02 Tacoma doublecab 3-Link on FJ80 axles

@slander nothing is wrong with the sticks/setup, the quality is great it's just not meant to be run in a taco with an auto tranny and dual RF1A top shift cases. The amount of work to relocate the stock auto shifter gate and electronics is an unnecessary waste of effort, it's just not possible to get all three shifter's into the stock location which was my original plan. It would work no problem in a taco with a manual transmission or an early pickup. That being said, I bought the front range twin sticks because the quality looked awesome. I'm giving up a cup holder but the more I think about that the less is bothers me.





Just waiting on the twin sticks and I can start putting some stuff back together. I talked to the powdercoater today and they said my stuff should be done by tomorrow.

 

twinsticks came from brian at front range offroad. Liking the quality alot.


T-cases have to come out one more time to cut a hole in the floor for the shifter and to mount the twin sticks. Still have to extend the three wires to the new speedo sensor. just trying to get this thing drivable again. driveshaft need to be extended, the one I got from a guy that was running it with a crawlbox and a lefty is about 2" too short.

Got my grill pretty much finished up, still have to do the little inserts but this is pretty much what its going to look like, adhesive has since dried so I cut those zip ties in the corner off. (excuse my hobbit foot in the frame)


knuckles came back from the powder coater. I'm pretty happy with the job they did considering how much they charged me and what I asked them to tape off. none on the bearing surfaces are coated, I wanted to keep all those metal on metal such as the bottom of the arms and the top of the knuckles, lower caps, spindle face etc. Not that thrilled with how light their FDE is but I mainly did it for corrosion resistance, and no ones really going to see it. Also had them do a set of relentless fab light bar brackets in black like the arms and caps.

 

Pulled out my interior today to get ready to cut the hole and modify my center console for the twin sticks. While I'm at it also going to put down some sound deadening/insulation all throughout the interior, and the back wall of the cab. Just trying to get done all the stuff I can do with one good arm.



I made a cardboard template the same pattern as a Rf1a shifter base and put it where it needs to be. Looks like it's going to be coming up right in between both holders. Luckily my moms BF does sheet-metal for a living so I may just go custom console but for now I just need to get it drive able.


A lot of dirt and dust accumulated in the cab in the last 15 years (moab, big bear, western sierras, anza borrego etc), still need to shopvac it out and prep everything for the soundmat.

 

Twin sticks are in, moms Bf made me a kickass cover plate out of sheetmetal to take up the empty space. I wanted access to the top 4 shifter mount bolts, while also not having a big old gaping whole in the floor so that should solve the problem and give the shifter boot something to mount to. Going to reuse the stock tcase shifter just going to have to grind the ball at the end into a flat piece and maybe add a little length to it because of the body lift.


Middle drive shaft between the case output flange and the carrier bearing was too short so I took it to the shop to have it lengthened and balanced with the rear portion.

Bought about 36sq feet of sound mat, that will be here tomorrow but I wont have a chance to put it down till wednesday. Once thats in I can start putting the interior in.

Things are moving along, my goal is to get at least a few things done a day. I work nights so its doable.

 

Nice progress. Keeping an eye on this since I'm getting closer to installing my crawler.


That shifter base looks very similar to this base I just picked up.

 

@ToyRyd04 yeah that looks alot like my rad designs boot and retention plate. Must be nice for these shops to have a cnc plasma or a hydrojet. I think It came out really good considering the half-ass sharpie on paper drawing I gave him for dimensions.

 

Agreed, digging that panel cover plate.

 

I took the 80's pickup shifter apart and the stock tacoma one and combined them to make one, so that it will come up in the stock location. I needed it a little longer because of the body lift. The stock chain drive shifter has a ball on the end so I had to file it down flat on either side so it would fit into the marlin crawler modified shift fork keyway. I have to figure how to re-attach the shifter together since I destroyed the rubber heating it up and pulling it apart. I'm thinking some JB weld and maybe a set screw will be more than fine.

Driveshafts should be done tomorrow, I only gave them the middle shaft between the t-case and the carrier bearing but they need the whole thing to balance it all together so I had to drop off the rear portion as well today.

 

Sorry for not updating the thread lately, have been working hard on the truck. The sound deadening material was more of a pain in the ass than I had anticipated, but it's 98% done. While the interior was all out I gave it as good of a cleaning as I could, with some turtle wax upholstery cleaner. When It's all said and done I'll get it professionally detailed so I can start with a clean slate. Diassembled my auto trans shifter because the mounting plate was rusting, so I painted that up. Need to make a set of rear mounting brackets for my mastercraft seats. Been talking to Wyatt at rocksolidtoys and they want to do the build. He asked me for a breakdown of all the parts I have so he could get back to me with a quote so that's where we are on that. Found a place for the trans cooler, just need to make some mounting brackets for that and plumb it to the factory cooler. Last but not least I had to get a new battery from sears because my die-hard platinum shit the bed (under warranty).

 

After some setbacks and other non-sense the front axle is pretty much done. Only thing I have left to do is set the wheel bearing preload on the spindle nuts and mount the calipers and it's good to go.

 

Looking good! Glad to see you have the front axle mostly done.

So what sort of issues and setbacks are you having??

 

@1999RegCab The powdercoater got material in some of the holes and like an idiot I didn't chase the threads so two of the holes got buggered up, I had to take it to a shop that's done headwork for us in the past and they put some timeserts in the passenger side knuckle. Also the area around the caliper bolt needed some real estate removed, too tight to get the bolt and a wrench in there.

 

Never a dull moment with these projects! There's always something. Glad to hear you figured that one out successfully.

 

Yeah wasn't a huge deal, just enough to be a pain. The top ear on the caliper mounts need to be filed on a little bit as well, theres just a tad bit too much material in one spot that wont allow the caliper bolt hole to line up. Thats a couple minute fix other than that it's pretty well handled. Going to wait till the axle side link brackets are in place before I start thinking about where to put the brake lines. Probably going to route the airline for the ARB up the top link or something like that.

 

Run your ARB line, diff breather and brake hard line on the upper link from the axle. Look at this link and scroll down to post 278. This is my next project. https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/pas-cantilever-with-some-3-linked-sas.478911/page-14

 

Haven't been updating the thread lately, my bad. Things are moving though. Most of my parts are down at rocksolidtoys except for the truck and the axle, I've already paid Wyatt a deposit to secure my spot. He has to finish one more rig before mine can be brought down there. That being said I still have to tie up some loose ends.

1st thing i need to do is recenter the body on the frame after the body lift. I tried to do one side at a time as to not get much movement but I do have a little bit of shift. Anyone got any secrets for making this job easier, without getting a bunch of plumb bobs and other crap. I have some wear marks that i can use as reference but its still going to be a pain.

2nd- is to finish making the brackets for my tranny cooler and plumb that.

3rd- fill the tcases with fluid, and extend the speedo wires, and splice in a low range indicator sensor so the dashlight works

Thats about all i can think of for now

 

When I did my 1" lift many years ago I only lifted one side of the cab at a time. My buddy and I used a floor jack with a big ass piece of wood to lift the cab up on the side we were working on high enough to get the lift blocks under there The install went easy that way and all holes aligned ok. But I have a reg cab, so not sure if that makes it a bit lighter and easier to manage.

 

Thats the same procedure I followed. The body lift has been in for awhile but i just haven't tightened the bolts yet because of the body shifting a little bit, I need to figure out how to get it centered again.

 

Are all holes on both sides out of alignment, or just one side?

 

pretty sure the cab is shifted to the drivers side. it has 3 BM on each side. 2 core support, 2 behind front wheel well, 2 at the back of cab.