Ryan's Tacoma Build and Adventures Thread

A buddy told me about a shop having a garage sale so we meet up and looked around. I'm glad I looked in the random cardboard box under a table.



Brand new ARB recovery point for a Tacoma. Always wanted one, but they are $$$ and hard to find. Broke down and bought it. Will hopefully install soon.

 

And today picked up a new battery to replace my bulging Optima. X2 power agm 27f. I'm pretty sure it's just a rebrand of the Odyssey Northstar.



It barely fit. I had to have the handle up for the battery bar to reach. 12.5 pounds heavier than the optima and another 26ah, for a total of 92ah. One heckuva battery for under the hood of a Taco.

And no, I don't have any bad things to say about the Optima that failed. It was just under 3 years old and it started bulging shortly after I ran it flat when my alternator died. I'm pretty sure that is what killed it. I would call what I did to it abuse. Was still starting and running fine, but it popped it's seals and was causing a boatload of corrosion on the negative terminal.

 

I’ve got that x2 in both my trucks. Awesome battery.

with an 85w hood solar panel, it’ll basically run my fridge indefinitely.

 

Hmm... I do have a solar controller from my old setup... But I'm not really running anything off it... Things to ponder...

 

On my 3.3 mile commute to work this morning my Tacoma hit 115,000 miles. I remember when I was bummed I didn't even break 20K miles my first year of having the truck, hitting somewhere a little over 17k. Now that I'm 10.5 years into owning it, I've averaged 11,000 miles per year. I'm pretty glad I've got such "low" mileage. It just means I've got many more years, and many MANY more miles still ahead for it. As folks on here would say, it's just about broke in!

 

Keep forgetting to post up these pics. Mounted this thing up about a week after my post above about picking it up. Whole lot different than the original one!!

 

Had fun out at Belfair State Park over Memorial Day Weekend sharing a camp spot with a couple friends.






These Gyro packs from Fred Meyer make great camp food. Just heated up the meat and the pitas on the camp stove.




Bringing the RC crawlers make every walk around the campground a 4x4 adventure.





That makes 19 nights in the Scout Yoho.

 

Quincey Lakes for the weekend with friends. From mud to sun and back again. Was super thankful to have the Scout. Parking and being setup was great. Others had some trouble to find reasonable spots for their tents. It dumped rain all night before we left, too. Packing up for us to leave took about 5 minutes and we were dry and clean.











21 nights.

 

Spent Thursday afternoon through Sunday morning at the Northwest Overland Rally in Plain, WA. This was our third trip out to it. The Scout sure made it a comfortable trip, especially being so close to your neighbors. Gave us some privacy and insulated us well from noise at night.




Being able to drop the camper was great. First time we've brought the legs with us somewhere. Needed to be able to use the truck since my buddy Mike and I volunteered to lead a trail run Saturday morning.








Line of rigs airing down before hitting the trails. @Shadowhunter has the white Taco in there.




This frontier randomly caught up with us so we let him join in our run.








The day before the run, Mike and I did a prerun to see how the Tronsen Ridge trail was. It was impassable. It took us 4 hours straight cutting and moving trees to make it through to our destination. Sadly, we couldn't clear the whole loop since the rest of the trail had about 3x as many trees down. Even though it ended up being an out and back the next day, everyone still seemed to really enjoy the drive.





Thankfully, Mike always comes prepared.





24 nights in the Yoho.

 

Mainly a note to self here at 117k miles, Driver side CV axle had a lot of play at the diff. Took it in to Auburn Car Repair and Offroad and had them install the bushing. Definitely took the play out.

 

aww man, I miss the heck outta you two!

I'm gonna have to call you later to concrete some time to go Bethel!

 

We are hitting Bethel this weekend with a couple friends, and you are welcome to join. It was just decided this last week. BUT, we also plan to do 22nd-24th with a few more peeps. So... show up!! lol.

 

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!! Or at least, 4th of July weekend. Headed out Friday right after work with a friend right behind us and another about 45 minutes ahead of us. Made it about 1/3 of the way there and the friend behind me blew a seal on his transmission. The radio conversation went something like this after I saw the giant cloud of white and grey smoke in my rearview and more pouring out under his rig... ME: "Your truck just blew up". HIM: "Whose truck blew up? My truck blew up?.... F^%$!". Thank God I had my cell booster. Was able to call my buddy Mike who is so prevalent in this thread of mine. He was in the middle of his Birthday dinner with family, dropped what he was doing and headed out to save the day as he's done for so many people, so many times. I made it to camp later than planned, but no big deal. Camp setup is such a breeze now!!

I think this was our 4th trip up to Bethel Ridge? Was two years ago on the 4th of July we were up here, as well. So glad the Scout made it up no issue. Was worried about the tight trees on the last mile in, but they opened it up a lot last year when they were fighting fires.












That makes 27 nights!

 

Three day weekend out to Sun Lakes-Dry Falls State Park near Coulee City, WA. Was hear a couple years ago with Mike and his family, rocking the Habitat back then. The Scout made it easy to leave camp and buzz the half mile over to the day use area right on the lake. Cause 200 yards is WAY too far to lug our floaties, lol.




Another great Home Chef meal. We actually did Home Chef all three nights for dinner. This was salmon tacos.




Parked at the day use right at the water.




Few pics from the visitor center that overlooks the location of the dry falls.




The campground is down in the bottom of the canyon, just outta sight around the corner to the right in this image.





30 nights!

 

Another successful 3-day weekend spent up on Bethel Ridge. This time @TheOnlyPajooned and a couple of his friends were able to make it out and join us.








First time with an actual fire on the Ridge for us. Plenty of downed stuff around made it pretty easy to find more than enough firewood.




Nicole found about 19 different wildflowers up there on a single short walk. Was able to identify about a third or so on day one. They may have wilted a bit too much by day two to figure some others out. And apparently keeping more of the stem/leaves woulda helped. Not bad for the first try.




Quick stop on the way home to snap a pic of Rainier in the background.






33 nights in the Scout Yoho!

 

Hadn't had time to install the Bluetti AC200 Max in the Yoho yet, but that didn't mean we weren't gonna try it out on our latest Bethel Ridge trip. 2048 watt hours, 2200 watt inverter output (with surge of 4800). It was a bit of a pain taking up a hunk of our aisle space, but was worth it til we get it in place.




Our first real test was making some breakfast sandwiches on our electric griddle.




Came out perfect!




The next day we decided to really up our wattage needs and ran both the griddle and an AIR FRYER!!! 1871 watts was no issue at all!




Each of these appliances are rated at 1000 watts. Not as big as our units at home, but fit the camper great!




This was another Home Chef meal. Turkey Jalapeno Popper sliders with fried, seasoned potatoes. Delicious I assure you.




Here's a shot from the Bluetti app on my phone. Super easy to connect to via Blue Tooth. 138 watts input from our solar panel is pretty good for a 175 watt panel. Saw in the 130s quite a bit, and even saw it in the low 140s on occasion. Even using our electrical appliances we were able to get back up to 100%, or darn close, by sun down.

 

Spent two nights with new friends up at Blewett Pass over the weekend. Sadly, Nicole couldn't join.



Trees got too tight for the Scout trying to run a trail. Really, the trees were fine, it was the fact the ground had long sections of off camber that woulda had me tilting right into them.









35 nights.

 

Way back in January I booked this group spot down on the Coos Bay dunes in Oregon. Trip ended up going great. Had 5 friends, my Parents, sister, and of course Nicole along for all/part of the trip. Spent four nights. Being able to unload the Scout Yoho was great, and the bed mat sure came in handy for a patio space to help control how much sand we got in the camper. Being able to drive the truck into town for gas or pizza was a huge plus.










Mike brought his new Bronco down and tried it out on the sand. It had zero issues getting around. I think my mom might want a Bronco now. Me, I just want his RMAX SxS. I think I put about 30 miles on it after he left (buddy with the wing below hauled it down for him).





One of our friends brought his wing with him to see about getting some more practice. He made 3 or 4 flights down the dune and Mike would buzz down and pick him up with his SxS.












39 nights.

 

Truck hit 120,000 miles coming home from Yakima this morning. Not bad for a 2011. Will have had it 11 years in about a month.

 

Hanging out at the Overland Truck Show at the Snoqualmie Block Party today!