Wyoming B.S. Thread

Ask a Mercedes dealer?! He'd have to refinance the house to get the service manager to even crane his neck over the counter and say hello.

 

If you have a question and don’t ask, you never get the answer you’re looking for.

 

He might get the answer but he will lose money at a rate of ~$130/hr

 

Seriously? I would assume that if you ask a question like that they will tell you how it is reset, and would only charge you if they actually take it in for service.

Could even do it via a phone call. At least then, he would know if something is broken (because the reset procedure doesn’t work, and he’s tried it) or if he just needs to learn the first time.

Shoot, I’m asking questions all the time. Even if I look stupid, at least I learned for the next time - as opposed to just staying stupid.

… or maybe I learn the answer and stay stupid. That’s certainly more likely.

 

See that's the fun part of the question he has, the reset is universal (legally required to be). But getting it to do the work to become "ready" again... well that's up to a set of parameters that the manufacturer come up with. I would probably ask an indie euro car repair place since they're normal people who have to live with these things as they age (smart folks don't keep em long). Luxury brands aren't in the business of giving away info, they will let you bring it in for a diagnostic though which is usually about $125-150 for BMW, Porsche, and Merc.

This isn't about whether asking question is stupid or not, of course it's not. But asking people who you know won't have the answer or at least won't divulge it, yeah that's not smart.

 

I suppose I just like giving people the benefit of the doubt before writing them off. Especially as a large group. We have too much of that already around us today.

At worst, you waste a few minutes on the phone. But if he’s got an indie shop to call, all I’m suggesting is that he make a phone call to someone who might know, rather than just wonder.

Whatever though, I just wanted to suggest the option in case he hadn’t considered it.

shall we get back to our regularly scheduled programming?


I’ll assist the regular programming by asking how many people have inspected the lower spherical bearings on their rear shocks? Mine have 60,000 miles on them and certainly need new bearings - they are way past due. Uppers are just fine.

 

What are those?

Living on the edge.

 

Igor doesn't have a front plate. Hasn't in years. Supposed to though.

Montana has lifetime registration so I never have to worry about it.

 

I say, just leave the plate covers on. What could ever go wrong?





Also, an interesting evening. I was surprised how different (but obviously similar) the internals of an ADS shock are compared to King.

 

What kings have you taken apart?

2.5s?

 

None, hahaha. I watched a video, in the hopes that I'd have a better idea of what I was getting into. And a video for Kings was all I could find. It certainly gave me a better idea, but the construction is definitely different and requires slightly different techniques in some places.

Assemblage tomorrow morning, and then I'll do the front two with Mike and Dan.

 

nice you guys finally pooled for a nitro kit? haha

 

Mike apparently has a whole new outlook on toys (it seems - tires, tent, nitro kit, ... ) ever since ... I dunno, the shock tower incident?

Not that I'm complaining at all - I'm 100% supportive of his hobby, hahahaha. And of course, I'll be lugging the spring compressor (the other half of the toys for this job) to one of their places to do the work, since I have no shop.

Oh, and I'm on the lookout for a double cab if anyone sees one for a reasonable price. Might be waiting a while, but that's OK.

 

Double cab? Why?

If you are going to that honestly..get a 2nd gen.




I know that hurts..but you'll probably pay almost the same anyways. Get more room, more options for a build of literally any kind.

 

This whole thing with the rear axle housing has me realizing that I want a backup truck to do trips if the main one is down for an extended period of time. Right now, I feel like I'm sort of racing to bandage things up so I can get back out there. Maybe I should have realized it with Mike's shock tower, but I didn't. The 4Runner also could have filled that gap, but I only looked at it as a family vehicle, so didn't realize at the time. Hindsight and all.

Looking at a 2nd gen is probably a good idea, thanks for the recommendation. I don't love the wider wheelbase, but you're obviously right on the "lifetime" being way better. Knowing very little about them, is there a magic year? I do like the later front ends ('12+ ?) more than the '05s. Would hate to end up with the 98-00 face again, hahahaha. Whatever I get, I'm betting it won't be until next year sometime when prices (hopefully) come back to earth. I was at the Toyota dealer the other day to get a new cam sleeve, and they had a used '19 TRDOR in the showroom for $53K. Stock.

 

haha welcome to the multi rig club


anyways. I think that 08 is the magic year for a few odd reasons. But nothing deal breaking, can't remember all of them, but i swear while doing stuff on my dads we'd find out that is was last year they did XYZ or or only year they had A and B as a thing, or whatever. The +12 years look better but they have a few quirks, mainly some engine emissions stuff that can be annoying but only if you end up wanting to get get more power out of the 4.0. Otherwise, go for it. You could swap a +12 front end on though.

I used to be able to find 2nd gens around here under 20k pretty regularly. If I see anything i'll let you know. Dealers are marking stuff up like crazy right now due to the fact they can't hardly get anything new in the first place.

Width isn't so bad. Think of how many people take them everywhere you've been and more. I wouldn't let that stop you. The way you could build it over time for when it's time to move fully to it from the 1st gen will be worth it. Tons of great mods for the interior, suspension options abound, and more.

Only thing you probably won't like to hear is.....get the auto. It's much better than the slug in 1st gens so don't feel bad. But the 6spd manual is not ideal for offroading, 1st gear is super tall. So if you go to anything over stock you'll be dying to regear just because of that. it can be nice with a short thrown in it, Marc's was super smooth. But I think he'd probably agree that its not awesome to do rocky stuff with. Of course plenty of people have it so do whatever you want, but the auto is fine. And I know it'll take major abuse from experience haha

Funny enough I talked to Tim at DMZ this week to order my new engine perches. We chatted for a good while. He brought up how much better the 2nd gen ride due to the geometry of the arms. Said he tried for years to get his 1st gen to ride awesome as did his buddy at Icon that owned as 1st gen. He was building so many 2nd gens and they would ride so good, then he'd get in his truck to go home and be like..."wtf". So he moved on. He could never get it up to his standard over everything. Jumps and big stuff was fine, but the little stuff he said he couldn't dial that in.

Odd thing to think about but honestly some of the best riding trucks I've been in were 2nd gens...so One thing is for sure you have way way way more bolt on suspension options to suit any driving style you could possibly want.

Anyways Im sure everyone else will have opinions and insight to share tomorrow too. But moving to a 2nd gen is a good idea right now while there is still good aftermarket support. I think that has about 3-5 years left before it moves on so you could build up a solid rig in that time.




Also..you gotta move. You'll want a shop to have a place to keep Rig A torn down while you use Rig B. And vise versa. So...add that to the list while you're at it haha

I bet you could make a big profit right now and over pay for a nice place somewhere with a big ole shop outside the city and still make money.

 

Maybe consider a 1st Gen tundra or sequoia. Yes they are a bit wider than a 2nd gen but they are built a little beefier and I'd imagine you'll likely be at or near GVWR again. Some parts would be interchangeable with your 1st gen Tacoma.

 

Just avoid 05 and 06 2nd gens, but yes, 12+ look better.

 

Finding an affordable 1st gen dcab would be nice. I've thought about it and am looking all the time.

 

Dan R and I pooled our resources to put together a nice nitrogen kit and Dan B picked up the coil string compressor so we could all share it as a resource. What is lacking is the experience of doing rebuilds and modifying shim stacks, but with time I think that will come along too.

Putting together a quality kit is not cheap. I think combined we have ~$1000 into this one so far.

Hey man, I'm just trying to keep up the best I can. The coil bucket failure was definitely an eye opener.