Canks' Build(s) Thread

Owned a 2005 Tundra for a bit, really enjoyed it. But had always dreamed of a four door Taco. Old Tundra:











Sold that and picked up an 08 DCSB at auction a few months back (sorry don't have any great pics):














Goals:
"Comfortable" prerunner for Mexico, with the ability to chase and do the occasional 4x4 trail.

 

Picked up a solo XLT 4x4 kit + links

 

Started tearing in to the body and removing the front sheet metal and suspension:






Truck has a touch more rust than I expected... It was purchased from Wisconsin. Had to drive around the block with loose lugs to get the wheels to separate from the hub







Finally started coating everything in PB Blaster, and started slowly removing what I could before Thanksgiving dinner... Decided to stop when the upper arm bolt was interfering with the factory sheet metal. Is this normal? Or is my frame slightly tweaked up front?

 

....From here on out this should be re-titled to Canks Cluster Fuck de Proyecto's

The 08' Taco, surprise surprise, hasn't made shit for progress (that is the DR way after all).


the frame was worse than I expected with quite a bit of hidden rust:




Got both sides all cleaned up:




And the rack was a complete bitch to get out:



Sadly that is all that has happend on the Taco for now.


but wait... there's more!

 

Sold the sand car in the background of one of the pictures at the top... Picked up a Canam

The cages on these things are sketch, so I replaced that right away






Did the only logical thing and put wayyy too big of tires on it:







Took the sxs's to San Felipe for a buddies bach party

The welcoming committee:




Rented a place in El Dorado right on the water



best pastor in San Felipe






shameless IG plug:

 

Started thinking i could use a better DD and got antsy again wishing I had my 05 Tundra back, ended up picking up this '04 Tundra






Very simple setup with a Total Chaos front end and a little secret under the hood:




Previous owner had all kinds of electrical things hooked up to it: two sets of sat radio, old school Lowrance, cd changer, 3 subwoofers etc.






I started tearing most of it out to install a modern head unit and clean up loose ends and anything not connected








When I bought the truck I made a deal with the guy selling it that I would get it smogged based on circumstances (I didnt want to make the drive to see/pick up the truck again). Little did I know that smog would be a total pain in the ass. I should've known. No tech's wanted to touch the truck until it had the "TRD" sticker stating the part number and Carb E.O. Even with the printed Carb E.O. nobody seemed to care. I was unable to get TRD to help me, and both dealers I tried to get the sticker through couldn't help me.

But I made some moves:

 

Finally got the truck smogged and registered the day before we left for this year (2018) Baja 1000 to chase Swift Motorsports class 5

We were chasing the San Felipe side, so we booked the same house in El Dorado again

El Dorado is not a fan of offroad... Probably too many assholes doing donuts on the golf course


We actually sat outside for a half hour while they debated whether we should be let in or not





Ford = problems



Pitted at 280 for a driver's change/fuel





Sitting at Coco's waiting on our car:



Turns out they lost a water pump at 340, so we high tailed it back to about 339 where we regrouped. Bronco proceeded to smack a rock on its fuel cell bending the pick up and killing the pump. Race car was back on the road, so I headed on course to rescue the bronco just past Mag 7 circa MM340. I ended up towing them on a strap from south of Gonzaga all the way to Percebu-ish where we pulled over to make sure everyone was still awake. The fuel pump randomly came back on so we booked in to SF to get to bed.

Bronco on the strap for about 5 hours towing in to the sunrise:



All in all the Tundra kicked ass as a chase truck and I had a great time. My only damage, lost one stud. Remember to recheck your lugnuts:




Surprisingly the Cooper STT's did extremely well in the silt we saw (which wasn't nearly as bad as further on the course)





524 ended up winning their class at the 1k and thus taking home the points championship for the season!

 

As of November 2018:

This catches us up.

Goals for the truck, keep it simple and as chase capable as possible, while still being able to get to remote areas at a good clip, 37's, 5.29 gears and a new bumper and rear setup:
I'd like to redo the bumper similar to this:



And I'm really tired of axle wrap, so I'm thinking of a simple link/panhard bar setup similar to:

 

December 2018:
Was prepping the golf cart for New Years in Glamis, started messing with a "turn down" of sorts... Dont mind my crap tig welds, couldnt get the factory exhaust to mate up to scap exhaust tube I purchased, on top of that I was messing with pie cuts for the first time.




yay porosity!



meh, its not structural...



Fuel tank hold down spun in the factory tubing... had to tack it in place



Started messing with some spare mount ideas, but ran out of time and didn't take it anywhere





Dunes

 

Early this year one of my close friends borrowed the tundra to move some things... When he was done he asked if I'd be willing to sell it, which hadn't crossed my mind. But he offered enough to make it worth while, so, she gone....


And as per my ADD build thread goes, this seems appropriate:




Found this online with some good parts






Made an offer I thought would get refused and...




It was a little bit rougher in person than the first pictures alluded to

 

Went down to chase Norra for Dave Sykes and Scott Steinberger both in X3's


Packing up to head south


The public storage Dave uses has some interesting stuff in it







Standard:






At Tech/Contingency


























blew out my sandal day 1, I was pissed. I hate wearing shoes when its not necessary.






Had to pit (legally far enough) just off highway 3 coming out of the mountains toward Diablo... Didnt get more pics because Dave blew up an inner cv and we scrambled to fix it.

 

San Felipe for the night










Pitting the next day in Puertocitos, in front of our buddy Russ' house






Bay of LA the next day





Kung Fu still racing

 

Bfast in Guerrero Negro @ Malarrimo









Got a call over the MSAt that Scott was rear ended pretty good right outside of BoLA and popped a fuel pump. We headed north and scrambled to find a replacement. We were lucky enough to find a rival team and borrow one. We sent one of our chase guys with an off duty cop north from Viscaino back to Bay of LA


Scott got it going with the new pump, this is outside Rice and Beans on your way in to San Ignacio, still moving






Made it to San Ignacio for ice cream and to watch the start of the new section

 

Made it down to Loreto as per usual, got stuck working on the car till 3am unfortunately. Stayed Oasis (yes I accidentally used this pic previously)





Pitting just north of La Paz





Fuck these things






La Paz









Todo Santos "Pit"






My favorite part of the trip by far was the finish line... They serve beer right next to finish line so pics get fuzzy from here...















My new favorite race team











I'm the big dude on the left





I beat RG out on some rooms at Cabo Azul... pro tip use hotels.com while others are waiting in line....





Of course we run in to socal locals at the southern tip of baja





Team dinner at Flora Farms... We got our Uber driver to drift the suburban on the dirt roads coming in. Sketchy and amazing








One last super hammered pic

 

Was driving the truck around trying to get it registered... Previous owner was from AZ and removed the factory evap system.... Truck died, randomly. Luckily I live in San Diego and a random offroad guy grabbed his full size and drug me home on a rope







Truck is throwing the following codes:
P0453 Evap
P0500 Vehicle Speed Sensor
P0171 system too lean bank 1
P0174 system too lean bank 2

The first two are obvious, the second two ive read can be from cracked exhaust manifolds.....



Truck will be getting a 4wd swap so I picked up an A750F, FJ manual shift transfer case, and a 2nd gen tundra front diff




Hoping I can figure out how to shorten and make this fit




Installed a new starter which is in a terrible location (under the intake manifold), new one is a good bit longer than the old, requiring all of the smog air pump to be removed.



Then started working on the electrical side of this truck to figure out why it wont start or stay running. Unfortunately the previous owner decided to move everything to the under seat cubby in the extra cab portion of this truck. Already replaced several relay's, now on to testing the neutral safety swtich. Hopefully that is my problem.





And of course had to reverse sear some ribeyes and mac n cheese for dinner