3" Lift and New Grill

Finished my lift kit sooner than I imagined. Got bored, found some scrap expanded metal, and here is the result...

 

Looks really good man!! Im about to do this to my grille this week acutally. What kind of expanded metal did you use? whats the spacing on the gaps?

Love our trucks by the way!

 

wow! grille looks great! nice job on the lift also. could you get up a few more angles of the truck so i can see what it looks like with stock wheels and smallish tires (for the lift)? also i like the wheels, i think that style of wheel is the best factory one toyota makes, when i get a lift and tires im considering not even getting aftermarket wheels and just painting the stock ones black and keeping em.

 

Just make sure your dont get tires that are too wide. The will rub on the frame at full lock.

X2 on more pictures!

 

Thanks guys! Will snap more, and better, pictures soon. The lift is 3" spacers in the front and 2" add-a-leafs in the rear.

JR97, what gaps are you referring to? The actual expanded metal spacing? I can measure tonight, but its probably 1/4" or 5/8ths.

When these 31x10.5x25's are gone, I'm moving to 33x10.5's. Probably have 10k worth of miles left on the tread...but might have to help that process along with a few burnouts. haha.

 

Yeah I was talking about the expanded metal spacing. 1/4" looks about right. How did you fasten it to the grille?

 

grill looks bad ass. wish u would have done a step by step on it tbh so i could possibly do it myself.

 

Grill, lift and wheels look great.

Makes me have a bigger boner for a 95-97 front end

 

Grill & Lift looks sweet! Time to get some lights behind it now.

 

That is fucking BADASS!!!

 

hahahaha

 

haha, thanks again guys!

Yes, I should have done a step by step, sorry...but here's the best I can describe it, but let me know if you have any questions:

Upper grill:

1. I cut out all inner plastic with a dremel.
2. There were some spaces on the side of the grill that could have been filled with fiberglass and bondo'd...but I chose not to. might do it down the road, but you barely notice it with all black. (pics to come)
3. Traced the outline of the grill onto cardboard and cut it out.
4. Traced the cardboard pattern onto expanded metal and left 1" extra all around.
5. The only tricky step: In order to not see the edge of the expanded metal, I had to heat up a few links and melt them into the remaining grill supports. (pics to come)
6. Cut half way through the expanded metal with cut off wheel and bent a few pieces over to meet up with the grill...then used epoxy to stick them together.
7. Everything was painted with bed liner spray before and after installation.

For the Lower valance:

1. Cut roughly 4x6" piece of expanded metal, pulled back the bottom of the grill and shoved the expanded metal up there. I then simply welded it to the frame. Can't see the welds because its black and behind the license plate.
2. Painted

Unfortunately, in the winter, I go to work when its dark and get home when its dark...so I promise a few more pictures this weekend.

Will likely mount a few small driving lights behind the grill soon. I was thinking that, or molding a few into the bumpers somewhere. I like the looks of big PIAA lights, but want something I can keep on at all times. 1st gen lights aren't too powerful

 

Nice job, the blacked out look in the front looks awesome

 

here are a few more pics

 

Is this similar to what you used?

 

Essentially, yes. I got the spacers off ebay for $60 and AAL's from a random website for $80, and rear Tuff Country shocks from Amazon for $43 a piece.

very inexpensive lift.

I have some bad noises now, which are apparently due to the driveline angles. need to drop my carrier bearing this weekend and see if it helps.

 

I just used (2) 3/4" nuts with longer bolts to drop my carrier

 

Sounds good. I have some scrap aluminum stock that i'll likely drill through and make some spacer blocks out of.

Did you have a noise or a vibration before the drop?

 

Yeah i had both. Also because my carrrier bearing was shot.