5-lug, no lift, budget to match build thread

I noticed the other day that my mods are reaching a point where they're hard to keep track of and would clutter relevant threads if I included enough detail to be helpful. Sounds like it's time for a build thread. The mods listed are probably vanilla by many standards but hopefully there will be enough oddball uniqueries to make it worth the read. I've had the truck for just over a year now and have a number of projects that are finished along with others that are incomplete so this thread is partly to remind me of those unfinished ideas and where I left off.

Truck as it was purchased with snugtop rebel and Thule rack. Parked on an incline but you can see it sags in the rear.


If the mod is simply a copy of someone else's work or basically public knowledge I won't write it up but if I can add to the knowledge base I will. Those write ups will be added as time permits, hopefully with adequate documentation. I do take pics but if I miss something let me know and I'll try and fill in the missing bits.

Completed mods in order of completion, more or less(difficulty):

Intermittent wipers(1)
Back up camera, prewired(1)
Bed tool storage platform/drawer
Ride rite lift bags routed to driver's side cubby(2, because no lift means no room)
Acekraut lecense plate remount(1)
OCD organizers, glove box and console(.25)
Notched the console tray so it slides further back and made new corner for it
Bestrix compact phone mount(1, the 2-sided tape failed so I switched locations and used contact cement)
Fia oem seat covers(2, because fat fingered)
Husky floor mats(1, because I hate vacuuming)
Bentrodder's bed supports(2, because drilling, painting)
DC ditch tracks on an AC(3, because too many steps, possible diaper changes)
Noico roof, back panel, clam shell doors
Mesocustoms white dome/maps(1, every vehicle I've ever owned needed this)

Incomplete or uninstalled mods(status):

Bussman rtmr w/ diy mount plate(waiting on Delphi order but ~80% complete)

Air on board including lift bags, MV-50 compressor, 2 gal tank, bed outlet, Iggy inspired cubby switch console and solenoid operated air distribution under center console(needs two ch4x4 lift bag switches, inline filter install, main power/ground feed, switch power feed(both from bussman), finish up led backlighting for input/output pressure gages, connect console panel to manifold and solenoids, wire harness for switches w/connection to dimmer circuit)

Center console remote auxiliary fuse panel(installed, just need a jumper from the outlet feed to the panel. sockets to be always on from bussman on separate feed/ground.

Heated seats w/modded switch leds (need to pull the seat covers, dash dismantle complete, panel fitted, power line pulled low enough to access without another dash removal, relay modules placed with switch connectors.

Front/rear camera anytime mod, kit from logistice91(switches ready(changed leds and resistors), front camera wires run and head unit plugged in, just need to finish fitment of the switch panel and its harness).

Led dimmer circuit for added switch panels( need to tap the circuit, make up the 2-wire cable feed, upper switch harness done, lower switch harness not).

Cab/cap air powered windows(parts here, switch installed in drivers door, inspiration lacking)

Glimmers/possibilities:

Additional reverse lighting

Better cap lighting

O-track under cap lid

Water on board (frame mounted under driver or front of bed)

Fridge, cold beer

Alloy rims, because steelies are fugly

Low pro winch, because I've always wanted one, maybe twice needed one

Cab/cap t-slot rack bars

 

I'm a carpenter so my first real priority was organizing the bed storage to suit the tools that I typically carry which consists of a compact table saw, 10" chop or 8" slide/miter, folding saw stand, small compressor, folding saw horses, a collection of 18V tools, 3', 4', 6' levels and a 50" Bora clamp, plus other tools and fasteners in assorted parachute, canvas, or gate mouth bags. The intermittent wiper mod and rear camera(both plug and play) were fillers while I was planning what to do. Though the varoius aftermarket systems definitely have appeal, they weigh alot and give up a significan amount of space so being a cheap bastard weight weenie I opted for a diy solution using for the most part scraps I had on hand. The heart of the system, such as it is, is the offset center support/level holder/saw stand cubby with 4 stacked level slots of varying depth. To the left of the support is the full length slot for the saw stand that has a cleat for securing the stand against sliding and is keyed to the bed slots. The top of the support is notched for 2- 1 x 8 maple boards that rest in the bedside slots and support a two piece 1/2" plywood deck. Under the deck to the right of the support is a single large drawer that can be hauled up against the bed front using a pulley attached to the forward maple board and secured with a boat cleat at the back of the deck. The drawer rests on 4 small closet door wheels attached to the sides plus 10 plastic transfer bearings scattered around the floor but riding on the bed ribs. These were a later addition since drawer bottom had too much friction to easily be drawn in/out, now its great. With the drawer pulled in, there's just space for 2-3 folding sawhorses in the back keeping heavy tools forward and the light horses at the back. Larger items like the saws, vacuum, compressor and ladders rest on the deck above. The Thule rack is adequate for a modest extension ladder or squeeze plank but I'll need a cab rack for lumber of any length. My previous trucks had a lumber rack and shell that I swapped twice a year but I need something lighter now and dont want the permanent drag of an overtheshell rack so one of the future mods(now complete) was always going to be some sort of remove able cab rack.

Now for some pics.


Ugly old 3/8 ply but this shows the wheels and layout of the transfer bearings, you can see the wear from the bed ribs now eliminated by the bearings.

Close up of one of the bearings.
Here's how the saw stand and levels fit.

 

After one summer on the stock seats and wondering what the previous owner might have left for me I sold myself on the idea of seat covers and not wanting neoprene and too cheap for Clazzios let alone Katskins I opted for Fia Oem seat covers which certainly wont wear as well but neither will I worry about them. They fit really well and because of this are a pain to install. At some point this summer or fall they'll come off forward the heated seat elements. The fabric is a bit more comfortable than the stock fiber and to me nicer looking.

 

At some point last summer I grew tired of the weak leaf springs which gave a nice ride with the truck empty but were woefully inadequate loaded. I'll end up spending more on my diy controls but in spite of my claim of being a cheap bastard I still like what I like and if I don't like it won't buy it. I don't like the aftermaket control panels. Add a leafs are a fixed change to load response and I wanted something tuneable so I opted for Ride Rite lift bags to replace the bump stops. Finishing the controls is still a ways off but at least the vision is complete and much of the dirty work done. For most of the time since install the fill lines were routed to the drivers side cubby where I accessed them to adjust the ride with either compressed air or more often the CO2 bottle I carry as a substitute for the compressor. More recently, the fill lines were routed through the lowere rear corners of the cab wall, under the sill covers, and across under the seats to the space under the center console. Being a base model, there's no inverter in that space so I've chosen it as a somewhat readily accessible location for portions of some mods. From the compressor and tank location in the passenger side bedwall a line runs parallel to the lift bag fill line to a solenoid valve which feeds a 6-port manifold. Another pair of lines run from the tank to the rear as fill port/tool use. There are a bunch of push to connect(ptc) fittings between the solenoid and the ones that actually supply the lift bags and the solenoids isolate the tank and lift bags from possible losses in these connections. The manifold has this inlet solenoid, the tank pressure switch, a shrader fill valve as a back up supply port, an overpressure/release valve, and a ptc outlet to the pressure regulator. The remaining ports are plugged. I really like Iggy's cubby panels but as he makes them won't quite fit my needs so I opted for a diy abs panel instead but credit him for the idea. The panel gets located in the low center cubby in front of the stick and houses the pressure regulator, compressor ON switch, supply ON solenoid switch, and left/right lift bag ON switches as well as 1" dia input/output pressure guages. With the supply switch ON, opening either lift bag solenoid allows the regulator to increase/decrease pressure according to output pressure guage. If the pressure is low, turning on the compressor switch energizes the pressure switch and I can either let it run until the pressure switch shuts off or the tank has enough air for current use. The outlet line from the manifold splits and feeds the input pressure guage and regulator. The regulator has an output port that feeds the output manifold and a guage port. The output manifold has 4 ptc lines: one to each of the lift bag solenoids, one to a 4-port reversing solenoid valve, and one spare solenoid that might someday be used to pressurize a water tank. Also to be located in the area is a 6-slot aux fuse panel, ground buss, and wiring for the heated seats. I found a handy scrap of aluinum at a local salvage yard and have used pretty much every bit of it for mounting various mods you will see in this thread and 3 of the pieces were used to locate the input manifold, fuse box and input solenoid, three of the output solenoids(the four-port fourth being located on the rear cab wall), and the ptc connections that make up the output manifold. The ground buss is on scrap alu from a different chunk. My faux Iggy panel is built up from 3 layers of abs, 2 @ 1/4" and 1 @ 3/16" to match the depth of a stock switch panel. It was drilled with hole saws to accomodate the regulator and guages, and the switch holes were routed with a jig on 25 mm centers to accomodate the Toyota small push switches. It's tight fitting those on the one panel since the air connections in back take up more space than what's seen from the front. Tomorrow I'll edit in some pics of some of this stuff. Since I'm also making another abs panel for more switches in the standard location I'll be combining the pics for the two panels into a single post to follow.

This is the area under the cup holders behind the shifter. The supply side solenoid is to the right of the fuse box and feeds a manifold underneath. The 1/4" lines on the left branch from the output of the regulator and feed the other 3 solenoids lined up below the bundle of red wires.
Lying on my back to show where I drilled into the cab(top right)I want any lines/wires to cross over the exhaust inside the cab. Also shown is the tank stuffed into the bedwall.
Another from the inside showing the main feed and the grommet above for the passenger side lift bag line. The main feed has a qr outside the cab wall and a barb fitting on the inside.

 

I need a rack over the cab for stuff too long for the bars on the shell. For awhile I contemplated modding the oem bars until I saw the Rhino ditch tracks on a DC and was instantly sold. The problem is the tracks don't follow the curve of the shorter AC roof
so I needed to tweak them pretty hard to make them fit. All I know about bending 3D extrusions is that they kink if not bent with dies so I filled up the channels and encased them in Wood before attempting to bend them.

The bending jig was just a couple short 2x's joined with 1/2" bolts ~3" apart and held apart with 2" sections of 1" pvc. I clamped this in a vise, slid the wrapped track in and working my way from end to end tried to bend it a little bit at each point. I never pulled as hard as I could since the idea was not to kink it but it was surprising how much effert it did take to get even a minimal increase in the curves.
Plain wood didn't fair so well so they were rewrapped with 1/8" ply. This next one shows the additional curve in one dimension, the other bow was also increase. I actually didnt need that much since rougly a foot was coming off and the roof bend is most extreme from the ribs forward.

Once they were bent enough(took 2 or 3 passes each) I could prepare for the install. It helps to keep it full length until after it's bent then cut it to the specific length when you've dropped the headliner and can see where you want the pre drill holes or any you add have to go. To cut the channel I just used my 6" 18V circular saw with a carbide blade which works well for aluminum and also for mild steel.
Oh yeah, where to cut the ditch moulding? I watched a youtube video where it showerd drilling through the moulding at a specific point(on a DC) and then snapping it but it was easier to pull it up from the front and cut it with snips just forward of the seam at the rear curve in the roof. There's another clip there for the moulding and I cut just in front of it and saved the offcut. After each track was installed I cut what I needed from this to fill the ditch in the front. The tracks have end caps that capture the loose ends of the moulding. Using the rear clips as a precise guide and the front of the roof ribs as an target I cut both ends of the track so one of the predrilled holes went through the center cross rail and the back of each track was 1/8" from the rear moulding clip to allow for the end cap. This left me with one hole ~3" from the back end and nothing at the front so after I drilled the roof for the 3 remaining predrilled holes in the track I measure from these holes to locate an additional one at each end. That's how those two ended up so well located on the metal tabs inside. The bottom of the channel is several layers of sheet steel (at least 4 and possibly 6 at the cross rail) and due to it's channel bend extremely strong which is a major reason I prefer mounting ditch tracks as opposed to generic tracks mounted on the flat part of the roof. The video reccomended painting the holes with cold galvanizing compound and the smallest I could find was a spray can. Not wanting overspray I sprayed some in a paper cup and used a toothpick to paint the holes with a couple coats, it dries in a few minutes. Other than using different fasteners and choosing my own locations I otherwise followed the instructions supplied and supplemented by video.
I don't have a large rivet gun for the rivets that come in the kit which also assumes you'll be using the tapped holes the the DC ditch channels so I picked up some 10-32 SS button head cap screws/washers, and stop nuts. This of course also meant I needed to drop the headliner to tighten them. There's plenty of info on that but whats germain is that the side curtain air bags obscure most of the back half of the channels on the inside. Crap, went to sleep and woke up having decided I didnt need to unplug or remove them completely if I could just loosen them and nudge them aside so I left the two bolts at the windshield, removed the next six completely, and just loosened the three that hold the charge cylinder and supply tube. Some of the attachment brackets have tabs that hook slots in the roof. The back half is attached to a rigid frame but will still pivot away from the bottom of the channel so you can slip the nut/washer on and tighten. This pic shows the loosened airbag and the 3 forward screws(5 total) including one that pierces the center reinforcement rail.
Here's one showing the rearmost hole on the passenger side. There's another ~2 1/2" forward of it.

Here's how they turned out.

 

Switch panels, there are some available but not quite what I need or want so it's time for a diy solution. First off, I need one for my oba controls(compressor, lift bags, pressure regulator and gages, etc. I liked Iggy's enough to copy the location if not the construction. Instead of 3/16 aluminum I'm using 11/16 abs(2 layers 1/4" and 1 layer 3/16") glued together with black abs cement. I made a template of the cubby out of 1/8 ply and started making holes. The switches are set low on the panel because that's the apparent centerline from the driver's perspective. I thought I was going to be rich but turns out somebody already thought of ruler lines on tape.
To the right of the switch holes is where the pressure regulator goes and to the left 2- 1" pressure gages. I drilled the holes for those with two different sized hole saws and angled the holes for the guages for better viewing. The switch holes were first rought cut with a jig saw then routed using a template(more on that later).

The backside behind the guages gets a plate to hold them in which has square holes to key them in place. The guages aren't as deep as the swiches so I used less abs there.

I've started on another panel to replace the 4 switches and two 12V sockets with 7 switch holes and I'll take some pictures of the jig in use along with more of the progress of this panel.
Here's some pics of the jig and progress on the next switch panel. It holds the switch panel snug on the sides and the screws at either end allow for fine tuning the end to end location in the jig.

The other side is cut out for the diameter of the router base plus the dimensions of the switch minus the diameter of the bit. ABS tends to melt when you cut it so the tape allows me to undersize the initial cut and then cleant it up with a final pass.
This is the 3rd time around for this template and it's showing it's age. Anyway, this is what it allows me to do.

Went for an mtb ride this morning and this afternoon pulled the dash apart. I was dreading this but it's actually not a big deal. I needed to get the lower center panel out in order to hack it up. Any last words, meat?

After the cut and some trimming.

It was a squeeeky tight fit to avoid over cutting the lower corners. Also, this area isnt flat, there's an angle just right of center so before I even glued the 3 layers together I made a notch in the back of the front piece I could later use as a hinge and adjust with micro thin cuts. The last of these cuts was done now that I could actually stuff it in the hole.
I spent a coupe hours fitting it, basically whittling the hole to get it in and then the ends where the 3D curves need to fit or be fugly. I'm stoked at how it turned out, there's days of hours in this thing and it would suck if it sucked.

After rounding the bottom corners and stuffing it with switches. It falls out so tape. Knew it would and just need to add some small dollops of abs glue in a few spots and when it cures it will stay snug as a bug. Kudos to Meso for his 3rd gen panels, they were my inspiration on this following up on Iggy's cubby panels. They weren't what I needed but were the ideas I needed to borrow.

 

Very clean and well done Scott!

 

I was looking at all of my options for on board compressor and tank on my project yesterday. I love how you set yours up!

 

Thanks, I read a bunch of threads before deciding on that location. Mainly just wanted it off the corners, on the passenger side, between the axles, and not in the engine bay(not reccomended due to heat concerns). I'll have more pics of the compressor/tank and mount in a dedicated post for that at some point. I'm trying to balance the taco lean and the bedwall cavity was the best spot not too close to the exhaust run. It's a snug fit with the tank touching the body panel and the right angle fittings touching the bed fiberglass, both are padded with gaskets.

 

Glove box/center console mods(exclusive of stuff stuffed underneath).
Went for the Salex kit: glove box organizer, center connsole organizer, and tray. Normally these would just rate a spot on the list in the op but given my propensity for modding my mods(if I think of it I'm halfway to doing it) I had to include this adjustment to the tray. Its great, and makes a fantastic coin depository but it's in the way of the nicely(or not so nicely) organized items under it so I notched it to allow it to slide a scoche further back.
Just some 1/8" abs sheet glued into a corner, then glued to the tray and cut out the outside corner. Not a big job but makes a big difference in access.

For those finger challenged among us.

 

Dedicated to the men and women who serve, whether it be armed or not. Especially those who struggle without recognition for the ideals that make this country one to be proud of. It's a long list. Think of one, they surely deserve your appreciation.

 

Tomorrows the day I pull the dash apart to cut in the new switch panel that replaces the 4+2 below the AC controls. Then I can finalize the shape, tap the illumination circuit, power my mini aux fuse panel that feeds the seat heater switches in that same switch panel, and wire the front/rear cameras. Woot!

 

Yay! It worked! See switch panel post above.

 

Nice job on the switch panel, looks really clean. Clever cutting it from 2 pieces of ABS.

 

3 pieces actually. Had to end up at 11/16" then router it in stages to get the switches to flush mount.

 

Some things on the to do list for mañana dont know if all will be finished but it's a goal anyway.

Pick up some adhesive to re adhere the hood to the support ribs. I'll just make a T to rest the hood against the radiator instead of the hood support, the weight should do for a clamp.

Replace the split loom with heat shrink on this harness from the engine bay back to the drivers seat grommet and get it installed.

Drill and tap three 1/4 x 24 holes in each of 4 of these 3 1/4" pieces of aluminum t-slot stock and use the same jig to cut them in thirds(see saw kirf near left end).

Finish up the harness for the camera/heater switches in the center console area and some final touch ups to the switch panel. Make up a power/ground/ground wire to go back to just above the passenger side bed cubby for an aux power panel
with the extra ground for the compressor. Bring power from the compressor relay in the center console back to the compressor.

 

Scott I just read your DIY Bussman thread, Thank you for that you are very skilled with your tools. Heck I thought you were an electrician or electrical engineer, I'm sure your carpentry work is top notch. Take care

 

Thanks but maybe you mean tacozord's thread? I just follow it and try to help where I can.