My $2,500 First Gen (2002)

Well fellas I did it now. Tore the front of the truck off. Used the compressor to blow all the dust out. Wiped it out as best I could with towels and mineral spirits before I sprayed it down with black flex seal.


Inside the hole under the fender:


Inside where the wiper motor sits:


A couple pictures inside the cowl area. Might try and get that seam to the left in the pictures a little better tomorrow. I’m not sure.


Neighbor gave me a curved 32” light bar. It fits about perfect should fit just right behind the grill.


I have a new metal piece for the bumper coming. That should show up wednesday. All new headlights and corner lights are ordered and I ordered a ton of replacement fender clips off eBay. Should have enough clips to break every single clip and replace them all about 3x over.

I don’t have pictures of it but I painted the wiper linkage rods and the bumper piece that I’m mounting the light bar to. Just knocking some rust off as long as the parts are pulled. Might have to see if I can find some plastic paint to paint the grungy bumper valence before I mount it to the new metal.

 

Today’s update; painted my nuts:

 

More fun stuff and progress to my resto...
Got a new tool!

Took a bunch of stuff to work when I thought I was going to have a slow day. Painted all my bumper brackets and hardware. I had to straighten the right angle brackets in the vise as they were bent when I took them off. The new bumper metal showed up and I am hoping to throw it back together tomorrow or Wednesday evening.



When I took everything apart the rubber pieces on those angle brackets were pretty trashed. So I ordered up some new ones and they showed up today.


After all my attempts to seal up the firewall leak... we have had some pretty steady rain the last 24-48 hours. Decided to take a peek inside the truck and I figured out that all of the sound deadening material on the passenger side firewall was SOAKED. Poking around some more and I noticed that there was some rust and chunks of the black foam-ish seam sealer at the bottom corner of the windshield. I should have taken some better pictures here. However a little work with the hose and I think I may have finally found my leak.

Here is the spot. I already sanded some of the rust and pulled out the chunks of seam sealer I could get to.

There’s a gap here that looks like it runs straight inside he cab:

Prepped!



Primed the bare metal. Many coats of flex seal to fill the gap.


How I ended today. Looks a lot nastier in pictures than it does in person. It’s actually pretty smooth. Gotta let it set up for a day and I’ll throw some more water at it before I throw the fender back on.




Looking forward to getting the new headlights installed. Plastidipping the grill tomorrow. Debated painting it but this should be reversible. I want to get it road worthy again!

Oh yeah, I scuffed the valence and painted it with some plastic paint today. The valence was pretty rough and a couple tabs and things were broken. So I figured worst case I’ll buy a new one off of rock auto. For $29 it would be worth it. I think.

 

Hory shet I hope I don't get that leak

 

He’s a terrible negotiator! lol

 

Always good when that works to my benefit.

 

Plastidipping the grill today. Might go back to chrome in the future so figured I’d give this a try.

 

Pretty happy with this result. Maybe I won’t be painting the whole truck after all. Gotta find me some OD Green plastidip!

 

Did it work?

 

24 hour cure time JUST hit right about now. I’ll hose it down when I get home today.

 

Scored a free cap on the way home today.

I just hosed a few gallons in that spot and through the cowl. I honestly think I have it fixed now. Which is exciting because I really want to slap the fender back on and get to driving it.

 

Put the bumper back together. Toyota went way overboard on hardware for these.


I threw it all back together. Corner lights are just thrown in for the moment. Not sure how I feel about the front end now. I want to like it but I’m still on the fence.

 

Nice camper!

 

is that a barrett 50

 

Good thread!. However, as sort of a purist....I like the chrome more.

 

Yes sir, but sadly it's not mine it belongs to a friend. On a positive note I get to shoot it and I don't have to pay for the ammo.

 

I tend to agree with you. I like the chrome. Just didn’t want to pay for a new bumper. I only did the plastidip on the grill because the lights I bought had black trim. Maybe I’ll run it like this for a bit and see if it grows on me. If not I might be buying new lights.

 

nice thread! any rubbing with the 17" 2nd gen wheels? what size tire are you running? I love those wheels but wary about the rubbing possibility.

 

255/75/17 tires on it. Slight rub at full lock when turning left. I don’t wheel it (yet) but I can imagine it would be worse flexing. They could definitely use some spacers to really “fill” the wheel well. Ideally they would be as wide as the flares. They fit my budget though.

Half the time I don’t know what I want to do with this truck. Having 3 vehicles is getting to be a pain in my butt. However I got talked into a wheeling trip to Rausch Creek in June, so I’m probably going to buy some skid plates and sliders here before too long.

 

Sooo this happened. Still chasing wet floors. My previous fix wasn’t enough. Throwing more flex seal in the cowl. Pulled carpet to let the cab dry out. Pressure washed the carpet and it’s currently draped over the bed drying out.

Decided to clean out my nasty vents while I was at it.



Mainly pulled the dash to fix the rattle and pull out the “paper towel mod” that was wedged under the windshield. I’m sure I will cause more rattles but time will tell.

No pictures but I lined the defrost vent with some rubber stick on seal. Should fix the rattle.