do that.
2. While jumping up to a much larger size does not necessarily warrant a recalibration either, it is worth it if you care to keep your odometer accurate.

 

Did a chalk test, looked pretty good at 36 psi.

I did all four tires and took pictures but I don't think it's really necessary to put them all.

Front Driver.


I could drop them a couple more psi to see how they ride but I believe 35 psi is where the tire rating is measured from, so I probably wouldn't want to go below that.

 

Regarding your fuel economy and speedo correction....

when I swapped from factory 245/75’s to 265/75/16’s I notice my speedo was actually more accurate. GPS, and paying attention to mile markers on long trips convinced me my speedo was reading a couple mph fast on stock tires.

Obviously with larger tires you have fewer rotations per mile, which equates to lower indicated speed at the same actual speed as before. Short version, with the oversized tires my speedo went from reading fast to almost dead on accurate. Barely hurt my fuel economy too.

 

It would be interesting to check that, I need to compare the results with a GPS, I havent done that yet.
Do you use any particular app for that?

We have several speed traps around the city that I could compare numbers with as well

Of course with the calculations I have done I was working with absolute and static numbers. Real world data gives much more variation. I wouldn't be surprised at potentially seeing something similar to your result.

 

My parish is really helpful and puts up those radar powered “you’re driving too fast” signs up all over the place.

Don’t recall what app was used honestly. Either way, I went into it expecting to find my speedo off with the bigger tires and low and behold it was actually almost dead on.

 

How kind of them!

I was doing some more reading up on it and found some information "lightly suggesting" most car manufacturers intentionally set speedometers to under report speed. I seem to recall hearing that someplace many years ago too. Makes a bit of sense if it's true.


Update: I was just driving home and happened to glance down at my scan-.gauge, then I looked back down at my scan-.gauge and realized that it's a scan-.gauge. Staring right at me with an mph reading.
I also passed one of those speed signs.
65 on the speedometer
61 on the Scangauge
59 on the sign

Whut.

 

I also have a Scangauge. It just takes the speedo reading out of the OBD port so it shouldn’t be far off your gauge (unless you follow the procedure for correcting it for larger tires.) Check your documentation for details.

 

I'm sure the instructions that came with mine are long gone by now, I'll look that up though. It wouldn't be a big deal to throw a quick glance over at it for an mph reading while driving.

That sign was in an odd spot just at the crest of an incline on the freeway so there may have been other factors in play.

 

https://www.scangauge.com/support/user-manuals/

Make sure to grab the right one for your firmware version.

 

@caffeinated_medic here's another nice Prerunner build

 

Right on, thank you!