n0rth's Tacoma build

Thanks fellas

I was a Shot for 8 years in New Mexico for the Forest Service, Then went to work for the BLM in Alaska and am now working for Twin Falls District BLM in Idaho.

 

nice build bro, repping for all us 4wd 4 bangers nicely!

 

I decided with the price of fuel going up, it was time to shed some pounds on the truck. I pulled the Budbuilt skids off to drop some weight and also get them ready for paint. I have pretty much made up my mind that I am going to sell them and go with a set of ATO skids/crossmember when the crawler goes in some time this summer. Talking with Kevin a while back and spending some time lurking his posts he has a great product especially if you consider the fact that he has figured out a way to get rid of the current low hanging crossmember when you clock the TC up with the crawler. Hopefully that will be happening this summer. If anyone wants the budbuilts I will make them a good deal but shipping will be on the buyer so PM me if you are interested. Next I figured I would change the look of the truck and drop some more weight by ditching the CBI swing away for a bit, I'm sure I will put it back on at some point but dig the look of the truck without it currently. Am I saving gas by getting rid of the weight? maybe a little bit, currently I have gained just under a mile per gallon from a flat 19mpg to 19.8-19.9mpg that is with 2 tanks of gas fresh oil and rotated the tires. So we will see if it gets better or worse, what did improve was performance so I will take that instead. I am not downshifting as early on long hills and the acceleration is definitely better but its still a 4banger and I don't expect to win any races with it. So here are some new pics from this afternoon.

 

What are you thinkin' for prices on the Bud-Builts?

 

I haven't put a whole lot of thought into it, Let me see what I have in them and I'll PM you. ...otherwise I'll make sure and add them to my for sale thread.

 

If you're looking for mpg's I don't think the ato's will be ideal. They are the beefiest out there. Are you running the stock air filter?

 

Jason I was starting to wonder where you have been hiding at LOL. Not much has been going on with my build lately as funds and time have been scarce to put towards it.

I'm really not sure exactly what will be the final result on the skids and have some ideas that I've been talking to Kevin about based on the way his truck is currently set up. I am hoping to end up with something that can be utilized later in the build and he seems to be really open to ideas that will suit some long term plans (SAS) but will be functional for the short term while I am still IFS. I am really interested in the high clearance crossmember that he is running on his truck and getting the belly flat as possible on my truck. I am thinking of going with lighter gage skids he has available. This is all after we figure some stuff out with setting up the crawl box. Which getting rid of the Bud-builts will put some funds torwards that project and help set someone else up that wants/needs my old skids. I usually need some reason to justify to myself why I do things and gaining some mileage by dropping some weight seemed like a good excuse to me. Which I have brought my MPG's up and come up with a plan after stalling for a while on the build. My FJ 40 should be showing up tomorrow night a friend of mine is bringing it up to me from NM. So I am looking forward to having a second rig on hand this summer to tear into the Taco and still have transportation to get to work.

Currently I run stock air filters the little bit of reading I have done on aftermarket ones just hasn't convinced me as to which one would be the best option. I have decided that a header is planned for this summer and am pretty much set on going with LC engineering. So that does bring up looking at air filters/air box mods this summer, so if you have any thoughts or advice from folks running stuff and getting good results I would like the input.

 

This is the sweetest 4 banger I've have seen. I want your FJ Transfer Case. Keep up the good work!

 

haha. I've been keeping an eye on things.

I too marvel at Kevin's cross member. Seems much stronger and the obvious clearance gains would be awesome. It would also be useful even post sas.

As far as air filters go I couldn't be happier with my afe pro dry. I can't say I noticed much of a performance gain but it's easily justified by it being reusable and likely the last filter necessary to purchase.

 

Kevin's work is really good, he and Wyatt seem to be all about helping folks out and work really well together. Which is another reason I want to do business with Kevin and have have been doing business with Wyatt. I will definitely check out the AFE pro dry filters.

My 1972 Toyota Landcruiser showed up yesterday I'm stoked it has been sitting for quite a few years and its showing after having a quick look at it today. So I need to focus on it so that it is road worthy again when I start working on the next steps for the Tacoma. I shot some quick pics with my phone yesterday and today they aren't the best quality but you can see what I will be up to if I dissappear for a while.

When it showed up yesterday, my friends came up from NM and spent a few days in Moab I told them they were welcome to wheel it but I guess they rode mountain bikes instead...


After we unloaded it, a shot next to the Tacoma both trucks are on 35's.


A shot of the interior it is original from 1972 and in pretty good shape. Actually the entire truck was original with 83K on the odometer. I am the 3rd owner of this truck the 2nd owner had it for only a year and rarely drove it during that time before he sold it to me in September 1998.







I will get some better pics soon and start a new thread for it in the other builds section.

 

Thanks man, Wyatt at Rocksolidtoys.com can set you up with an FJ case there will be an article in the next issue of Toyota4wd owners mag on the FJ transfer cases he has built. I am getting closer to having a deposit together on the crawlbox for this summer so hopefully the work will actually start happening again....

 

Ive noticed on all the trucks with the new MTRs that the tire on the left is running in the opposite direction as the right., its very odd.. Wondering if this was intentional or not by goodyear?? guess theyd need them to be left and right only tires as well to correct this.. I like the look of them thou

 

These tires have definitely made me think, They are an asymmetric tread design. The lug direction is opposite on each side of the axle but the lug direction matches on the driver and passenger sides front and rear. There is not a right or left tire only a inboard and outboard side when mounting the tire on the rim. It really made sense when I rotated them and the lug direction was constant for the driver or passenger side. Hopefully this makes sense and I haven't made it more confusing. I think Goodyear did this with the intentions of better performance and I feel these tires truly outperform any tire I have had. Not to say I won't try a different tire when these wear out but they are wearing really well so that won't be any time soon. I know in a earlier post I had said they were opposite on each corner I was incorrect when I stated that and went outside with a headlamp to double check just now, sorry if that caused more confusion but it was what made sense in my head when I was trying to describe them before.

 

Interested in bud tcase skid. Please pm me with info/pics shipped to 80443.

 

The Bud-builts are already gone, sorry about that. Gonna use the proceeds to put torwards a deposit on my crawl box. Did you ever find the rear axle that you were looking for?

 

I did find an 09 full axle that was perfect. I had the unfortunate luck of finding worn tierods when i was in the shop for an alignment. With the extra costs I had to put the axle on hold. It was not a bad thing though, with the extra time to think, I have decided an ARB Locker is a much better option for strength.

 

Plus not much more expensive than and Elocker axle swap.

 

Good choice. The 8.4 diff has bigger gears and the ARB is stronger. The ARB also engages much easier/faster than the E Locker.

 

If you take a look at the driver's side tire you will notice that the "thinner" lugs all slant upwards towards the center of the truck and on the passenger's side they all slant downwards towards the center of the truck.

The "thinner" lugs look like this (passenger) \\ \\ (driver) where they should look like this \\ // if they were truly symmetrical.

On a side note, how are the flares coming along? Time to send them to me?

 

I got them being asymmetrical off of the Goodyear website and at this point I am not even sure what to call them but the visual you gave is the best way I have seen to explain them. All I know is I have been really pleased with their performance and for me that is most important thing. How are yours working out for you? They look bad ass in the pics with your new wheels.

On the flares, that has turned into somewhat of a PIA the guy that was working on them has left the shop he was at. So I have a cut and welded rear and a uncut rear flare the fronts are good to go. If you would be willing to finish the rears I will box and send them to you tomorrow. The folks at the shop have been good to deal with and I've known alot of body men so it was one of those things that you kinda expect to happen but wished it would not have. At this point I haven't even looked at them in a while. So yeah I'm totally ready to be done with them and if you could finish them that would be awesome.