[Fishwerks]

That's a bunch of LEDs, the whitson rack looks killer.

[twitchee2]

Making progress!

[twitchee2]

Lights are all mounted up, now I need to sort my wiring out. I fired them up last night and they are awesome!

Its all up there, I will figure out wiring and then i will need to put some more paint on the welds. I also added a mount for a flag and CB up there while i was at it.

More pics:

Upper mount with








rears:



Hopefully will have powered pictures but this coming up weekend!

[downpour11]

Looks great!

[twitchee2]

Not many pictures but all my wiring is done, just need to clean up the dash and put it all together.

Here is the fuse/relay panel I built to put in the rear of the truck. This is before I fitted the AL and zip tied everything in place.


Should have more updates today/tomorrow. Off to pismo for the weekend so I have to get it all done! Also got new pads and rotors installed, finally wore out my tundra brakes. Also replaced my custom end links with factory ones. Hopefully they will not make so much noise anymore!


more to come in the next day or so.

[twitchee2]

Here are some pics from Pismo this last weekend. Naturally I forgot to take a picture of the light pattern but it is amazing!

Here is a video and some pictures.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEgv8EGtnes

[thenightman]

Originally Posted by twitchee2

I saw these pictures, and said holy crap, I need to go back to Mammoth! Been camping around there, but never hit any trails. That scenery is amazing. What trail/trails is this?

[twitchee2]

Originally Posted by thenightman

I saw these pictures, and said holy crap, I need to go back to Mammoth! Been camping around there, but never hit any trails. That scenery is amazing. What trail/trails is this?

its the road/valley up to laurel lakes. I wasnt able to make it to the actual lake due to a huge snow bank. You can only get there late in the season.

[twitchee2]

Just for my own documentation, I removed and re-torqued my steering rack guide bearing and it significantly reduced the slop in my steering. I have 264k on the odo.

I would recommend doing this every 100k miles because it is so easy. 30 minute job with the right tools.

[twitchee2]

Also, Just realized today marks my 10 yr anniversary with my 4runner! 264,197 miles! 132k miles in 10 yrs! not to bad and it was not my DD for 3.5 yrs!

[twitchee2]

So unfortunately, this last post was lost when they rebuilt the server so here goes, again. Here is an update/maintenance log since April, I have put a few miles on in a short amount of time.

Not a whole lot has happened to the 4runner other than just getting used. I sold my Whitson Metal works Roof rack, that was sad but its at least getting used rather than collecting dust in the garage. I sold it because I just moved to Norcal from Socal, the extra cash and not having to move it was nice. Plus it killed my MPG and I knew I was going to be putting some miles on.

Then my buddy decided he wanted to get married so we had a bachelor party at pismo. Had to mount up my old LED bar. This mount literally took 20 minutes, start to finish. I need to pull it off, clean it up and paint but it works great.



Next, the weekend we were at pismo happened to be Turf-N-Surf 2018, so that was cool. Tons of really cool rigs and I was very surprised how many people struggled out in the dunes. I think there was lot of not knowing how to drive in the dune. So many people were afraid of the skinny pedal, which is how you have to drive out there. I pulled out a couple people so that was fun. Then, I hit a bowl that a bunch of Toyotas lined up around the lip. One of the guys there got it on video for me.

Video>>>

Next up was our annual Christmas Tree Hunting trip up in the Lassen National Forest. We did some snow wheeling. Always a good time.


Next up Maintenance

So in honor of my 4runner being 16 years old, figured the maturity of a 16 year old needed to come out.


I have been having some strange wandering issues and my tires are wearing pretty strange. I assumed I had worn out LCA bushings thanks to some squeaky bushing noises that i thought was my sway bar, it wasn't. So I decided to swap them out. Here is how bad they were.

Video>>>>>

This job got really fun, really fast when I found out my passenger side alignment Cams were seized nice and tight. Drivers side cam out easy, probably due to the oil that inevitably gets on them from the oil filter. I had the privilege of burning though 7 Sawzaw blades cutting the two Cams free....took 3 hours to get the one LCA out.... So quick PSA. if you have over 200k miles, change your LCA bushings. If you haven't done so, grease them up generously before reinstalling them so you don't have to do what I had to do.

Cut out pieces with new Cams:


Then I got it aligned, I am not real happy with it. I think i am going to take it back and have them take some camber out to see if they can get more caster in it.


While I had the front end all apart, I also changed out the LBJ's just because. I need to look but I think I had ~120k on these last ones. better safe than sorry. I also found that my steering rack bushings needed to be replaced again, so I did that and new sway bar bushings. All of this was done @280,715, just for my notes.

Anyway, all and all she's running great!

[twitchee2]

just posted this in the "what did you do to your 3rd gen" thread, but adding it here just becuase.

I got a oil thermostat installed tonight. Was heading up to Tahoe last weekend and my trans temp never got about 125deg and dipped down to 95deg when it was 20deg out. my trans cooler has always kept my trans cooler than most and I haven't had an issue in 9 years. Usually runs ~140deg@70deg ambient 160ish@100deg. I just moved to NorCal and it gets a little colder up here than in SoCal so here is the install.

So far, my quick trip say it settled in at ~154deg@62 ambient. Had to try but it got it up to 170 on a quick acceleration, but it settled back at 155 once I started cruising again. It is very obvious when the thermostat opened and closed, pretty cool. Very happy with the initial test.

Here is what I used: Fluid Control Thermostats : 3/8" NPT Fluid Control Thermostat Kit

[TonyB66]

Originally Posted by twitchee2

just posted this in the "what did you do to your 3rd gen" thread, but adding it here just becuase.

I got a oil thermostat installed tonight. Was heading up to Tahoe last weekend and my trans temp never got about 125deg and dipped down to 95deg when it was 20deg out. my trans cooler has always kept my trans cooler than most and I haven't had an issue in 9 years. Usually runs ~140deg@70deg ambient 160ish@100deg. I just moved to NorCal and it gets a little colder up here than in SoCal so here is the install.

So far, my quick trip say it settled in at ~154deg@62 ambient. Had to try but it got it up to 170 on a quick acceleration, but it settled back at 155 once I started cruising again. It is very obvious when the thermostat opened and closed, pretty cool. Very happy with the initial test.

Here is what I used: Fluid Control Thermostats : 3/8" NPT Fluid Control Thermostat Kit

Any photos of your tranny cooler? My apologies if I missed it. From your first post, looks to be a salvage yard special...

[twitchee2]

Originally Posted by TonyB66

Any photos of your tranny cooler? My apologies if I missed it. From your first post, looks to be a salvage yard special...

Its in post #3. And yes, it is a salvage yard special. its been a long time and i dont remember what exactly it came from, but I think it was a late 90s Ram 2500...little overkill

Edit - it looks like this: https://www.amazon.com/APDTY-Automat.../dp/B074NT9ZW9

Turns out its the trans cooler for a 95-02 5.9 cummins...hehe

[TonyB66]

Originally Posted by twitchee2

Its in post #3. And yes, it is a salvage yard special. its been a long time and i dont remember what exactly it came from, but I think it was a late 90s Ram 2500...little overkill

Edit - it looks like this: https://www.amazon.com/APDTY-Automat.../dp/B074NT9ZW9

Turns out its the trans cooler for a 95-02 5.9 cummins...hehe

Thanks for the link. I didn't see it the 3rd post... Dang that is big. That explains the exceptional cooling you experienced!