Lefty's golden taco.

Man you truck is looking so good! Tell me more about that wiring setup you put together. What are the different components?

 

Did some more wiring. I'd probably go faster if I didn't have to redo everything 3 times. And of course i ran out of heat shrink.
Panel is in wires ran to the cab for the controller ,10 gauge ran to the bed and 6 gauge to the battery.

 

Thanks man.
It's a busman box. I bought it of the guy on TW who sells them wired. I have one side for the relayed/switched accessories. And the other side for stuff that just needs a fuse. The circuit breaker is for the 10 gauge running to the back that's going to have a 12v and USB outlets for the fridge and to charger out phones at night and for a light in the tent

 

Well ain't that a bitch. Of course it was probably self inflicted. Which I came the realization after losing my shit for a min. I believe it was cause by a pare of pliers that was left when I had previously tried to close the hood. Still........they were so awesome.

 

Ahhh shit man!! Bummer!!

 

Still plugging away. I better plug faster. Lol
Got my new head unit cb and fenix switch all wired up. I forgot the mic for the head unit. But I'll be back into in a few weeks so I'll just do it then I still have a ton of other wiring to finish up. Oh well poop breaks over here some pics.
Cuts for the cb
Everything all put in and wired up.

 

Well after a bit of a snafu with how I wired the busman box all is well and working. Apparently you can't have a power wire going to the ground.

 

So I guess its update time.
So I'm finally down to only working 1 full time job, so I decided that it was a good time to go back to school. Well that definitely infringes on wrenching time.
AZBCD was looming and everything that could go wrong went wrong with getting the truck ready. Plauged by poorly planned mods and not checking parts before installing. We had hoped to have everything done and tried out a night camping before the trip but that didn't happen. We were a day late and wrenching on the truck at 6am before we left. We were off to a great start. Not really we were running about a hour and a half late. Which ended up being our theme for the trip. So we set off from mesa to benson az. After calling and letting the group know we were running late ,we started making a list of everything that we forgot to bring. So I'd like to make this excuse before going any further. I haven't camped in about 10 years and my girlfriend even longer. Pillows were on the top of that list and made there absences well known late on.
We finally caught up the the group and everyone was awesome about the delay. Which was made worse by needing to refuel because I burnt up the tank trying to make time and the coffee had kicked in.
Finally we all set off and rolled through rural AZ which has it own stark beauty and small community's. When we finally hit dirt we stopped and aired down. And this is were my photos start.
what my views would be filled with.

It was fun to be in various places in the group throughout the trip. We stopped a few times for photo ops.

It was equal parts 1st and 3rd gens. Which became the running joke.

 

I'm steeling a couple of pice from my girlfriend and one from another member one here.

 

We finally made camp for our first night. So far the truck was hanging the weight fine my cb was broadcasting weak. we were having a great time we set up our camp everything went up quickly.
We had a great time hanging out and enjoying conversation with everyone. We went to bed .a couple issues were noted and made for a long night. Not being level kinda sucks sleeping with your head lower than the feet. Obviously no pillows was awesome, and the mattress is kinda hard for a side sleeping. We missed hearing about the 9am start time. So we were the last ones still packing after everyone was ready. Still everyone was kind enough to wait at the stageing area or with us and offer encouragement .as we got everything put away and strapped down.
We were off again meandering through tracks, tiny towns and stinky muddy waters.


We hit a little bit of highway.

We hit the section that stopped last years group due to crazy snow. We had been having amazing weather so far .the group stopped for lunch and to wait for more people to join. The guy with the awesome shell setup took a nap. I was definitely envious but now way I'm sleeping in a shell unless it on a 7'bed. But my truck was looking good and doing great. Aside from throwing a couple codes.

And a little group photo part way up.

We all made it over the pass without and issues and bombed down the other side.
So we popped out at a large town called globe.and this is were we caused a second delay. We made a long ish pit stop at the local Walmart. Pillows and a topper were obtained and some other members got some provisions and we had one person who had other obligations leave. We stopped at the taco bell which was in the parking lot and had a early dinner/late lunch. And I had to use the bathroom . I think the delay might have upset the group which I understand and truly fell bad about. Well we finally caught up with the group after getting gas.thanks again for waiting for us I really appreciate it . I didn't have the map downloaded.
After a short but pretty strand on the road we hit dirt again .

 

After a bit we were flying down some dirt roads and had a small water crossing.

After a bit of back tracking we found our camp site for the night. Everyone had some sweet setups.


After a way better night sleep. Level truck, pillows and a mattress topper made all the difference. Every one got packed up and we were still last but it was better than the day before. We headed off to see some Indian cliff dwellings. I was super excited to see. We had a pretty deep water crossing and a ruffer road we made it to the start of the trail.

And I'll pick up the rest tomorrow.

 

So the indian cliff dwelling. Man was I supper excited to see them. But that hike didn't turn out as planned. The hike follows this cool mountain spring but is very strenuous and is difficult for a novice hiker. My girlfriend to her credit gave it a go but quickly found that she was unable to continue. She was suffering from a back and foot injury. She's also has little to no hiking experience. I need to remedy this and maybe do a little more research next time.
After a 3 hour hike the rest of the troop returned and told us about the crazy hike ,they didnt quite reach the ruins. We'll have to tray again another day.
It was about time to wrap up the adventure. The group split into 2 one finished going north and the other was turning around and heading back the way that we came.i wanted to continue north but my traveling companion was adventures out as it would had added about 2+hours to our drive and she was hurting pretty bad.so we joined the returning group and made our way back. There was on slightly deeper water crossing. I tried to get a video of it but it didn't turn out all that great.
https://youtu.be/-Q023TVP1jY

 

Next vid is me going through I didnt do a video good job filming it but if you watch the sideview mirror you can see the next truck going.
https://youtu.be/gbM4eea5tuk
We made pretty good time back to the main road. We aired up said out goodbyes and headed home. I did stop and top off the tank with some good gas. It was cheaper than what I pay in mesa. And we made it home without any other issues and no more check engine lights.

The take home from this trip.
Probably not smart to thrash on the truck getting everything ready at the last minute. Because all that dose is make everything 10 x more difficult. Check all your parts before installing them. My blue sea block that was supposed to have a 12v and usb ended up having 2 usb ports. And one was even labeled 12v. Grrrrr. Of course I didn't find that out tell 9pm the night before. After fighting the 10gauge wires. Luckily I was able to find one that night at autozone. I guess i could have not taken the fridge. And the Jerry can holder the i put in was to far back and i couldn't put the can into it because of the tent and when I went to pull it the bolts that I had bought at home depot had stripped there treads in the middle which necessitated cutting them out . I didn't think my neighbors would have appreciate me grinding them out at midnight so I did it at 630 am. Lol so I ended up just strapping down the gas can. Which actually held pretty good. Also I'm permanently leaving the rain fly on the tent. The second night at camp as we were setting up it and I was commenting that I should probably put the fly on it stared raining. And of course it stopped as soon as I had it on.
What did work right; man the fridge was awesome,although it did have some temp swings.our stove worked really well as did the jet boil. And the lugable lue was clutch. Our storage worked well and buy the last day we had it figured out and out take down time was pretty quick. Having the tent low on the truck definitely helped make it fell stable and the table holder was nice to have for packaging. I'm gonna have to have some work done to the rack to make the side bars more vertical which should have with everything fitting better.
Also if anyone who was with us. Thank you for you patience and sorry for all of the delays.

 

Got the truck unpacked and washed all the mud off. Ended up getting a cheap power washer from harbor freight. It seemed to work pretty good and even has a foam attachment. So most of the fleet ended up getting a bath.
I got a little vid of my head units cameras in action. Unfortunately I bought the wrong front camera so the image is reversed.
https://youtu.be/KEscSjcyOq4
So I've been bugging Brandon at avid for a while and we were finally able to get a time worked out so I dropped the truck off with them and they squeezed it in when they could. I'm super happy with the results. He was able to attach the swing out as high as possible to the trail gear bumper. Its held open with a gas strut. It holds my spare with a adjustable base. A rack for my Jerry can and shelf for my Co2 tank. I also had him add a low light bar to the front bumper and it has tabs for lights. I like that it's not as high as trail gears.
The night I got it.

Next day.

 

I finally got to install all my led's.
I've been running the
LP530 LED Ion Yellow Wide Spread Fog Beam Kithttp://www.piaa.com/store/p/891-LP530-Ion-Yellow-3-5-LED-Fog-Light-Kit.aspx
They don't list the spec's on there site. There pretty nice. I'd like to see how they compare to the other companies sae style fogs. They have a ok cut off.
I got them from a guy on here a couple of years ago as a package with the ditch light brackets. And I did run them there but upside down as i didn't realize that they had a cut off. Lol.
So I have those mounted with some cheap Amazon mounts that seem to be working well. You can see their cut off in the previous page.
I have some baja designs squadron sports in the new bar.https://www.bajadesigns.com/products/squadron-sport-pair-amber-led-spot.asp

And then I put in some rigid d- ss pro's spots in the ditch brackets.
https://www.rigidindustries.com/d-ss-series-d-ss-series.html

And some night shots.


And a vid. It goes bd,piaa then rigid.
https://youtu.be/9Wqpj9inoIU

 

I got a new hood strut frome redline. The one held the hood up ok but definitely pops up with some authority again. Wiring in the lights was easy peasy with the bussman box.
So on the to do list.
Engine skirts are good be ordered soon.
Some bed stiffeners.
Order new 12v outlets.
I need to probably send out my throttle body to get it bored and get the injectors cleaned while I'm at it. I still haven't gotten the iac off and I didn't put in a new gasket when I tried to clean the throttle body. I don't know if that's what's causing my codes or if it was bad gas or the tps isn't set right.i was getting codes fora high idle.sobi replaced it. I think part if the problem is I don't drive it enough anymore.
Gears and a front locker. Man going up the mountains sucks with stock gears and 33's. I think I'm gonna go 4.88 and a harlop in the front.
While everything is out of there I'm gonna do the motor and trans mounts. I have some solid mounts waiting to go in.
And I need to probably rebuild my upper control arms I'm getting a pretty good clunk while turning. But I'll investigate a little more before I tear into them .
And I need to pull my stero and ground the brake wire and run the mic. And look at my cb while I have all that out. My pa isnt working I don't know it it's just unplugged.
And I still need to install the amp and sub that I have sitting around.
So much to do. I better get busy and quit playing COD.
Thanks for looking. Feel free to comment.

Damn stupid fender flares need to go back on too. Lol

 

Looks good man!
I've been thinking about adding some sort of swingout to my all-pro bumper like that

 

Thanks I've only seen one other person with a similar set up but there's was down lot lower.
I dont remember their name but I saved a pic of the truck.

Hopefully this helps with your decision.

 

Nice. Yea the issue for me is figuring out some sort of setup that doesn't really affect my departure angle too bad. Probably wouldn't be putting jerry cans back there.

The allpro bumper also has a step kinda thing so that makes things more interesting for adding a swingout

 

I get the departure issue. I asked him to put mine as high as possible because I'm always backing into stuff or down gulley's as seen by my license plate.
Have you thought about doing a tire gate? I was thinking about going that route but I like my tailgate to much.