Millenium Falcon Taco Build

Yup.
I'm seeing the end of the craziness. Almost have it on the road!

 

This is absolutely awesome. Impressive, inspiring, and make my rust concerns look ill founded and repairable by comparison. Thanks for sharing.

 

The attention to detail is unreal. I'll be following this! Amazing work

 

Really appreciatethe kind words!

 

Thank you!
Much appreciated

 

So I pulled the exhaust off this evening.
There were a couple pin holes that were from a previous fix that were noisy. Also the hanger that is near the tailpipe has rusted through the pipe and was no longer attatched to the exhaust.
I've included a few pica of the equipment I'm using to cut and weld. And of course the safety equipment.
Saftey First!

 

And lastly before calling it a night I stripped the split loom, electrical tape and plastic fasteners that went from the fuel tank back.
It also was completley filthy, muddy, smelly and had been spliced and "fixed" previously.
The first picture is what I removed from that wiring harness.
I will post more pictures of the progress and finished product.

 

To remove the exhaust it had to come out in one piece from the exhaust manifold Y.
I suspect that is not how it was from factory.
Regardless, in order for me to do that I have to remove the transmission cross member/support.
In doing that I noticed one of the four molts that attatches the trannsmission mount to the cross member had previously broken off, by Toyota I image when they replaced the frame.
I removed the mount from the transmission and drilled and tapped the hole again.
I noticed some gross buildup under the transmission moint so I cleaned the majority of it off before reinstalling the mount and everything else.

 

The truck was behaving today so I permited it some time outdoors.

 

Got the bed flipped over and welded in a couple peices of steel in place to give me something to weld new nuts to for fastening the bed to the frame.

 

Put the bed on the truck to be able to drill holes and weld nuts in the right place.

 

DUDE AWESOME JOB!!!! KEEP IT UP!

 

Before reinstalling the rear bumper I pulled the plastic peices that snap into the top of if.
This is what I found duct taped to it.

 

I finished cleaning up the wiring for the rear of the truck and reloomed and taped it.
I ran it and reinstalled all the lights again.
The first picture is part of what I was fixing not the finished product.

 

Thanks man, much appreciated

 

Truck is pretty well back together minus the front fenders.
Took the truck home tonight because it is being taken to go have it's underbelly pressure washed tomorrow afternoon.
Stay tuned!

 

Long tome no post.
I took the truck over to Banks Maintenance and Cleaning to use their hot water/steam pressure washer to rid the last of the nasty gunk, mud, oil and smell from the underside of the truck. Now I can indercoat it!

 

I started to do the front brakes last night and realized the caliper on the passenger side was completely seized.
I picked up a rebuilt one today and did the front brakes.
Using a set of pads with a 3 year replacement warranty.

 

I have those same rebuilt calipers and they have been great. I replaced both my front ones because the passenger side had seized and the drivers side still moved fine but made some crunching noises when moving. I put ceramic pads on as well and I'm not sure they made a real difference, but the calipers have been working great.