Building the Golden shitbox

Picked up a 96 reg cab 4x4 about 3 weeks ago, it was a little rough but the body has 255k and the motor has 30k with new clutch. I’m gonna document my new to me daily/camping rig.




Here is what I’ve done so far or will be done by Friday 02/08/19 still waiting in parts and the current blizzard conditions are just slowing everything down.

1. Rack and pinion with new outter tie rods and poly rack bushings
2. Both cv axles
3. Transfer case output shaft seal
4. Changed all fluids.
5. Complete OME kit with 882’s, nitrochargers and Dakars
6. 33x12.5r15 BFG KM2
7. 50 sq ft of 80 mil noico sound deadening to cover the cab
8. Vinyl flooring form Aardvark motors
9. Abs plastic door panels
10. Corbeau JP seats and brackets
11. Body lift removal

Coming down the pipe soon
1. Custom center console
2. Front pads/rotors, rear shoes, drums and wheel cylinders
3. Trail gear front bumper w/ warn
4. Trail gear sliders
5. 4.56 gears
6. Trail gear flatbed kit

 

First thing I did was strip down the inside to hunt down the rust. Smelled like a mix of spilled soda/a dead animal/corn chips. Found the rust and took care of it with rust encapsulator.

 

Put down Noico 80mil sound deadening material everywhere in the cab. Put down vinyl flooring, new shift boot, put in Corbeau seats.

Oh and upgraded the headlights

 

Lastly I contacted @Wheeler's Off-Road Inc and Josh hooked me up with a full OME kit with 882 coils, diff drop, Dakar leaf pack in the rear, extended rear brake line, prop valve relocation bracket.

And I put 33x12.5r15 BFG KM2’s on

Still need to take off the 3” body lift that came on it

 

Awesome project! Anxious to see more. Is that flooring custom contoured for the truck or did you form it yourself?

 

Thank you there still a lot more to come! The flooring is pre formed from aardvark motors.

 

Looking good

 

Took my bumper off while removing the body lift and 2 of the 4 bolts broke right off. So I just took it off and I’m going to weld In some square tube and box the rear frame in place of the bumper.



Got half the body lift off. 5 of 6 bolts were a struggle due to rust, the 6th broke and I had to drill and tap the hole. I was going to start the front but didn’t wanna start a new problem that late in the evenring.

 

Great looking truck. Looking forward to seeing this without the body lift. But...

Have to admit, when I saw this thing with OME+body lift+mudterrains I started thinking about getting 33’s and a body lift kit.

 

One of the best builds I've enjoyed reading about!.keep it up

 

Body lift is off, ended up just cutting all the old bolts off since they were so rusted they had become fixed to the lift blocks.

Only sits about 1/2” lower in the front now that the suspension is starting to settle

 

Yeah I feel ya, but it rides and handles 10x better with the body lift off

 

Looking good!

Cleaning up the interior is on my short list as well. Mine smells of cigarettes and dog when I run the heat/ac.

I suspect your flooring is made by ACC. Rockauto sells both too.

Did the sound deadener do much?

 

Yeah it definitely helped insulate the cab, I live in the eastern sierras and it’s regularly in the negatives. It was night and day after i installed it with heat retention.

As far as sound deadening it’s deffinateltely noticeably quieter, I put the old door panels back on to see the noise reduction and it’s pretty quiet now even with mud terrains

 

Came here because of the thread title cool build! That rubber liner on the floor really cleaned up the interior nicely.

 

Same station and pump? Thanks for posting these before and after. Still a bad ass truck without the body lift!

​

 

Yeah I live in a pretty rural area, it’s the closest pump for 32 miles