Urban Escape Camp Road Tripper

Yeah they do stick out a lot more than I expected, and I hadn't seen any mounted pics of them when I ordered them. Looks like they should put the rear tire onto rocks etc. nicely though. You need to be careful parking in tight spaces between other cars so you don't hit them with your sliders haha.

Are you going to BM this year too? Yeah it would be nice to have the winch there but I doubt I'll need it. My two biggest investments for the truck didn't happen in time, the shell, and the winch. Pretty bummed about that. I do own multiple paint respirators though, and I usually don't bring them, but I might this year.

Yesterday I got a stock rear bumper from Jerry @ BAMF and put it on, and the FROR is going up for sale. Today I'm putting the stock receiver back on for now to mount my bike racks to carry to the burn. I'll most likely get a different rear bumper with built in receiver. Anyone want a good deal on a FROR bumper let me know!

 

Great job on the build. Very smart quality choices for your upgrades, sir. Looking forward to seeing it with the new camper you described. Well done!

 

Nope, I have work. Hopefully going next year. I bet it was epic!

 

Really sick 1st gen man!!! Keep it coming

 

Nice truck. Love those sliders

 

Got back from Reno last night, Burning Man was a great time as usual. Somehow we managed to misplace our camera the first day and find it the last day, so I don't have many pics but I'll post up the few when we do have time. Truck is FILTHY and still loaded to the brim with gear, and we're heading right back out tomorrow morning to Lake County to do a long overdue camping trip with my girlfriend's family. I wanted to get the new shell on today but It will have to wait til Monday because the dealer's not available today. GF's brother loves wheeling and there are some decent trails near their place where we are camping but his ZJ is stock and I don't want to be a dick and ditch out of family time so I guess I'll wait til next time. Maybe I'll sneak away to Cow Mtn for a few hrs if I can but I dont expect to.
That seems to be the theme of this build-WAITING...

Thank you! Your truck is even more badass. Yeah I'm looking forward to the camper too.

Thank you, I will. Good new things to come.

Thanks. Me too, Jerry does good work.

 

I added a few more pics of the audio install to the first page. I still need to find the rest.

 

Dude your truck is looking great.


hello its Jace

 

About time you joined jace! Welcome to TW! I know it looks like poo, that's why I always need your help to make it awesome!

 

Hey thanks for the welcome. Seriously though your truck is looking really good. Nice job on all the recent upgrades. I am a bit jealous. I am here to help just give me a call my garage is open to you anytime. We should get together soon.

 

Love this truck.

 

Well camping this weekend was interesting. Any potential to go wheeling on Cow Mtn was definitely not happening! Wildfires on the other side of Cow Mtn from the OHV kept us on the edge of our seat and ready to evacuate all weekend long. I would have left but everyone else wanted to stay for some reason. At one point my girlfriend's brother who stayed home came tearing into the campsite saying we needed to evacuate their house just down the road in Blue Lakes. So then we went back to there loaded up valuables and brought them to the campsite. Turned out to be okay at the house in the end but we just kept camping, BBQing, and watching all the different aircraft handle the fire. The helicopters were filling up on water right there in the swimming pond at the campsite in front of us and at one point the planes were dumping fire retardant almost directly on top of us literally. Make for some nervous times watching the fire creep down the mtn toward us. By the time we left I think the fire was about a mile away. Battery on the camera died so I had to take pics with my iPhone.














Yellow Jackets were swarming all over and one decided to start munching on the dead dragonflies on my radiator.


Not what you want to see coming down the hill towards you!








Back to the build... things have been frustrating with this winch package from Toddco. After not shipping the fairlead for two weeks, I got this thing, which is obviously not an anodized Viking 250 series fairlead pictured and listed on their site and what I believed I would receive, but rather some spray painted generic fairlead with "4x4" cheese on it. I also got a silver thimble instead of black which I asked for but it's a such a hassle to splice a new one I guess that's what I am going to have. Todd has has some truly horrifically tragic events occur in his life so I am trying to keep things in perspective and not make a big fuss over it.


Besides that I'm considering some additional rear lift options. The Dakar rear leafs have sagged a bit after two years of use and withe the 882s I have negative rake now even with the bed empty and no shell. I am thinking about longer shackles or even AAL or both.

 

longer shackles will sag out your leaves fast I know from experience. Get the Allpro 3" pack if you want a cheap spring over pack to fix your rake. You could also rebuild your leaf pack using some other old leaf springs instead of using a stiff AAL.

Crazy pictures btw

 

Got the new shell install today and it's really nice! More crappy iPhone pics but you'll be seeing more of this.

Back with the stock bumper and hitch for the moment. New rear bumper coming soon!

It has tip out win-doors as you can see in the second pic, a tip-down front window, carpet headliner, and roof rack tracks. Found a Yakima rack setup for a good deal on Craigslist this evening so hopefully I'll have that on soon. After that there may be a cargo basket to add to the shell roof to mount the spare, snowboards, and other crap. I may also relocate the hi Lift up there too depending how serious I get with the camper shell interior build. thinking about something similar to BajaTacos but not sure if I want anything that permanent all the time. I love my Kodiak canvas tent but its one big heavy PITA so it sure will be nice to just park unload, jump in the back and sleep

I'm excited to get the winch installed but my garage landlady suddenly decided she is going to kick me out of my garage if I do any "work" in there. I'm getting really sick of this shit and am trying to figure out where I'm going to move outside the city so I don't have to deal with that kind of BS and can really start having some fun with my builds.

Besides that I'm re-dyno tuning my Evo Weds with the new turbo actuator and modified and rewired Walbro fuel pump. Hoping to squeeze a little more power out of it and fix a lean spot in the tune. As if you guys care! Just exucses not to be working on the Taco.

 

Damn I just ordered Daystar 1.25" shackles from Wheelers today. If I were to get a new pack from Allpro I guess I would get the Expos but thought I could get away witha longer shackle. Think I should cancel my order?

I'm working Fri and Satbut we're overdue for some chillin!

 

More goodies! LEDs for spot/rock lights

 

Yeah we are overdue to chill maybe we can do something Sunday or next weekend. Paintball is scheduled for the first weekend in October. I will have everything you need to play.

I ran those same shackles for about 2 years with energy suspension bump stops. The first year they did great (felt like cranking the T bars on on old truck). I would have given them to you if I had known (gave em to some guy on TTORA). My original springs bent backwards (from all the weight) after I moved here and I was riding on bump stops all the time. The worst part was the axle wrap. Every stop the rear end would pop in and out.
I got the regular springs (non-expo) and they are stiffer then the original springs. If you plan to hall allot or tow heavy things get the expo leaves. I changed mine myself so I can help you if you want.

 

Shit well I guess I better cancel and step up to the expos. Damn I'm dumping money into this truck lately! Yeah I'm off Sun and my girl is working so I'm down to meet up. How's your Camry paint project coming? I've got projects galore, from winch install to an Ethanol fuel content analyzer gauge in the Evo to "big three" ground wire and terminal upgrade on the Tacoma... suck my grage land lady is hating on me doing any work. I'm looking for a new garage because I predict I'm gonna get evicted soon since there's no way I'm not going to do something in there that she doesn't like and I'm sick of her shit, like stealing all my tools for a few days.

 

Don't buy a whole set of expos! Just do the D6XL AAL. After installing the aal, I carried 14 pallets of soil, a pallet at a time up a fuct ass washboarded 3 mile 20 grade hill early this spring. And my original dakars were 4 years old... My rake in the back is 2" above the front w/o any load in the rear. They're like $30 per leaf.

I'm north of CowMt off the 20 in mendo. I usually go every weekend... I got turned around at talmage. Is it pretty charred up there?

Oh, and how much did that topper run you? And where did you get it built at?

 

Thanks for the tip license! I'll look into those. Sounds like what I need. How is the ride quality?

The shell is an ARE and I had to order it through my local dealer, Custom Truck, they are a chain around the Bay Area. It was a little over $2k with all the options I added, tax, installation, etc. and took around two week for ARE to build and to arrive. Not cheap but a better deal than to closest featured SnugTop or Leer for sure.

When we left it actually didn't look too bad on the side we were on but I'm sure it's a lot worse on the other side but I didn't see that side. From what people said and how it looked, I would believe it.

Cool you are pretty close to my GFs family. Maybe we could meet up some time.