Official Crawlbox BS thread!

so $8400 for everything? seems steep but its not surprising. wonder if that includes shortening/lengthening drive shafts and shifter fab. if so, its probably not to far off but yikes for that.

 

Yea, I just asked what the installation cost is. Provided my vehicle and they replied with “depending on vehicle” (which I provided…) so I’m assuming that’s most of the cost. Before taxes… so probably 9k at least.

 

If this is something you don't think you can handle, see if you can make friends with someone on here local to you who has done it, and would be willing to help. The more you can be a part of it, the better.

Just curious, what aspects of the install are you worried about?

 

That’s steep. Install is pretty much straight forward. The hardest part is cutting a hole through the cab if needed for the shifter. Extended and shortening the DS is easy, measure and supply shop with measurement, probably cost 3-400 to re-tube/balance.

Look around your local area for a shop. If you’re willing to drive to Fresno area, there’s a few 4x4 shop in the Clovis/Fresno location area that will do it for much cheaper.

 

If your profile is accurate and you do in fact have a manual, then the increased labor cost could be accounting for cracking open your transfer case to swap the input shaft. Hard to say for sure but that is Marlin's recommended approach, versus what the kind folks here suggested as an easier alternative which is just swapping to the transfer case out of truck with the automatic.

 

I'd also second what the other guys here recommended, i.e. looking into how you can do it yourself or shopping around for other quotes. Custom modifications like this will generally run up an expensive bill at any auto shop, if they're even willing to take it on. I also wouldn't doubt that Marlin's quote is high because while they do install their own parts it's generally not their core business; most of their customers install their parts themselves. So you can undoubtedly find a place that will do it for less. You can also try to compromise and maybe do some of the work yourself or find ways to cut down on the labor, like having the driveshafts modified and ready to go or finding a used auto tcase so that it can just be swapped in. Anything that will make the mechanics life easier will cut down on labor and therefor cost.

 

Did they give you an itemized list of what they are going to do, or just a flat quote of $4,500 installed?

It'd be good to know if some of these things folks have mentioned like drive shaft mods, swapping inputs, and the additional tcase mount are included.

Bending and welding the sticks was my big obstacle, and even I managed to bend some metal and melt some bolts on the end of pre-fabbed shifters to make it work.

 

Looking for a post in this thread about right procedure and ~ volumes to fill both taco box and stock t-case for an oil change on a 2nd gen. I’ve got a few quarts of gl5 75-90 ready, but I notice that the taco box fill plug is a lot higher than the stock one, so I’m hesitant to just fill both to the top of the fill.

Any links or tips are appreciated!!

 

Stock case you fill till it spills. My taco box i filled from the top after removing the shifters. It would puke out anything over about 1 and 1/2 qt through the shifters.

 

same here. basically with the taco box i put 2qts in. cuz it takes a min for it to get into the other cavities of the adapter to the tcase. i fill from top too. alot easier. and it will puke out what it doesnt want/need

 

great, thanks. Bit more works for me to get the shifter off, but sounds like it’s worth it to get the level right. I’m trying to get rid of a nasty smell and I’ll be worried I over/under filled it if it doesn’t go away.

 

Here’s mine and seen to work each time and prevent the gear oil smell due to over filling.

crawl box: 1.50
chain case: .80

 

My crawl box showed up recently and I’m looking to get my parts together for my transfer case mount. I’ve got a 96 reg cab Tacoma with the 3.4.

I’m running a crawl box in front of my Tacoma chain case and was wondering what everyone is doing for their mounts?

Ive seen some pictures of guys using the marlin mount with some plate welded to the existing transfer case crossmember but looking for other ideas other than the fror mount.

 

I think anything you do to stabilize the rear case will benefit you in terms of reducing vibration in the drive train and being able to drive comfortably on the street/highway. I have seen some elaborate stuff over the years, but I went super simple. For my marlin setup, i had a buddy weld some c-channel onto the cross member to the bracket and that helped stabilize the rear case. Searching for a pic for you....

On my NWF box, there's no provision for a mount. There is a noticeable difference in the amount of drive train vibration between the marlin box which was supported, and the NWF box which is not. I cannot drive over 75mph without feeling like something is going to blow apart.

I am running a double cardin, single piece driveshaft and also did the same with my marlin setup. Marlin was definitely more stable at the 75/80 mph with that additional support.

I would love to see NWF incorporate some threaded holes for a bracket of the cross member.

 

i may have some carnage to my crawl box. i havent dropped it yet but im sure i got some nuggets in it now. will do that this weekend.

 

Not sure if you are still looking around for quotes or if you made a decision?
My total cost to do it myself with only getting parts came out to .... $4184.72
This was a crawl box and manual conversion with triple sticks. I do have an auto and not a manual tranny. The biggest effort was running the triple sticks to the location I wanted. Otherwise everything else was straight forward other than electrical given the manual t-case conversion. I also opted for the TG 4.7 over the marlin do to them not having them in stock and I got the TG on sale for $2306.56. I am really happy with the results. If you are mechanically inclined at all you could most likely handle it yourself. Otherwise the more quotes the better.

If you are not changing the auto t-case to a manual and you only have 1 stick this should be even easier. My stick(s) location etc... took a while to work out over the 3 days of work.

Basics ....

• 2022 4Runner manual t-case = 358.00
• RTV silicone = 22.88
• Swepco 101 = 26.95
• TG 4.7 = 2306.56
• Trident Triple NWF = $549.00 <-- this required bending, shaping, cutting, welding
• T-case mount 4xInnova = 75.00 <-- this did require some welding...
• Drive shaft (stock conversion) = 480.00
• Exhaust re-rout = $300
• Some other minor things like oil...

 

looks like i jumped the gun. looks like its the rear diff so yay. dont have to deal with the dropping of the tcase and crawl box.

 

Sucks about the diff, but definitely a win over pulling the cases.

 

yeah, but this probably going to be more expensive. i dont plan on going back to the 8" diff