0210 Crawls Starbucks

Phenomenal scenery man.

 

I wish we had a train system like europe where you can drive on and shoot across the country faster. I would love to just get out west and then explore in my truck. Its a bit too much to do a full drive across the country, I feel like it would be excessive wear on the truck. But then again maybe would be a great trip.

I've only been to Banff for snowboarding but I really want to come out west and see it in the summer etc. East coast is pretty nice too. Newfoundland is gorgeous in the summer. Sucks I'm in boring ass southern ontario haha. Where all we have is a worthless piece of shit preimier and government that only cares about cyclist and taxing the living fuck outta us. So close to just leaving this province.

Great looking truck by the way. If you ever end up in ontario check out OF4WD. You can find all the trails on there. There's some nice ones in Minden, Bobcaygen etc, nothing near here in toronto though. unless you want to ride a bike haha

 

Just a heads up, an orbital polisher can't actually buff out scratches. You'll need a dual action buffer like a porter cable, few different pads and cutting/polishing compounds. I was able to remove every pinstripe on my buddy's 1st gen taco in about 6 hours. As long as your finger nail doesn't catch the scratch, you can buff it out.

 

Thanks. I mis-wrote. I did use a dual action polisher - got it from Harbor Freight a little while ago. Nail did catch on a ton of the scratches originally. It's pretty good now - can only see the scratches from up close and certain angles.

 

Storage drawers/platform is coming along:





After a few test-fits in the truck, I realized that a drawer on top of the far column would not work - the shape/dimensions of the canopy/windows is too restrictive to make having a drawer there worthwhile. I also realized that there's no way for me to fully extend the bedslide while having an action packer behind the fridge (inside that far column) - again, due to the shape/opening of the main window.

Sliding the bedslide out ends up with the far column hitting the inside of the canopy at that main window. This happens with about 2.5" of beslide "sliding" left, which is not a big deal itself, but the downside is that the bedslide cannot lock in this position. I had a look at how the bedslide position-locking works and it looks like a very easy job to add more spots in which the slide would lock (remove top of slide, drill a hole on each side of bedslide frame, reinstall top of slide), so I'll be adding one 3.5" out from the furthest current spot.

 

Did a ton of work on the platform over the weekend - sanding, routing, trimming edges and corners for various clearance problems, planning out mounting of electronics, etc. Also started applying Herculiner.

I also added another locking position in my bedslide (reason described in previous post), so my slide can now lock 4" short of full extension, which will give me plenty of clearance to work with, and still keep the slide (and its contents) secured in position.

This is what Herculine'd pieces look like:



The main unit's finish isn't quite as nice because I rushed things and applied the liner too thick... should have done several lighter coats and not worked at night. Oh well.

 

Installed the ICON uniball cap covers today. I put in a bunch of teflon white lithium grease a few days ago, let it get "worked in" during a few drives, filled up the uniballs with as much more grease as they could fit, and sealed them with the ICON caps. I was not happy to fork over the ~$50USD for these, but think they'll do good in the long run. Turns out they're metal (I expected plastic), and the 3M tape/seal has nice coverage that I'm hoping will work well to keep the elements out. Greased the uniballs from the bottom, too.

 

Storage unit is slowly starting to take shape...

 

All done.

Far column has the electrical cavity which contains:
- 79ah deep cycle AGM battery
- 20ah sealed battery (in parallel w/ the one above)
- batteries connected to 100amp circuit breaker, which is then connected to a fuse panel

Near column contains a single drawer (3/4 extension - unfortunately all I could find on short notice) and several storage openings of various sizes. Door has a paper-towel holder mounted (painted black).

At the bottom is a 51" drawer mounted on 48" Orr & Orr slides.

Everything is covered in Herculiner. Applying this stuff is tricky if you want a nice, consistent and not overly-thick finish. As far as finish goes, I'd rate the exterior of this storage unit as 'okay', and the inside of the columns and drawers between 'poor' and 'crap'. The only part's finish I'm really happy with is the external sides of the large (bottom) drawer - this was the last piece I had covered, and by this point I had finally figured out how to get a nice finish with this stuff. Lessons learned, I guess.

The whole unit:



Far column from the external/window side:



Electrical cavity inside the far column:





Electrical box is covered with a hinged lid, and has tie downs for the action packer that will live there:



At the last moment I decided to add some chest handles that I had laying around:



This is the finish that I'm happy with. "Thin," consistent texture:



Ran out of my 'normal' hardware (5/8" #8 screws) at this point and since it was Sunday night, everything was closed. Anxious to finish, used whatever I had laying around.

 

Yesterday I finally got around to doing the diff breather mod. Put the breather behind the taillight.

Today I took out the dog platform from the rear seats and started sound deadening. I got 100 square feet of B-Quiet Ultimate and am going to town with it. Covering everything I can, and doubling it in some spots. Did the rear wall (covered the driver's side vent, but left the other one) and floor underneath rear seats & foot area. Planning to also do the floor & foot wells in the front, as well as the four doors. This stuff is easy to apply, but the whole process takes time. Spent five hours on it today working non-stop.

 

Haven't updated the thread in a while...

- made a new dog platform (will be making a new cover for it this coming weekend)
- cut apart the storage platform I had built (will be making two drawers in its place)
- ordered a ton of parts for relocation of the auxiliary/house battery to behind the rear seats
- ordered PrInSu canopy rack (month away)
- ordered All Pro Expedition leafs (month away)

Started building a new electrical panel that will sit in the driver's side corner of my Leer shell. This will have two Blue Sea fuse boxes (one for main battery, one for house), 12V socket, USB socket, and a distribution block + relays for "switched 12V" accessories (such as my rear-facing dash camera).

Brackets that attach to the original hardware:



Laying things out:



Mounting a few of the components:

 

got any info on how you did the rear camera repurpose for front camera?
what cam you used, how you mounted it etc.
Was thinking of doing the same thing.

 

I had it written up at one point, but don't have it handy. Honestly, I don't really like my solution. The approach in this thread is much better, and I'll be changing over to it eventually: https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/adding-a-front-camera.354084/

 

German shepherds are awesome!

 

Nice build!

 

Are you gonna create a sleep setup soon? Or just sticking with tent camping?

 

Yup. Version 3 of drawers & sleeping platform will be happening before the end of the year! Will live on top of the bed slide and have "wings" to cover as much of the open space as possible.

 

Nice build, I like the idea of the dog platform in the back. Looking forward to seeing what dog platform v2 looks like.

 

Thanks! That's already built and being used (actually a bit simpler than my original version). I just need to sew the covers I have in mind for it, and then I'll share photos.

 

Electrical has come a long way.

Used one of those pre-drilled galvanized steel pieces from Home Depot to make a bracket that holds two circuit breakers and the solenoid. Mounts into original (empty) factory holes on the body using 8M bolts (also from HD).





That loose red 2AWG is now hooked up to the far (100amp) circuit breaker, which is in turn hooked up to the main battery. This red cable runs along the frame and into the canopy, to the top (main) fuse box.

Electrical panel mounted & largely hooked up:



The bottom fuse box is going to be powered by my aux batteries and is not yet hooked up. The relay is powered by a switched 12V via the distributor block at the bottom (used a fuse tap in the truck's main fuse box) and will turn on/off my rear dash camera - already hooked up, but I still need to make a bracket to mount the camera itself.

Still need to run a 2AWG from main battery to aux, set up the aux batteries in place, mount their circuit breakers, and run a 2AWG from there to the canopy. Then need to set up another 12V socket (from the aux battery's fuse box in the canopy) for permanent use by my fridge.