1st Gen Lunchtable Thread - General Discussion

@Speedytech7 do you ever miss having a stock truck? or are there any parts of your stock truck(s) that you miss?

 

Well, it's going

 

I've modified vehicles to the point where I no longer like them before so I really try to be conscious of what my goal is and not overshoot with "cool" stuff that makes it also lose drivability. I take some pride in being able to put anyone behind the wheel of my truck that can drive a manual and not have to give them any instructions other than "no, no don't let off, stay in it" the first time the turbo spools hard. If I were to take out the camping related shit in the bed... it would just be a really nice riding Toyota pickup that's fast. No special knowledge or warnings come with that, because as a vehicle it doesn't throw you any real curveballs like modified stuff is apt to do sometimes.

My truck is truly 100% a toy too, I don't daily it anymore, I leave the camping stuff on it and I'm converting the rear to an enclosed sleeping space... but I can do that because I don't really need a truck that bad and I don't really have any sense of purity for it as a truck either like some folks might. It's just a toy, but I like it to be reliable and easy to drive. I think I'd have a different approach if a 1st gen Tacoma was my dream vehicle or I revered it like some might, but it's just a solid old camping/wheeling rig for me. I don't take an OEM or OEM+ approach with my truck really, but like I said if you put stock bumpers and strip the bed back to just being a bed... then it would be a pretty nice 1st gen as a daily.

I get to ride in much more stock trucks than my own and on the surface I love the look and the "idea" of driving one. But then I sit in it for a minute or drive it a bit and I remember it was just nostalgia and stock they're not that great haha

 

Apart from the guilt of messing with a clean truck, the biggest things that keep me from changing mine are the fear of reducing reliability or drivability. Following your build with those exact things in mind has been a lot of fun for me.

 

It takes time, and sometimes a few vehicles to gain the comfort with messing with things to the point that "nothing is sacred" is more of a vote of confidence in your own abilities than it is a death sentence for the usability of vehicle. I'd always gotten to do more involved things working on others' cars and trucks but for the most part kept my stuff mild-ish until 2017. Rolled my truck and that basically flipped a switch on what I was willing to do... had plenty of other very involved car projects but the truck ones always sort of took a backseat in terms of complexity and DIY factor until then.

Lots of research and gathering info from even the most unlikely sources helps, I used to spend days/months researching a topic before executing. The internet is a blessing and a curse, it can tell you a million ways to do something wrong and still drop one nugget of truth in there and you have to be the one to seek that out. Couple that with the fact that search engines are rapidly degrading with the amount of AI generated "articles" and site content and their ceaseless need to push advertising over being a useful resource... it can be a task all its own. The background research for a modification can take time.

I'm glad you enjoy my build, that's nice to hear though. There are lots of nuggets from others' builds in there too. If you ever find yourself in Eastern WA come by and you can take the truck for a rip

 

Awww hell. These pointed-top trucks are all over the Ozarks now.

 

They probably wouldn't be such a big deal if they didn't look like they did, if they looked normalish.

ignoring all the other things going on that some might care about anyway

 

There's so much going on in the world, and nothing us peons can do about it

 

I don't watch the news, just hear about from people at work, with their theories

 

I don't know about you but I'm always sending out

 

I wonder if you could bake a tots and pears casserole

 

Utah theories must be especially colorful

 

I guess quantum fiber is currently having a full on DNS issue currently. Can't get to any website without an IP address

 

Ooooh old white oil field guys and all

 

They all need to come out of the mountains and drive in a parade around Little Rock.

That will make national news.

Then it will become as unfashionable as a 61 Imperial.

 

Same here. Landing took longer to learn and get exactly right, but it took a long time for the takeoff apprehension(s) to go away. Everything had to be right, and go right...especially on a short (or soft) field takeoff with trees in the distance. Landings always had the go-around option unless you did a sequence of things completely wrong in exactly the right order. It seemed like you had to do landings over and over to get one exactly right and grease it in, then you had an exact reference in your mind and senses of what it felt like that never leaves you thankfully: not even during the first solo landing. It's a start.

Of course the next handful were again bouncing affairs and/or the hard, too high drop-ins which flicked the sun visors down. Hard to explain.

 

Well at least we've come a long way since the days of ancient Romans pushing slaves off of cliffs with makeshift wings

 

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