My Saf-T-Cap experience

Just installed Saf-T-Caps on my ‘02 Tacoma and wanted to share my experience with someone. Lord knows my wife doesn’t care, she thinks I’m a dumbass for buying it.

Luckily I know a guy with a shop that is fully stocked. If I ran into a problem, he had a tool for it. I really don’t think I’d have been able to do this without him. And he wouldn’t accept payment. He’s a great human being.

Anyway, here’s some photos. I’m not the most internet savvy individual and I’m doin this from my phone so hopefully this isn’t a jumbled mess.



here we are removing the bed with a Lull. Made it easy.
Here she is in all her rusty glory

Here’s my good friend torching off the old leaf spring perches

This is after most of my grinding and wire wheeling. If you look about halfway down the frame you can see where the jackass who owned it before me welded in a patch and then covered it with body filler and undercoat to hide it. There were half a dozen holes filled with bondo I uncovered. It was depressing.

This is the pile of rust I removed. It’s 2 feet long, a foot wide and 4 inches deep. I had cut a 4-5” long hole in each side of the bottom of frame just behind the rear cab mount. Then attached a 5 foot piece of brake line to a blow tip on a massive compressor and started at the front of the truck and just blew out massive piles of rust that had built up inside the frame. It was crazy how much came out.

Here I am dry fitting the caps.

Here’s some caps welded on. All you pros, don’t laugh at my welds. This is not something I do on the daily and doing this myself was the only way I could afford the repairs.

here they are all welded up and coated with black fluid film. I installed new leaf springs and shocks as well. I also drilled a few 5/8” drain holes in the forward section of the frame. Honestly the biggest pain in the ass was getting the bushings in the leaf spring perches. Inner bushing on the rear perches just would not cooperate. I chamfered the tube on the perch and chamfered the bushing itself and lubed everything to hell and it still would only go in halfway. I eventually just tightened up the bars on the hanger and mashed it in there best I could. I expect it’s gonna wear out prematurely. I fluid filmed the entire frame, inside and out. She’s ready to take on Ohio salty roads! It’s just such a relief to have this done.

 

Having friends like that is always good.

I hope you can return the favor when he really needs an extra hand or 2

 

Since he wouldn’t take any money, I told him that when I left yesterday. He owns his own crane business and I’m sure he’s gonna have a side job and need a ground guy/laborer at some point that I can repay him with. If we’re comparing apples to apples I’ll have to do 5 weekends to make it a fair trade lol

 

Damn Ohio Roads ate mine up too.
Mine has turned into a restoration. I just don’t know when to stop.

 

Right on. Well done!

 

They all turn into a labor of love.

If you really looked at the numbers we put into these Trucks people would think we are all nuts!

 

Very impressive! Well worth the extra effort.

 

Just lookin at the thumbnail in your profile and that frame looks pretty good. Is it original?

 

Yes it is.

 

taking forever I’ll never let it get wet again lol

 

Rusty taco that look absolutely amazing. What did you do to the frame to make it look so dang good?

 

Holy cow dude... You can see yourself in those valve covers!!

 

Yeah that engine looks brand new.

 

I pretty much started off like you did although I only Safe T capped where the front of the leaf springs mount. I replaced both of the rear crossmembers they were pretty bad. I pulled the cab because I was going to go through the engine and decided pulling would give me access to the rest of the frame.
I needle scaled every inch of the frame. Then washed it and used rust converter.
Painted with etching primer then just painted it black.
I’m a year in but, I can’t work on it every day. Probably average a few hours a week because of Work, waiting on parts or, something else come up.
Thanks for the kind words! Yours turned out great!

 

WOW!!!!, very impressive on both Trucks. They should give both of you years of enjoyment.

 

I'm a beginner myself so I can't laugh at your welds... But can I critique them? They are convex as hell and they look way too cold, like you didn't weld into the parent steel but deposited the wire on top of the surface. It looks like you rushed it where the legs are too narrow, or it's possible the wire feed speed was to low and the voltage was too low. I'm not experienced enough to say whether you reinforced the frame or just hung some thick plates on it for decoration.