Madjik Man's laugh-at/with-him "build"

I was going to do a 95-97 grille/headlights/etc with an 01-04 bumper and valence.

I'll start with the grille swap first and see if I'm motivated, or desiring, to do the 01-04 bumper/valence.

 

Where did you find that cup holder center console??? I have hated the fact that my truck has no cup holders since the day I bought it. Also, does it line up right or did you have to customize it a bit?

 

Finally 5 minutes of this day not wasted. Good job man. Now I KNOW I'm not the only one with re-moditis.

 

I bought that cup holder/center console assembly from a member here.

It's from an 01-04 with bucket seats.

It will line up perfectly with the 98 shifter trim. You just have to make sure to get the 01-04 bracket that attaches it to the tranny hump. The holes in said bracket will line up perfectly with the holes in the tranny hump.

The only customization I did was paint/dye it black and upgraded the cup holder tabs: http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/1st-gen-tacomas/14384-cup-holder-thingies-2.html

Thanks

 

Looking good man! Glad I could help out, those ribs were absolutely killer btw!

 

Man, I'm so grateful you drove these badboys all the way here. Glad you liked the ribs... it's the least I could do.

If you ever get sliders and need someone to weld them on hit me up... the guy who did mine was unbelievable.

Good "seeing" you again.

 

Hey Madjik, while you had the panels out of the rear of the truck for dying, did you happen to notice if you can get to the vent that goes through the rear wall used for controlling cabin air pressure? Mines broken and rattles like hell especially when I shut the pass. door. Im trying to get at it without moving the bed box back. Any insight would be most appreciated

 

You can access it behind the rear quarter panel.

But honestly, there's nothing to break on it... it's just formed metal that creates a hole.

I fixed a couple of rattles in that rear quarter area. The rattles originated when I shut my doors also.

The mechanism for the forward most seatbelts (for the driver/passenger in front) rattles whenever you shut the door. It's mostly from the actual gears and shit on the side of the mechanism. I took some BXT II mat (equivalent of dynamat) and secured the shit out of that thing without affecting the seat belt retraction. That helped a lot.

The other rattle is literally between the outer skin and inner skin of the rear quarter panel body.... right where the striker is. If you reach in through the rear speaker cavity, you can feel the two pieces of body (outer and inner) come to a point where they are almost touching. Whenever I shut my doors it would create enough of a jostle to have those two points of metal hit each other. I just stuffed some Ensolite (sound deadening foam) between those two points along the entire jamb.

Hopefully that helps.

But to answer your question: yes you can access those cabin pressure vents from behind the rear quarter panel trim. The vents are in the lower corners of the cab. In order to take the rear quarter panel trim off you have to remove the rear wall trim panel, fabric cushion thing, and rear seats first.

 

sweet thanks, thought you might know before i tear into the rear panels and trim. Yeah when I shut the passenger door the vent blows completely free and rattles against the bed box! Pain in the ass to say the least

 

I like all the little mods. I wish i was at that point in my build cause those are the fun things. Lights, Painting the small detail stuff.

Love the truck, Looks like a fun project.

 

Thanks a lot man.

It's been fun for sure.

Good things to come tomorrow....

 

Everything is back together. This spring I will replace the carpet with a dark charcoal gray option (and then paint the rear cup holder platform) and will definitely take my upper dash panel out and paint that. After that, the entire interior will be blacked out (charcoal for carpet).

I can't get decent pictures of the a-pillars and oh shit handles... just use your imagination

So to recap:

I took out every trim panel in the truck, disassembled them, either painted or dyed them all, sound deadened the rear wall and both door panels (and strategic areas of the rear quarter panels), installed a new head unit, new front speakers and an amp to power them, then put everything back together.























Sound deadened the back of the kicker panel:






Put a thin seal of ensolite foam on the backside of the speaker brackets to prevent rattles:

 

Tomorrow these bad boys are going in... hopefully

 

what kind of seats are those?

 

2005 Subaru Forester XT

 

Very jealous!!! Looks great!!!

 

All I have to say is 45acp is a sick bastard (that's an endearing term where I come from).

I give all credit to him for thinking of the best way (safety, strength, least way to fuck with the Subaru seats, etc) to mount up the new seats.

Not only was his plan genius but his execution was insane. There is no f'in way... read: 0% chance I could ever pull this off. This was all 45acp.

This was a huge undertaking and while I had every intention of detailing a great walkthrough with many pictures, that simply just didn't happen due to circumstance. So I am just trying to recap off the top of my head... and it's a little tough because he just left after spending two nights here. In fact he tried sneaking out early morning and I'm a little heartbroken and my eyesight is blurred from tears.

Okay.... first and foremost if you're like me and don't know wtf you're doing, don't do this. There is a point in the swap where you've gone past the point of no return and could end up with your stock seats unable to mount back in and the new seats not able to mount up.

The seats: 2005 Subaru Forester XT bucket seats. Driver's side = 3-way power adjust, passenger side = manual. Both are heated.

When we first set the Subby seats in the truck, they sat WAY higher than OEM and at best we'd get one mount on the seats to line up with the mounting holes on the truck. I'm 6'0 (190 lbs, blue eyes, good cook, clean, romantic.... how yoodoin'?) and the new height of these seats just would not be comfortable, safe or desirable. So 45acp decided that cutting the tracks off the Tacoma buckets and welding them on to the bottom of the Subaru seat rails was our best bet.

Here he is figuring it out. You can just see the genius juice coursing through his veins in this picture.



Since this was going to be a long, sweaty and intimate project (if you know what I mean, Monte).... first thing you have to do is take a picture of your trucks holding hands. You jelly Monte?



Then 45acp began cutting the tracks off the Tacoma seats. Never once did I doubt his plan or skills.... except when he'd look at me and give me his signature ambiguous "heh, heh" laugh. Which was very frequently, actually. I've come to learn that that laugh signifies victory.



Once all four tracks were removed from the Tacoma, 45acp essentially ground them down until they would all sit flush with the bottom of the Subaru seat rails. Here's one of the modded Tacoma tracks to give you an idea



Then it came time to cutting off the tracks/mounts of the Subby seats



Bottom of Subby seat



Then 45acp welded the Tacoma tracks onto the bottom of the Subby seats. This sounds simple but this was a VERY intensive process. Lots of custom fitting on the bottom of the Subby rails. Too much to detail. Then lots of test fitting in the truck to make sure everything lines up, make sure the seat slides along the rails without binding, more test fitting, etc.. I think the first time we did this process (passenger side) it took us about an hour and half.

Finally, once confident we had everything lined up, 45acp welded the tracks onto the seats. Diligent heat management will ensure your rails don't warp. If they do the seats will bind when trying to adjust them. 45acp's engineering is awesome. Tack welds, beads, rosette welds, relief holes for pins/bolts on the bottom of the Subby seats, etc..



Then take the seat and mount it in the truck. Subby seats on top of your stock Tacoma tracks:



Then do the same as above for the driver's side



We were lucky I still had my previous battery sitting in the garage. We tapped into the motor assembly on the bottom of the drivers seat and would hook it up to the battery so we could adjust the seat (in the fitting processes). Once we saw that the seat wouldn't bind when installed, we adjusted the seat to my driving position and just left it until I can get it hooked up permanently.

Things of note that may or may not affect your swap:

1. The powered seat had little plastic inserts inside the Subby rails. Our best guess is that they are stabilizers for the seat when you are adjusting them. We got lucky during assembly because one popped out. 45acp realized that we need to take them all out before welding because they'd have melted and we'd have been fucked. This is the type of thinking you need to be equipped with to pull something off like this. I freely admit, I do not have this kind of insight

2. Apparently the heat from the welding breaks down the grease/lube inside the rails. They still move fine but you will definitely need to grease them back up. Tomorrow I'll go buy some wheel bearing grease and go to town.


So now I have Subaru Forester XT seats in my truck... sitting at stock height. I am so friggen stoked.

Yeah, yeah... I'll get some pictures of them in the truck. We finished last night at midnight or so and quite frankly I'm too heartbroken right now. If I were to go look at the seats I'd instantly flashback to all the fond memories 45acp and I had and it would just make it worse

 

Yeah we had a fire or two... thankfully on the damp towels we laid down over the carpet.

btw - is that Liberace in your avatar?

 

Gotta forgive me for how dirty the interior is. Since the tear apart I haven't cleaned it.