Sharkbait's Super Slow Build Because I'm a Broke High Schooler

Foreword, as you can tell from the title I'm a broke high schooler who spends all his time drooling over the builds on this site. My goals for my truck is something that I can take on trails and just look badass in general.

May 13th 2018: I got my first car (truck) and have been in love ever since. It's a 2005 access cab TRD sport and it had 73,xxx miles when I first got it. I named her Tallulah because I was going through a Jamiroquai phase and that was the first song I listened to in her.


The first mod was a Sound Stream head unit. I bought it because it was the cheapest stereo on crutchfield that had CarPlay. It works and I got to practice my soldering skills while installing it.


I saved up and bought a rough country spacer lift. I wished I had saved more and gone with 5100s but I was impatient and just wanted to be able to fit bigger tires. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of the install but you can imagine, lots of cussing and frustration because that damn 10 mm socket is always hiding.

After that I realized that I needed a new set of tires and found a good deal on some Goodyear Duratracs. They're 265/70r17s so not huge but bigger than the BF Goodrich street tires that came with the truck and I like the aggressive stance they give the truck, and I can't knock the performance.

After I got the tires I got into an accident. It wasn't super bad, I was driving down a two lane road (one lane each way) someone 4 cars up decided to make an illegal left turn which caused everyone to slam on their brakes. I was unlucky and slid into car in front of me. Thank God I had my dash cam running because it helped my case with insurance immensely. After looking at my truck I thought that my only damage was my grill was cracked. I start driving home after insurance info was passed around and found my brakes started locking up on me. It got so bad that at 30 mph I was at 4000 rpms. At that point I pulled off and called for a roll back to come get my truck. As it turned out in trying to stop and avoid the accident I hit the brake so hard that I broke my brake pedal pushrod. This led to my Dad calling me Fred a la the Flintstones.



After a lengthy battle with insurance I got it back from repairs and while it was being repaired I figured I'd upgrade headlights so I bought a set of Spyder projector headlights and I'm super happy with them. The body shop buffed the crap out of my paint and looks like a new truck now.




That's about it for now I'll update it as I build it more. I think the next thing I'll get will probably be some wheel spacers to get that stance life and show up those Honda bois in the school parking lot.

 

Went on a small trail yesterday and got too confident too fast, saw a mud hole and sent it. I got stuck at 7pm and didn't get free until 12pm the next day. So immediately after I got stuck my buddy got his tractor and tried to pull me out... then the tractor got stuck. He called a friend with a first gen taco who just got some new boggers and was itching to try them out. He hooks up some recovery straps to the tractor... and got stuck. So he called his friend with a chevy 2500 with the 8.1 big block. So he hooked up to the first gen... and he got stuck. Then another friend is called and he shows up with a tundra. It's about 2 in the morning at this point,we were able to create a train between the first gen, 2500, and the tundra. They got themselves out, but the tractor and my truck were still bogged. It's 4 at this point and I decided to call uncle or more aptly Dad. Understandably he was upset about having to come pick me up and take me home. I got a serious chewing out about safety when wheeling and how there's a time, place, and types of gear needed just in case something like this happens. So the next day my friend's Dad had a 10,000 lbs winch, which was able to pull out both the tractor and myself. All in all not the worst day ever, my interior is muddy as shit tho.

 

Sounds like you need a winch! Truck looks good!

 

I’d play easy in mud. It tends to be expensive.

Welcome to TW. Red is a great color.

 

From one broke highschooler to another

Welcome to the forum

 

Great first truck. Don’t worry about keeping up with other people’s builds, I wouldn’t want to see most of their credit card statements. Going in debt to look good for Instagram isn’t a good thing so pace yourself.
Also I would love to see the train of stuck vehicles lol that had to be great.

 

@ALI3N_123 @Jamesboy2233 another broke high school

 

Welcome to TW bud!

 

Welcome to TW! I'm also a broke high schooler lol.

 

The good thing is that the necessary mods aren't too expensive. Keeping her clean, painting the frame, greasing u joints (especially because of mudding), oil and filter, air filter, cabin filter, cleaning maf and throttle body are all things you can do for relatively cheap week by week that will keep your Tacoma at peak performance and reliability. Don't worry too much about the 'gram, in due time we'll all get to our desired end state on our builds.

Also, I second @T4RFTMFW comment, careful in mud holes, it's how I hydrolocked my first Jeep XJ

 

I wish I had taken some photos, but picture 6 teenagers all with about the same amount of experience with recovery (none) who are all sleepy as hell and falling in the mud in the dark. Quite the clusterfuck. I will say though, it was kinda fun. Learning as we went what worked and what didn't and bsing throughout. I just wish we had a winch earlier.

 

Glad to know I'm not alone

 

Might be time for a "Broke Highschooler BS" thread

 

In!

 

Kinda mad I just found this over a month later.. also a broke highschooler. Thought I was alone for the longest time. Im in for that BS thread though