Building the "BEAST"

That DO FJ plate bumper is fantastic... can't wait to see what ya get...

 

Hey Mike. Good to meet you also. My father-in-law lives out there and we're talking about going out there next year sometime. If we do I just might bring my truck with us and we can go hit some of those trails out there.

Take care and we'll see ya later.

 

Thank you very much.

 

It'll be different. We're not sure what we're going to come up with yet. But I'll post up pics as we build it.

 

Some pictures before I started putting everything back together again.

 

At the Gatekeeper in Calico.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiGNkBG6eAg

 

F'n A

 

Thanks

 

Ok, The trucks been in the shop for awhile now and i've finally been able to get to it. We did the rear end of the truck and now it's time for the front.

First, we need to lower the front of the truck down by two inches. On this truck the only way to do that is to redo the shock towers because the coils are turned all the way up.

First we did some measurements. We needed to move the mount point 2" higher in the engine bay an 1" out board to help clear the the frame at full droop.

Sitting in the shop waiting for somebody to pay it some attention.


Here are the old towers. They worked really well but it was incredibly hard to remove the shocks and they trapped water in the bottom..... so a new design was in order. I wanted something that was as strong if not stronger, didn't trap water, and was easy for me to remove the shocks without the need for three other people to help me.


Here is the start of the new towers. Now, alot of people are going to ask why we didn't just bend the tube instead of making a three piece hoop. The answer is space. We had to go high and tight into the engine bay, plus the orientation of the tube tabs required it to be a three piece design.




I used tube tabs from Ballistic Fab that totally circle the tube. This way you weld all the way around the tab and tube and it creates a stronger mount.


We needed to make sure nothing was going to move around so we added some supports.


Then we started the cross bars that cover the engine. We made these the same way we make all of them. With Camburg tube clamps so that we can still get to the engine.
This is the rear one. We don't have the front one done yet. When it is finished, the two will be tied together and we'll put something cool on the top. Yes... we started the truck and revved the engine to make sure that no vital parts touched the cross bar while the engine torques. Everything was fine.



..So next update will be the completed cross bar then it's time to remove the front axle and paint everything up front.

But before we do that, I thought I'd give you a teaser.



Here is the front plate bumper parts from our Fj Cruiser that we are making the Tacoma front bumper from. Please dont ask yet about a time frame... we're not sure yet. We're using my truck to get general demensoins from and then we'll tighten it up with a stock Taco. What we need now though is to see if someone out there has some stock fog lights from the stock front bumper that we can use to make sure they will work in our bumper. Let me know and stay tuned.

 

Wow Wyatt, thanks for keeping this post going this long. What a great way to spend from 3 in the morning to sunrise in Japan on a four-day weekend... Absolutely amazing truck. Hope to see it in person one day before I croak, that's how awesome it is...

 

ive got some stock fogs you can use

 

Cool. If you don't mind, pm me your info and Ill pay to have them shipped out here. Are you using them right now or are they sitting in your garage?

 

Thank you very much. We have alot of updates yet to do on m truck and on Dan's '02. We'll keep you informed

 

front bumper.....

 

Got to the shop and finished working on the shock towers and the cross bar.

These are the Camburg clamps that we used for alot of stuff on his truck that requires frames and such to be removed but also requires a strong fondation. Haven't found anything that is as clean and srong as these. They are a little pricey but they wrok really well.



Then we tacked on the front section and made sure everyhting fit.



We took it off after tacking on the center bars.


Then we added the center bars and welded everything up.



All finished. We were going to add something fancy in the midle but some times les is more, ( read tiger stripes )



When grade 8 just aint enough. F-911 bolts baby. I don't use anything else. On a coilover setup, these 1/2" bolts are what is holding the wieght of your truck and they better be strong. I don't recommend using anything less than grade 8 and I won't use anything but F-911 for this.


Test fit the shocks and still need to do alittle triming on the inner fender and then paint.



Now it's just waiting for paint. I'll be gone for three weeks so it's gonna sit for awhile. Maybe Jason will get the bumper going by then.

 

Oil filter looks fun to get out of there now

Looks good as always!!!!

 

Nope! Gots lots 'o room baby. Plus I can always just take the top off. Thats thereason for the Camburg Clamps.



P.S. Thank you

 

badass. Havent looked back at this thread for a while. The latest update was cool- I cant wait to see what you guys come up with for a bumper.....

 

i didnt even know a "f-911" bolt existed