Slash's "Budget" Built Trail Limo and BS, Now with Polls!

Done

 

Got one of these to help with driving habits and the trans temp settings. Need to set up the trans temp and eng temp. See if I cant replace the bottom left with that and swap tte to dte on the bottom right.

 

So I calculated my MPG difference to be MPGx1.068 to compensate for the tire size difference. I'm not sure how UltraGauge calculates, but at the pump I'll be able to determine it using this.

 

Also for those who don't know what ATR is, It's Appalachian Trail Roundup. A charity Even at Windrock Park Tennessee. Offroading Aug 31st through Sep 4th, Labor Day weekend. It used to be called Appalachian Toyota Roundup, but they wanted to make it open to all this year. You can even rent SxSs if you want to. Registration opened in June and closed July 31st. I forget off hand what the costs are, but it's around $500 for My wife, my Truck and I to go and camp for the whole time. The price includes raffle entries and food vouchers, and according to @CygnusX191 the STL crew cleans house most times. @Sasquatch3153 is bringing the SKI and possibly trail lunchables so it should be a good time.

@mcharfauros you going this time?

 

Trails we did in Colorado. It was a vacation first and foremost so the trails were a secondary thing, so not much to report.

Slaughterhouse Gulch Trail Colorado 7/9/23
Was a firewood permit area with a sweet offroad trail deep in the woods. I have a video to edit and upload eventually.










Even let @gasparic104 drive a bit.



Skyline - Canon City, CO 7/12/23
It's a fully paved road that winds up the side of a short mountain range and then rides along the crest of it. Pretty neat at points where there's only a few feet to either side of the road before it's a long way down.








Phantom Trail - CO 7/12/23
Super neat dirt road through the valleys of some smaller Mountains including Nipple Peak.
Tons of permit camping spots if you get a permit to camp anywhere.

 

What is it? Thinking about the same to watch trans temp when using for work.

 

UltraGauge MX. Its the only one that you can get to the Manufacturers code for the Transmission Pan and Torque Converter temps. I wanted it for long trips, so I could monitor the trans. Bonus benefit of making me drive more conservedly. Have gotten mpg up to 18.



Buy it, its 104 shipped. And have it preprogrammed to 2005-2011 (closest option for me), you'll have to manually adjust m codes 4 and 5 to get it to read on 12-15 models.

I missed a setting so the trans was in Celsius in this photo. Fixed now.

 

Thanks, never heard of the MX model. Of course I have a 13 lol

 

Went to leave work yesterday and the damn truck wouldn't start. I put the key in, everything lights up, radio on, go to crank, dead. I'm scratching my head, coworker comes up and jumps me and it starts, barely. I check the UltraGauge and it's reading 13v so the alternator is good. Get home, shut it off, see if it will go, no dice. Get out the voltmeter, everything is checking 13 volts from the battery. Fuse box has 13v. So now I'm thinking my ignition is bad. Notice some pretty blue crystals have taken up residence on my battery terminal. I figure, maybe thats it, go to loosen the nut. CRACK. The whole terminal goes in half...
A parts run in the beater 03 corolla and some modification of the stupid terminal (because they made the smaller ID negative terminal with the right sized bolt/nut for the cables, while the larger positive terminal has a tiny bolt...) and we're back in business. Drove fine today without any issues.

 

https://sdhqoffroad.com/collections...hq-built-complete-billet-battery-terminal-kit

 

Yep, been thinking about ordering them up.

Also ordered new lower coilover bolts since apparently that's what the clicking noise is in the front that I'd been attributing to the LCAs/Cams all this time. The OEM bolt is tapered and allows some play.

 

That sucks. Rigged up a new terminal years ago to get a friend on the road. Told him to get real parts later. Lol

 

Perhaps I need that too

 

So a little over a week ago, my wife and I were talking about how I need a daily driver. Somehow we got to talking about those little Kei trucks, which got me going down a rabbit hole. Now I've convinced myself I need a 96-98 Daihatsu Hijet, am going to Nashville to test drive a few of them as well as other keis to see if I fit, and am talking to a guy in Oklahoma who's got one for sale with a 'new' engine in it... I've also started researching importing one to fit my tastes as almost all of them stateside were imported to be UTVs and are all 4x4, which isn't the worst, but when you're trying to get a 660cc engine up to highway speed the extra weight doesn't help! I also went down the rabbit hole of even seeing if my state would title it, and after numerous mixed reports from the internet, I got in touch with a few locals that own them and are titled up and running around the state. I started talking myself out of it when thinking about sourcing parts, since they aren't exactly on the shelf at Oreilly's. I've been following a guy with a similar model on the Mini truck forums that's been picking through his and replacing and repairing parts and his process in sourcing them, so I'm a little less worried about it. If the crap hits the fan, I could always just throw the engine out of a US market motorcycle, atv or snowmobile in it. Seems pretty easy to swap with a welder and time since the bed just comes off with a couple bolts and the frame is totally open afterwards. The main part of the engine you sit over and the seats fold up and the shifter assembly also can fold up as it's all cable driven, so you get total access, albeit a bit cramped, to the engine. These things run on little 1l 3cyl engines and come in either a 4MT or a 5MT and for me the 5MT is the only way I can comfortably cruise at 60mph. (The 6MT tops out at 81 in the Daihatsu Hijet)

Stateside Purchase at a dealer = Easy, titled. Expensive...
Stateside used = Cheap, already here. May not be titled, which can make things difficult...
Import = Cheaper than a stateside dealer, much more involved. Though the hard stuff you can find a broker for. I have a line on a guy my friend used to import his Honda Wagon.

To make a long story short, I'm crazy. I got the itch for something weird and interesting to drive and now I'm sitting in a hole of excitement that may or may not pan out. Otherwise I'll be driving the beater 03 Corolla that for some reason I despise. I think it's the paint color, or the fact its BORING. My whole life I've been interested in Japanese cars, but then I got into off-roading and I won't let that go either. Now that I have the offroad adventure vehicle, I want something to street around in that's not something that doesn't bring me smile to drive.

Hopefully I test drive these things and I hate them and then I can move on.

My name's Josh, and I have a car problem.

 

I just keep thinking to myself, you are gonna be wearing it like a shirt.

 

Yeah, jury's out till I actually sit in and drive one. If my knees are firmly in the dash, I'm not gonna want it, regardless of how funny and/or fun it'd be. Plus I know it'd probably end up with me wanting to motorcycle/snowmobile swap it into something with a little more displacement. Which then turns budget shitbox commuter status into second moneypit and I don't need that

Now... If we negotiate a good bit of a raise in March.... Might be a different story. If things were less tight, things could be more fun. Although, at that point I'd be looking into upgrading to a house with a larger garage or land to build, depending on how soon we could cut our mortgage down and find something. Of course in todays housing market that seems like a pipedream too. I just want 10 foot ceilings minimum in my garage and outlets instead of an extension cord running the entire length of the ceiling!! I don't feel like that's a hard ask, but it seems like when houses around here were built, only one guy designed them and he drove a MG midget and was only 4' tall and never did any work in the garage.

 

Everyone cracks up that if it in my wife’s car. It’s a blast honestly.

 

Small cars are very underrated with the truck and SUV boom we're experiencing right now

 

I’m 6’2 kinda slim. Few believe what see when I get out from driving it. Toyota quality. It’s a go cart on wheels. We bought it years ago trading in an unreliable Jeep that I was wrenching on almost every other weekend practically. It even broke down on me during a trip and I fixed in an auto parts lots with the family and kiddo in the car. Reliability of Toyota has impressed me for sure. I know they aren’t perfect, but sure are better than most by far lol.

 

'Calibrated' the Ultra Gauge on my last fill up and now the AVG won't budge from 15, which is less than the truck calculates on fuelly with the odometer as is. I need to poke around and see how it pulls distance and see why it thinks I'm barely moving. The other odd thing is the instant I can keep higher than 15 everywhere but from a stop and heavy uphill, so it's strange it's not going up.