What have you done to your Tacoma today? 1st Gen Edition

Thank you brother!!

 

Got my dual batteries installed. "All that for a fridge." hahhaahah

Was a project I'd procrastinated for a while - not because I don't like electrical/wiring - I'm actually more comfortable with that than all the mechanical stuff...but because I knew it would be a giant pain in the ass.

Turned out pretty good though. Whole story and photos as usual:
MOAR Power, More Redundancy - Dual AGM Battery Install

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BEAUTIFUL! One of my car clubs has a lot of members from Canada, Alaska, and way up north. They take having a NorthStar battery very seriously. Like emergency vehicle serious. For them, batteries can become a "life or death" situation. Unfortunately, I would need to go out of state to get one.

 

They have group buy in here.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/closed-northstar-battery-group-buy-6-0.552594/

 

Had. It's closed since November.

 

http://www.all4offroad.com/rock-lights.html

 

How many you running? I have 6 and need more. 4 white, 2 blue.

 

I am running 6 of them. Might put 2 more

 

It will reopen again at some point

 

Try the X2 Power deep cycle AGM battery. They can be found at Batteries Plus, which is a huge deal if you ever need to cash in on the 48 month free replacement warranty. Since the Sears DieHard Platinum is no longer made this is the best "local" option.

 

I changed the power steering fluid this morning. I did not attempt the @Timmah! method this year. For those who didn't see the video, he rigged up his hoses so he could run the engine and have the power steering pump spew out the old oil while he filled the reservoir with fresh oil. My experience doing this last year was a failure in multiple ways, but I think the main problem is the pump will drain the oil faster than you can fill it, so it will run dry and get air in the system. I think an improvement to the Timmah! method would be to disconnect the fuel injector relay and have a helper crank the engine while you fill the reservoir. This should run the pump slower than running it at idle speeds.

Anyway, today I used my MityVac fluid transfer pump to suck out the dirty fluid until the system was dry, then suck all the air out and pull the new fluid through. This worked very well! No need to jack up the front end and turn the wheels lock to lock to get the air out. Forgot to take a picture of my setup, but it was the same as in the video, except my vacuum pump was connected to the power steering return line.

 

Got my oil change done today seems like just yesterday it was at 59,000 miles

 

At work I suck the res dry, remove the return, cap it. Hook my mittvac up to the return line and keep the res full till I get fluid coming out clear. Quick, easy, usually no bleeding needed

 

I hear engine oil changes are up to $55 dollars at the dealerships down here in AZ. No more $24.95 specials. At what point do you tell them you're not paying their $120/hr labor anymore?

 

I guess it depends if its just an oil change or a complete inspection Included.
45.00 or so I can live with because they do a complete truck inspection Including alignment and battery test and ANY oil leaks.

 

I have been trying to figure out what to do with my rusty hooks for a long time. I wire brushed all the rust off at one point and they looked awesome for about a month before they started rusting again since I didn't coat them with anything other than some WD40 (it's the only thing I had at the time). By the time I add up the chemicals, all the time and labor on cleaning them again, I probably shoulda just bought new ones since they lasted probably a good 10 years before they started to show any signs of rust...

I'd love to find some rustoleum or something that looks like the bare metal and not like cheesy aluminum spray paint. Suggestions anyone??

 

My rope hooks are starting to rust - and I'm in Arizona! It doesn't seem like this should be a problem for me, but it's going on The List. What tool did you use to get those big bolts out?

 

I used a screw driver and kung fu grip for most of of them. First put the screwdriver on the screw, whacked with a hammer, then unscrewed. A couple of them though I had to use a ratchet and philips bit. Impact Screwdriver might have worked better.

 

I tried hand and 1/4" impact driver and couldn't get them loose. I'm going to try the pneumatic impact next if I can find a Big Philips bit.

 

Wholly Crapolla. Toyota Camelback wants $11 each for the hooks. I'm going to paint mine black with rattlecan acrylic and hard enamel clear coat. This might not be durable enough for hard use, but should work to keep the rust off of them.