What's the best cheap thing you did to your 1st gen.

This .05 cent golf tee in my rattling dash!!!

 

Knowing that the factory jack set up at the specified point under the cross member would not lift my front tire off the ground, I decided that I better have a block of wood with me at all times. Also I wanted it to fit in the storage compartment where the jack is in my access cab. Got a piece of wood a full 2"x 6"x 8" . Traced the base of the jack and routed out the wood so the jack sat inside, put a couple of dowel screws in too to lock the jack in place. Worked well, it got my tire off the ground and gave the jack base a bit more of a footprint.

 

Do you have the charcoal gray or tan dash color? I have tried to match the locking latch from a 4 runner but the color hasn't been right on 3 attempts now. What year 4runner did this come off of?

 

That's the only reason I haven't done this mod yet. I've looked on eBay at locking mechanisms that supposedly have the same color code as my interior (FB10 or Moon Mist Gray) but their color looks more bluish gray where mine is almost a beige-grey.

 

Definitely not OCD friendly. I couldn't deal with the lack of coverage between the airbag/horn section and the pillars to the wheel. Nope.

 

Mine is the Darker tan color. The eBay listing said it came off of a '98. It was pretty much a perfect match

 

Bought this stuff for about 70 bucks on Amazon...gonna try it on a few parts of the frame that need some TLC...

 

Thanks for the info. I have the charcoal gray but the latches I bought are darker.

 

It seems like the gray colors are tough to match. Seems like Toyota did 3 or 4 variations of gray.

 

Yup, unfortunately. This guy seems to have gotten lucky with his but the thread is old and many people ran into my same issues. You just need to search junkyards for a match instead of buying online because it's so hard to judge the color from a screen.

 

The degrease mod

Went from this:



To this:



With a coin op car wash power washer and this:



5 bottles of degreaser and $15 worth of spray time = $20

 

Wow man is all that oil from changing your filter or is your front diff leaking like hell. Do you change the filter from the wheel well - remove mudguard? What's up with the petcock on the oil pan... Aren't you afraid you'll bust that sucker off? Ah never-mind it's under a skid, been awhile since I looked at an intact p/u. but there must be a reason...

 

lol that's why I degreased it. Pulled the skid and found that leak. Not sure if it was from the fill plug or the clamshell seal. It has an aussie locker in it, and I'm going replace it with an open diff so it's getting pulled either way, just wanted to see what was up with it. Yeah the oil drain has a Fumoto drain valve. The skid protects it. I didn't install it, but I'll see how it goes. Putting a piece of tubing on it to change the oil should cut down on the mess...

 

My skidplate on my old truck got ripped off while reversing out of a mudhole. Meant to hammer it back out and replace but never did. later found it wasn't really necessary and more of a pain to deal with anyhow.

 

Ah - so you're dealin with a previous owner who made it "gooder"

 

lol very much so - it's a blessing and a curse. The blessing is I've been able to sell $2150 in parts so far off of it to make it my version of gooder. The curse is everything else. Although I'm learning a lot more than I would have if I got a truck that was turn key ready for how I wanted to drive it. That's more valuable than the money to me because I secretly always wanted to learn how to work on vehicles. Speaking of money, I don't have much so I have to do almost everything myself lol. I'm lucky to have an opportunity to learn with a vehicle I don't have to daily drive and at least can make it around the block to avoid tickets from street sweeping. lol

 

I always try to get bone stock, had a few bad deals on modified stuff. Still chasing demons on a '92 wrangler - actually it's been sitting in the drive for a couple years, can't make trouble that way.

 

Yes. That's what I've been giving as advice to everyone on this forum asking about buying a used truck. Look for that old retired engineer / mechanically inclined person with the bone stock, looks-like-it-did-the-day-it-drove-off-the-dealer's-lot, single owner vehicle. That's also why I'm putting my second gen back to stock as much as possible before I sell it (besides getting more money for the aftermarket parts) - even cosmetic stuff that some people may like will most likely devalue it in some way to most potential buyers. I do like the truck a lot and after I'm "finished" getting it back to where I want it, I should know much more than I knew before.

 

So what was wrong with the Aussie? or was it just a bad install. I ran across those as an option awhile back, I think for the "heep" but was going with the cable activated modified CAD and a lockright in back with an exploder axle. Dreams... still it sits. I never considered a taco a viable candidate being IFS but maybe... like driving in snow with four wheel and four chains.

 

Nothing wrong with it besides the leak - it works as it should, but it cuts down on turning ability in 4x4 and could pop a cv axle when I wasn't expecting it to engage and just needed 3 wheel drive with the rear locked. I plan on running the open diff until I regear when my 33's are toasted and then add a selectable arb or harrop locker so I can lock the front when it's wanted and not when it's not needed.