What Have You Done To Your 3rd Gen Today?

It wasn't new anymore when you drove it off the lot the day you picked it up.

 

That just means it’s not broken in yet.

 

Time to part it out. Lol.

 

Part out, dibs on the RCI rock sliders!

 

It's called a "drawbar".

 

Semantics. I call it a ‘ball mount’ because to me a ‘drawbar’ is bolted to a tractor and allows implements to be pinned for towing.

 

Painted the red accents on the faux pro shifter (that thing comes apart SUPER easy) and installed tonneau Cover #3. The cheapest one is the keeper. Of the 3 it's the most secure and doesn't require a set of rails installed along with my factory rails. I have full use of the factory rails whether the tonneau is on or off.

 

Been to the The Villages once before, it's been awhile though. It's mostly senior citizens correct? Funny thing about the STD's, not sure what's up with that.

 

Got tired of sweeping sand out of the divots on the stock tailgate panel, so I installed the Gar-Fab P/N GF003 tailgate panel / cutting board.

 

Which other tonneaus did you try and which brand is that that you have on there?

 

Lift went on. Now time to decide if I want to go -10 offset with 275/70 and possibly have to deal with rubbing or try and find a 0 offset wheel where I shouldn’t rub at all.

 

The three others I tried:

This is the first one I tried: Rough Country Low Profile

Rough Country Low Profile Bed Cover for 2016-2022 Toyota Tacoma | 6' - 47420600

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07ZL564KL?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

It's a decent low profile cover but they made a design change at some point that went from a single add-on rail to a 2 piece rail that fits together (poorly). No matter what I did, I couldn't get the rear left side of the tonneau cover to close properly and I think one of the left rail pieces was twisted. Had it closed as expected I'd have kept it. Rough Country's support is excellent BTW. ZERO complaints there and I would definitely support them in the future.

The second one I tried was a used retrax. A buddy sold his truck and offered it to me pretty cheap. We put it on and after I saw how much space it stole from the bed and how difficult it would be for me to use my bed I took it off. It never made it out of his driveway.

The 3rd one I think I'm keeping is this one: https://www.ebay.com/itm/404616529228.

If you find a tri fold cover that looks like this one, they are the exactly same, regardless of who sells it or what name is on it as long as it's the correct one for your truck. They are at least $100 more on Amazon for the exact same cover. The negatives on this cover for some are actually positives for me.

1. The bracket handles are a little more time consuming than more expensive covers where you simply pull on a cord in the back and it just flips up. But I have successfully opened someone's tonneau with the cable release using a clothes hanger. This has 6 brackets that you lock into place. The front two stay secured and the last 4 are opened, 2 on each side. This can't be tricked open with a coat hanger. I carry expensive gear (10k plus) in the back that can sit there for hours or even days. Security is very important.



2. It's not flush to the top of the truck bed. Those flush mount tonneau covers require you to install an additional rail that the cover secures to. In many cases it renders the OEM accessory rails near useless. This one mounts above the bed and has rail accessories that slide into the OEM rail that the brackets above secure to. If you remove the tonneau cover, you don't have secondary rails to remove to use your OEM rails. This was a big deal for me. After the first two covers I decided against any tonneau cover that required the installation of an additional rail. I really wanted the Revolver x4s at one point but the fact you have to remove the OEM rail, install their rail in it's place and the OEM rail to their rail seemed ridiculous to me.

3. Those parts above? That's a pic of replacement parts easily found on Amazon and ebay for very little. The cover also shipped with some spare parts. As long as the seals don't fail, everything is replaceable. On more expensive covers, you have to replace the entire cover for some minor part failures. And surprisingly, this was packaged well and feels pretty solid. I was pretty positive I was going with Lomax but the 3 year warranty along with the only solution with a minor failure is a brand new one kinda sucked. If I can get a couple years out of this one I can easily buy another then and see what covers are available at that time.

It's only been installed for a few hours so we'll see how I feel about it in a few days but it met all of the requirements I wanted and resolved some of the issues I had with other covers. The fact that it is probably the cheapest hard tonneau available I can't complain.

 

That's not a draw bar either

 

Even with a 0° offset you may still have some rubbing with anything wider than a 265 tire. With a -10° offset you’re right, you will definitely have rubbing. If you’re going with a 17” wheel might as well go 285/70/17 or with a 16” wheel 285/75/16.

 

I know about 20 tractor owners that would call that a drawbar. Again, Semantics. And there are different types. First type is referred to as a 3pt drawbar. Here's another type that bolts in-line with the tractor's attaching point:



Here's another:

 

I’ve seen some people on here have a 3 inch lift with -10 offset with 275/70 claim they don’t rub at all 285 I’d more than likely need a cmc that I’d prefer not do.

 

Junkpile, sorry. But I happen to collect junk ... that is SUCH a coincidence. I will give you $10 for the whole thing!

 

I will raise the bid to $100!

 

Are you going to be ... eh ... difficult? Because I have this "friend" who could explain things for you ...

 

Eibach stage 2r came in this week.. rears are installed! Front this weekend. The more I look at this picture, the only thing I can see is that damn rusty drum