BLP's 2021 TRD OR 6MT

Woah talk about a busy day

 

Nah it’s not all in one day. Just don’t have time to update this thread all the time so I do it in bursts. That’s probably 2 weeks of updates. Everything has happened within about 1.5 months.

 

OEM Spare Tire Lock

I saw this accessory and figured why not. I don't have a lot to protect, but it was pretty cheap so I went ahead and picked it up. It's basically a little thing that pops into the spare tire hoist which snaps into place and has a keyed end on it. It is made by McGard and uses a McGard Key to operate it, similar to a lugnut. The key snaps onto the factory end piece that operates the spare tire.

Not much to say about it other than it's a simple piece that does its job and installs easily. In the case that someone maybe wanted my spare tire, now they will struggle to get it.

 

Rigid Industries 360-Series SAE Selective Yellow Fog Lights


After having the Rigid D-Series Yellow SAE fog lights on my Frontier, I knew I wanted something from Rigid for my Tacoma as well. Enter the 360 series SAE kit. It is similar to the old D series but with new and improved optics, better finished installation looks (more OEM looking), and naturally a higher price!

D-Series



360-Series



I think the 360s look much better! I reached out to Sidetracked offroad on here, who sells Rigid products for nice discounts. I got a very good discount and pulled the trigger on them.

I received them yesterday and got to work. The install was simple following the supplied instructions. You install a few adapter pieces onto the lights which allow them to bolt into the bumper. You terminate the wiring using a weatherpack style crimper which crimps the seals and the terminals. Test the wiring on the truck to figure out which is positive and negative: in my case green was positive and black/white was negative, so my red Rigid wire was installed to line up with the green and the Rigid black wire to match the truck's black/white wire.

Verify the lights work, tie up the wiring slack, and you're good to go.

Overall super happy with these lights. They look sharp, they have the right pattern, and knowing Rigid quality they should last a super long time. They're going to look awesome in combination with the OEM LED headlights once I get those!

 

Ecoological Body Color Rear Bumper Caps

When I saw these, I knew I had to have them. They were out of stock a while, so I had to wait a bit but I noticed they were back in stock so I ordered them. They go right over the chrome caps and cover them perfectly. Install was simple, about 2 minutes per side.

I have to say, they are a damn close match for being painted off of a paint code. I am good with how close the paint matches for sure, especially since the bed is metal and the shells are plastic (paint turns out different on each). I'd say this one is a win.

What I want to do with these next is cut out holes and mount Rigid SRQ backup lights to delete the Meso hitchpod and Baja S1.

 

New Tires - 265/65R17 Toyo Open Country ATIII

I knew when I bought the truck that the tires on it were not going to stay on it very long. The PO put on TRD wheels and LT265/70R17 Load E KO2s. While they looked sharp, that was where my happiness with them ended. They didn't have very good traction, they rode a bit rough, got horrible gas mileage and had poor traction in the rain. I really do not see why people like KO2s so much.

After doing a lot of research and going back and forth, I decided on the Toyo ATIIIs. These tires had outstanding reviews on this forum, there were a few good threads dedicated to them. I opted to go with the stock equivalent diameter for a few reasons:

1) Lighter weight (16 lbs less per tire) - better mpg/acceleration
2) smaller diameter for slightly more power to the ground - negligible but still slightly noticeable
3) better handling and ability to run the stock mud flaps with no rub

I know it's not the "coolest" choice to go with smaller tires over larger ones, but I was confident in my decision and so far I am thrilled with the results. These tires are SO smooth, very quiet, handle extraordinarily well and look fantastic. They are really all I can ask for. I truly hope they hold up well so I can trust in buying these in the future again. So far initial impressions are great. I absolutely can feel these tires being easy to drive, lugging the engine less down low, being a bit peppier to drive the truck, and cruising the highway easier for sure. Time will tell on the exact mpg but so far it is for sure better by at least a little bit.

I was concerned the small tire would look funny but honestly they do not look small to me at all - very proportional with the truck. I always thought the larger size actually looked a bit stuffed in there.







I was waiting on these tires to decide if I want to regear the truck or not. If I regear it, it would be for the 4.88 ratio. I am a lot less in the "need to regear" court now after the tires, however I do think the regear would make the truck that much better to drive, so the plan is still to regear it, however that plan is less urgent now so I will push it a bit. The main things I'm trying to improve are 2nd gear and reverse. After improving those too, the regear will just make every other gear more fun and peppy. So far I still seem to have about the same mpg in 5th vs 6th, so I really don't see a regear hurting my mpg much as I'll still be cruising lower rpm than my current 5th gear. I would be revving about 2750 at 70, and 3150 at 80. So I think the regear is still on the table.

Since I have pushed the regear a bit further back, I have gone ahead and pulled the trigger on OEM LED Headlights. Pretty excited for those, will post once I have them. I also have a Miller CatShield on the way, as well as a TRD skid plate and black lettering for it. I also went ahead and ordered a metal oil filter housing too, seen too many questionable experiences with the plastic, just don't want to have problems so I'm going metal.

 

Nice truck, super tasteful mods so far.

Still happy with your tune? And your experience with Alex? I'm in DFW as well with a 6MT and am ready for a tune.

 

Thanks! Yeah I am happy with the tune. I have ordered 4.88 gears. I think once I install them (february) I’m going to have him dial back the throttle to spicy or medium just to see how it is. My throttle is pretty jumpy on super spicy, it can get annoying after a while. Alex was good to deal with, spent like 4 hours with him because he really wanted me to try multiple options and then drive his truck for comparison.

I’m not sure if it’s the tune or not but it’s hard for me to gas the truck from coasting and not get a driveline clunk. I think it’s that touchy throttle kicking in quickly because if I really lightly gas it it doesn’t happen. And I don’t remember stock doing that. I just think with low gears, I won’t really have a reason for such an aggressive throttle anymore.

you’re welcome to try driving mine before doing yours if you want to swing by Plano.

 

Power and gearing, Nissan for sure. for "nice" feel, Toyota. If I could find a nice condition Frontier or Xterra 6 speed that I knew wasn't a piece of crap, I'd easily switch back. Driving the Frontier was just too fun. The toyota is pretty lame on power delivery. Aftermarket on the Toyota is way better at least. But that isn't everything. I was still able to do what I wanted on the Frontier, I just had to be more creative like with wiring projects and such.

 

I don't update this thread much anymore, mostly due to time and laziness, but I did want to talk a bit about to upcoming project....regear day!

Back in June, I reached out to @Texoma (Triple C Chop Shop) about regearing my truck. I decided to pull the trigger and scheduled for his nearest day, Feb 4 2023. It has been a long 7ish months. Not only was the wait long and difficult, but it gave me a lot of time to decide and re-decide on the route I wanted to take. I initially chose 4.88 gears and said I would stick to stock tires. I'm really not a big tire guy as I don't want to do the work to fit them and I don't need them...i.e., there are very few benefits and pretty much all cons to me running a larger tire besides stock. I ordered the 4.88's and planned to use them.

A month or so later, I made the decision to go with 5.29 instead to get the most gear change for my buck. It's not an inexpensive project and I'd hate to regret the decision. The plan was to also step up the tires from 265/65R17 (30.6") to 265/70R17 (31.6"). 4.88 absolutely would be a solid choice on the 30.6s, but if I ever changed my mind on tires or anything later, I'd regret all the money I spent on them.

5.29s on 31.6" tires will be a bit revvy, about 2900 rpm at 70. This is actually right where 5th gear lands in stock form, so I basically threw away my stock 6th gear in exchange for much better low end performance. I think that will be ok. I'm a 70-80 mph driver, which means 2900-3300 rpm. MPG will likely take a small hit but not much worse than it already is. For the most part, my mpg is the same in 5th vs 6th gear anyways.

Another factor in this gear change is that eventually I want to run the Hilux Transmission (RC60F or RC61F) instead of the stock RC62F. The reason for that is gears 1-3 are shorter (higher rpm) and 5-6 are taller (lower rpm) making for even more low end performance while making the highway rpm lower which makes the highway cruise reasonable while having fantastic performance overall.

Stock RC62F Ratios:

1 - 3.982
2 - 2.017
3 - 1.321
4 - 1.000
5 - 0.848
6 - 0.713
R - 3.385

Hilux RC61F Ratios:

1 - 4.784
2 - 2.423
3 - 1.443
4 - 1.000
5 - 0.777
6 - 0.646
R - 4.066

I will also be running on the 265/65s I have for a little bit until I get new tires. That will be about 3000 at 70 and 3200 at 75. I'll probably cruise those speeds until I get the larger tires. It will be a wheelie popper but it will also be enjoyable.

4.30 and Stock Tires



5.29 and 31.6" Tires



5.29, 31.6", and RC61F Hilux Transmission



As you can see, the Hilux transmission would significantly boost low end performance in 2nd and 3rd gear. 1st would nearly be a granny, while 2nd would be good enough to start in. 3rd could be used at low speed, and 4th will be the same. Then into 5th and 6th for slightly better highway gears than stock (higher rpm but not over the top). Combined with 5.29 gears though?? Pure awesomeness. Not to mention reverse, which would be a HUGE improvement from both the 5.29s and going from a trans ratio of 3.39 to 4.07. It ends up being like a 50% gear reduction for reverse alone.

Even if the Hilux trans doesn't pan out ($$$ and need to immediately tear down the new transmission out of the box to install the correct input shaft), I will still know that I got the best gearing I could get on my stock trans and I'll have tires that look good and will balance it out decently. Like I said, it will rev a bit on the highway but that's fine, the V6 does not care at all and at least it will perform really well.

Can't wait for Feb 4th!

 

gonna be a good day.

 

I'll be interested to hear how you like the 5.29's with the manual. I've got the 31.6" tires with the 6 speed as well.

 

I’ll for sure post an update! I’ll be on the stock size tires (Toyo ATIII) for a while, my plan is to run them down since they’re at the point where they wouldn’t recoup me much dollhairs if I stepped up to new tires and sold the old. But, since the performance isn’t that different between the 1”, my experiences with the stock tires will mostly be relevant to your tires anyways.

I expect it will be a blast to drive.

 

Did you ever get tuned by Alex?

 

Not yet. I spoke with him a couple weeks ago though. Hoping to get it done next month.

 

Cool. I had forgotten you were the one asking about him a while back. Since you’re local, the offer still stands if you want to try out the gearing. Hell after my gears are done if you were curious to try out the 5.29s on your tires, you could swap them to my truck if you had some time.

But either way I’ll be posting my experiences for sure.

 

Yeah, I need to quit putting it off and make an appointment. Thanks man, definitely appreciate the offer. I may take you up on it if I'm ever up that way, unfortunately I'm about as far away as possible from you while still being in the metroplex.

Excited to hear about the gears and future mods. We have a lot of the same stuff done. Did you ever install the rear footwell lights? I have the fronts but haven't come across a rear mounting option I love yet

 

I did not. I never have passengers back there at night anyways and if I do I don’t really care about them enough to make that a priority so they’re still in the box. I do plan to get to it eventually. I think @Tacospike bought some other light from VLEDS for his tundra or taco that used the same style plug in and he flush mounted it to the console or something. Might want to look that up, I think he talked about it in the footwell thread. I’ll likely do the same thing he did whenever I feel like dealing with it. I love those footwell lights, they work great.

After this I honestly don’t have a lot left. Some audio and sound deadening, the tire change, maybe a Hilux trans, a few aux lights and the rest is basically maintenance and driving it.

 

The fronts are one of my favorite mods so far, very high quality kit. I'll have to check out the flush mounted rear lights, thanks.

I actually have my whole interior out right now, I spent the day sound deadening the floor and back wall. Plan to do the doors and finish installing the puddle pods tomorrow. Not the most fun mod to do,my fingers have seen better days. Hopefully worth it though

 

I never came back to this thread just because I’m bad at updating it, but I really like the 5.29s. I’m on stock size tires for now still, but the plan is ultimately LT255/75R17 C (32.05”). Will balance out the gears a bit without bringing me too close back to stock. I really like how it performs now and don’t want the tires to negate it too much.

Mpg took a small hit for now but I don’t care, the performance boost is worth it. Reverse alone is considerably better. Still kind of want to do the Hilux transmission, and that may be in the works eventually, but not for now.