Carbon fiber hood

PPF it

 

I'm enjoying my hood.

 

There's always the fiberglass option, costs less but requires a lot more work to look semi-presentable.

 

But who wants to present that on a semi?

 

Is that the final paint job on it?

 

My gut says "yes".

 

The Duraflex hood came with a rough black textured finish (supposedly that's the "gelcoat"). I rattlecanned it with some Tremclad rust paint. It resulted in powdercoat-like texture and hasn't flaked off with all the tree branches slapping on it on the trails. Plan is to get it wrapped at some point in the future.

Typical forest trails encountered in my region (filmed while still on stock hood). I'd be more upset if I pinstriped the hell out of a glossy Seibon hood:

If you're talking about the "seepage" on the little rubber filler piece, that's just overflow from the ceramic coating I put on the headlight. If it doesn't come off, I'll just cut a new filler piece. Plenty of material left from the Home Depot BBQ mat.

 

I’ll just leave this here and not comment

 

You know nothing's "final" on these trucks. Build, break them off road, fix, repeat...

 

This is true. As long as the coating is holding up and you’re happy
Is that scoop functional on the fiberglass ones?

 

There's an S-duct that could be functional if I took the clear lid off my Volant airbox, but it ingests water in heavy rain or in a car wash:



The ducting makes the hood less rigid, as there's less support between the inner and outer "shells".

 

Finally built up enough courage to install hood pins as it’s recommended by Siebon. I don’t want to rely solely on the metal latch that’s bonded to the hood and have it eventually fly up on me. Highly unlikely, but don’t want to find out the hard way. Tons of videos on the overall process, but I haven’t seen any videos or TW posts on the 3rd Gen Tacoma’s specifically. I went with the standard (non-locking) Aerocatch pins. Here are some photos:

Started out by finding the optimal spot for the hood pin on the radiator/engine cross bar. Luckily there is already a hole there next to the radiator splash guard thingy bob. Took the dremel and sanded down the plastic to make room for the bolt.




I put a dab of paint on top of the bolt, then closed the hood slowly until the bolt touched the underside of the hood. This is where you drill. I used a 1.5” hole saw. Once I had the hole on the underside, I marked the top of the pin again with paint, and closed the hood. You’ll see in this pic where the pin touched the underside of the carbon fiber layer. This is where I drilled from the bottom through the top. No turning back after this point, so measure twice, cut once.


I made a template of the Aerocatch mounting plate, lined up the pin strike point, and started cutting. I used hole saws for each radius, and a dremel for the straight lines. Sanding wheel to get the fit just right.




I didn’t want to cut a huge square out of the underside of the hood, so I slid the mounting plate through the top hole. Used CA glue to keep the bolts in place.


Then pulled wire through the top to hold it taught to the underside of the carbon layer.



After screwing in the 4 “corners,” I pulled the wire out to screw in the last two.


Lining up the pin will take some time. I must have opened the hood and re-adjusted the pin height about 10 times before lining it up just perfect. Washed all the dust off and it’s done.



Only had enough sunlight to do one side. Other side should go a lot faster. And now that I have one side done, I can take exact measurements, or better yet, trace the right side onto some thin cardboard and “mirror” it over to the left side. This will ensure the placement and angle of the Aerocatch matches perfectly with the left side.

 

Seibon has just released a new offering along side the standard OEM scoop style. (HD18TYTA-TS)

I do have one unit in stock, fresh off production. MSRP is $1500, but of course - we do offer special forum pricing and free shipping!

 

Can you pm me price shipped to 92585 or picked up

 

now if they'd only do one without a scoop or vents I'd be all over it

 

how do i trade mine for this one lol....mines been sitting in my living room for the last 10 monthes

 

Saving this for when I do mine. Got long-shaft Quik-Latches on order.

 

Finished up the other side. Glad that’s over