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

New cowling and some rubber bits.

 

Cleaned up the engine bay. Radiator cracked a bit ago, replaced it and needed to get the coolant off everything.

Before





After

 

Also tried out Cerakote (one of many ceramic trim restorers).

We’ll see how it fares/lasts. The mirrors aren’t nearly as glossy looking in person. But more glossy than the flares. The flares have a nice matte (maybe a bit more sheen) finish. The mirrors are somewhere between semi-gloss and gloss.

Also, the after pic of the flares was taken too soon. They dried completely and streak free.

 

What’s the need for the limit straps? I’ve got Solo’s, think they’re great, haven’t seen any issues, but just had them for the summer. Is the issue upper/lower ball joint? Over flexing cv’s?

 

If the truck is a pavement princess, there’s really no need for limit strap. But regardless, if I’m running expensive $2-3k coilovers, I wouldn’t want the coilovers to full extend and become the limiting factor. Over time, that’s how they break. Creating a buffer zone of .50-.75 to reduced travel prolong the life of the coilovers from stress.

 

Protecting your coilovers, as the Solo’s (specifically the poly bushings) will allow the suspension to droop past the max coilovers length. That in turn yanks on the coil bucket, resulting in this lovely bit of fun:

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...-what-cracks-next.631359/page-2#post-21685153

@Digiratus

 

Not sure if that was the incident that led to him selling the coilovers…

…but they live on my truck now.

 

As has been mentioned, the straps will hopefully help to prevent the coil bucket metal fatigue that I experienced. They transfer that yanking force to the frame.

The thread that Dan linked to should be a wake-up call to anyone who uses their truck hard.

Nice! Glad to see you put them to good use.

 

I've had good luck without limits straps with solo lcas. But I think ymmv based on how you use the truck. I do more slower speed crawling kind of stuff. Most quality shocks do have internal top out bumpers as well which help a little.

 

Interesting, something to consider for sure. After my trip through Oregon, plenty of whoops, drops, etc, imagine that’s a good justification. Most of what we do is lower speed with the camper on now, but still plenty of hitting the access roads at 30 mph plus.

Still no one who makes a good coil gusset?

I wanted to get a set of the ones @Reh5108 was making, but he stopped producing them.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/1st-gen-coilbucket-gussets.717465/

 

That was world-class fun for sure.

I would not wish that fun on anyone.

 

I was trying to find pictures of the rebuild, all I have is a video of you starting it back up on Dec 1, 2019 after putting the engine back in.

 

Eimkeith makes some for the top, but it is still possible to break with them if you beat on it.

Check it frequently, gusset it, or add limit straps if you want to avoid it.

 

Hey that cowl looks great, where did you score that at and how much bucks.

 

You could definitely make your own, given all the other stuff you’ve fabricated. It’s a pain in the dick to get in there and fully weld them on with the engine in, but doable.

 

Whelp, took a while to make these rock sliders. This is the drivers side welded on with a bit more finish welding and paint left to go.
To tuck them up just a bit more I banged over the pinch weld...parts of that are really strong. Really stout, with four mounting points and angle brackets per side.

 

That looks really good

 

Here are a few...

 

Times coming, body and engine swap- that’ll be the time. @Reh5108 already did the work, I was like, please, take my money.

Good lord that looks like a pain in the ass. Awesome finished product, but oof

 

I am very fortunate to have some great friends who dove in to make it all happen. Many, many weekends with long hours.

A coil bucket failure today would be the end for most as the passenger side bucket is now unobtainium.