Deekyn’s build of Kevin the 2015 TRD Off Road Tacoma

Finally hooked up my SPOD that had been sitting around my house for months.Installing it in the engine bay way pretty straight forward on the mounting plate from PowerTrays.

Here’s the SPOD:

Mounting it was easy... but funny story. I disconnected the negative terminal of the battery like a good boy. Then when I was cleaning up wires from my old fog and light bar and disconnecting the mounting bolt that you attach the support arm of the PowerTray, I dropped my wrench with extension. It hit both terminals of the battery and arced. I wasn’t holding it thank god. Sparks flew and it ate a chunck out of my wrench. I found out later, because the positive terminal was still hooked up... when it arced it caused some sort of surge and a check engine code related to the accelerator. After a day of stress ensued waiting for the dealership to tell me I needed a new ECU or something... nothing. The code cleared on its own. Everything works fine now and the dealership did not charge me at all to look at my truck. Makes me want to figure out a rubber cap for the negative terminal when I work in the engine bay in the future...

Anyways...
A few months ago, I had installed a new rubber grommet in the firewall to put the SPOD wiring through.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/wires-through-the-firewall-the-right-way.531829/

While I was installing the SPOD, I also wanted to get my switches sorted out and my 2WD Lo module installed. Super easy to install, just remove the glove box, plug and play.


Wiring the switches was a little more work. The SPOD wiring doesn’t match the AironBoard switches I use exactly (I hate the spod rocker switches, and wanted the truck to look more stock.

I always wondered why the inverter and fog light buttons were left of the steering wheel while the ATRAC button was in the center console. Why one traction button all by itself? Drove me nuts. So I moved my Rear Locker Button and removed the fog light and inverter switches. This gave me space to move the ATRAC button to an AironBoard “traction” switch and add the 2WD LO switch

Went from this:
To this:

The switches are all lit when the dash lights are on. The ATRAC and 2wd LO are up and running. As for accessories,
at the moment I only have Baja Designs fogs and Cali Raised 20” light bar actually wired up. I plan to hard wire the cigarette lighters to the SPOD and have them be able to be always hot with a switch. I also will am planning to add lights on my rear bumper and lights on the roof rack. I was intending to just have the inverter be on an AironBoard switch but I don’t know if it’s possible, so for now it’s disconnected.



this project took two full days and lots of planning and learning. Electrical work makes me nervous, and I wanted it all to be clean. So there are tidy wire bundles in looms and zip ties and so on so that’s it’s clean and organized under the dash and center console.

 

Did possibly my favorite mod to my truck!


Dear sweet baby Fuckin Jesus is it so more peaceful in my truck!!

I was one of those with a weather stripping TSB if under 20k miles (I wasn’t). I had the howling wind kazoo noise over 65mph on windy days. As bad was the “clicking” noise right by my head, from the rubber sticking together and unsticking. Sticking unsticking. That shit was relentless. Tried flexible tubing. Tried dielectric Grease. Tried silicon spray. Finally just replaced it today.

Fucking A what a difference.

 

Woohoo! Was it pretty straight forward to install?

 

Yeah. They have a paint mark that you line up with a bump on the surround. Just press it in a little bit at a time. Easy. All you have to take off is the bottom little plastic sills and the quarter panel. No tools. Maybe 20 minutes for one side. 10 for the other once you got it figured out. Worth the $250 for sure. I didn’t realize how loud that had all gotten. It’s like a dream riding in my truck right now

 

TC gusseted spindles and resinstall rebuilt shocks and coilovers

​

Man what a learning experience... read that as a “it was huge fucking hassle“.

This started because I was tired of the taco lean and my front end finally settled with the weight of the steel bumper and my tires were rubbing again on the pinch weld, so I needed the coilovers adjusted up. But with 700lb springs and corroded bodies, doing it myself was impossible. I found a local shop that would rebuild/recharge them and adjust them at the same time. So it seemed like an opportune time to put on TC gusseted spindles on (because why not?) put new rotors and break pads up front. I had also hoped to swap my carrier bearing, all the u-joints, and my rear brake pads.

Turns out that was all too ambitious. In the end, I got the spindles installed, front rotors and break pads (NAPA, which I hate), and the rear shocks and front coilovers uninstalled/rebuilt reinstalled.

Did you know the spindle is nearly impossible to remove with the coilovers out? So I had to put the fucking coilovers back in to remove the spindle. That was a hassle.

Did you know that you have to force the tie rod end into the knuckle with a pry bar to Hold it tight to screw the castle nut in? I didn’t and drove like a 1000 miles with sloppy steering because I’m a dumbass.

Did you know that of you have one brake calipers off the truck and the other on, and step on the brake it forces the piston out of the uninstalled caliper and spills brake fluid all over your driveway and forces you to spend an hour forcing it back in and seating the little rubber boot, and another half hour bleeding the brakes?

In the process, I figured out that my TC upper control uniballs are shot and need replaced, and at least one spherical bearing in my coilovers/shocks is shot. And all the others are rusted.

I had a road trip immediately after this so a loaded truck (kayaks camping gear, etc) on sloppy steering (Until it got sorted out at a firestone in Chesapeake Virgins) and my truck has been squeaking like a fucking banshee ever since.

The project took days, was much more involved and harder than I thought. And now a bunch of it has to be taken apart again to fix the squeaks. Sigh.

 

Damn, sorry about the holdups but it came out looking great in the end

I ended up switching to SPC’s yesterday. The total chaos sounded like a bucket of bolts and caught everyone’s attention around me. It made driving somewhat unpleasant the last few months haha.

 

Cowl Intake “snorkel” mod​

So having trimmed my fender liners to all hell for my 295s on 16x8 with 3.5”BS wheels, I had been wanting to do something about the exposed stock intake. I still had some wheel well liners left but one good dunk in a river and I’d be toast I think. And the wife actively dislikes snorkels...

So I followed this thread and moved my intake into the cowl
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/cowl-induction-snorkel.525314/


I need to tidy it up a bit. I’m pretty sure the self taping screws I used to mount the pipe to the cowl are loose and squeak, so I will just swap them for bolts at some point. I also want to add a little lip on the inside of the cowl to keep water from splashing into the intake in the event the cowl has a bunch of water in it. Glue a triangle of ABS plastic or something into the mounting piece attached to the cowl wall

 

Yeah my UCAs were squeaking like a son of a bitch too, though I also think the shock ball joints are fucked too. Those are on order through king, to also be replaced.

I thought about SPCs but they still have some bad reviews and issues. I know the TCs and have them already. So for $190 and a few hours of my labor, new uniball every 2 years seemed like the better option for me.

I really wanted long travel though. But the wife isn’t interested in me dropping like $12k into this truck at the moment.

 

U joint and carrier bearing replacement ​

Part #s
Front

$24 Spicer 5-153x U-Joint - Individual

Spicer 5-153x
Rear

$43 spicer 5-1330-1x u-joint kit

spicer 5-1330-1x
Carrier bearing 5002007

After two Wisconsin winter of road salt eating my truck alive this summer is the summer of aggressive maintenance.

After 130k miles, I decided it was time to replace all five ujoints and the carrier bearing in my drive shafts. Easy right? Maybe not so much.

This to was a bit of a debacle, thanks to everything being seized with rust and me not having an impact wrench. The rust meant hammering more to few the drive line and working much much harder to press out ujoints. The lack of impact wrench meant that I had a damn hard time removing the drive shafts followed by me breaking the slip yoke trying to hammer it into the drive line a little more. ​

Toyota Doesn’t sell the slip yoke separately. They want to sell me the entire drift shaft assembly for far too much money...

northerndrivetrain.com has exactly the part I need for $42. That and a drive line rebalancing will be far cheaper than the dealership option. Still, feel like a dumbass though

So for now the truck is sans a rear drive shaft and un-driveable while I wait for the new slip yoke.

But, I did replace 4 of the 5 U joints. And the carrier bearing.

The front drive shaft was easy.


The rear was a hassle because of the carrier bearing. The bolts on the driveline are tightened to about 1000000ft/lbs so without an impact I really struggled. (I ordered one tonight)

tools that really help:
- for god’s sake have an impact wrench with 14mm socket on a swivel adapter (or extension might work?) for the cranked down bolts
- u joint / ball press. I tried my 6” vice and a hammer and two sockets. Not as easy as the new harbor freight u joint press I now own.
- 24mm socket for the yoke nut plus pry bar to hold the drive shaft while you loosen it
- 2 jaw puller to pull the slip yoke, I could not get my three jaw puller to get it out, nor a hammer like one video suggested
- 3 jaw puller to pull the bearing
- breaker bar
- 14mm wrench and pipe for leverage
- 17mm wrench
- small socket for zerks (8mm?)
- needle nose
- small punch to set the clips
- BFH (Don’t use it the way I did)
- paint marker for drive line marking
- center punch to scratch the yoke ridge and driveline spline to line them back up later
- angle finder?
- jack stands to catch the drive line
- grease
- beer. That was important.
- other things I forgot?

 

Replaced the bushings and uniballs on my TC UCAs

​

My suspension has develooed a number of wicked squeaks the last month. Two salty Wisconsin winters took a toll on the underside of my truck. Turns out both my uniballs on the TC UCAs were shot, and squeaky as all hell.

After some deliberation about swapping UCAs, it just seemed logical to spend the money to replace the uniballs in these instead.

Shout out to https://www.polyperformance.com/

I ordered these Thursday, with the free ground shipping I got them Saturday. That’s amazing.​

Since Every truck project of mine has taken longer than I thought for various reasons recently (mostly rust, FUCK YOU WISCONSIN). I told my wife I’d need between 2 and 6 hours today to do the work. It might have been five. Should have been 2.

Clips were rusted to the uniballs, spacers were seized to each other or to the ball or to the spindle. Battery tray settled a little Under the weight of the heavy ass AGM batter and made it hard to get the UCA bolt in and out. When I mounted a finished UCA to the truck, the clip was facing the wrong way and sheered off a little piece of a spacer, so I had to take that side all apart and reseat the clip. Had to sand and paint the under side rim of the UCAs since they were rusted. On and one.


Thank god I only have to do that every two or three years. Also that shit is expensive. $290 for the uniballs, the uniball tools, the bushings.



Mid day beer to motivate me...

 

Added RCI steel full skids! Now to take her out and scratch them up!

 

What's the rock catcher on the skid for?

 

Rock catcher? I did notice I forgot to take the stock tow point loop thing off, which I will. Otherwise there aren’t really any rock catchers on the skids. Plus I had my exhaust rerouted and have the smoother belly skid plate option because of it. These skids seem pretty smooth to me. Since I’m not a fabricator I live with the options on the market...

Were you talking about the little bump under the front diff? It’s smoother than it looks in my pic.

this pic is stolen from the RCI website

 

Yea that was it, it looked like it an add on bent piece only welded on two sides in the pic you showed first.

 

Yeah it’s hard to take pictures of a black truck or a black underside of a truck on a bright day. It’s a bump, but a smooth one. Anyways, it’s better than the beat to shit stock skid plates that’s for damn sure. I did notice my LCAs and transmission cross member are a little beat up... hopefully these will help.

 

Wired up this little blue sea 12v fuse panel so I would have a place to plug in the new fridge!

+5 Glamping points
(Yes it’s slightly crooked... perhaps I should have measured it first?

 

+50 glamping points achieved!


Installed and did a test run of my Overland Vehicle Systems Nomadic Awning 270 today! So damn big and so nice. Takes a minute and a half to set up and 2 minutes to take down. Seems super sturdy. This is going to make camping so much nicer...

Will do a review when we take it proper camping

 

Swapped the spherical bearings, spacers and clips on my King coilovers and rear shocks. Having all the right tools is so helpful (bearing press, clip pliers, impact wrench). I’m getting quite at breaking down and reinstalling my suspension.


Note the corrosion on the shock body and the rusted to hell bearing.

 

Mobtown OffRoad High Clearance rear bumper ​

Got this used form another member on TW, from VA. Had a whole big trip planned to go pick it up, but COVID, so we shortened our trip into an illogical route in a poorly planned trip with a bumper crammed in the back of the truck. The bumper sat in the back yard for weeks? Months? Until I could take care of a few other projects. Finally got it sandblasted and powder coated.

The install wasn’t so bad. I used the camper shell edge to draw a cut line. I think it turned out well, though, I can tell it slopes up towards the front. The bumper is leaned as far as possible to accommodate that. I cut it with a grinder and cut off wheel. Ground it down a little. Spray painted it and put a Trail Toys better edge trim.

Before:

Old bumper off:

Cutting line drawn (seems to slope up doesn’t it?)

Very clean looking cut!

Mounted and adjusted! Looks amazing!

 

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