[JVC8790]

Originally Posted by WildBill1990

sub'd. Build looks awesome man, cant wait to see what you do next!

Thanks! Next thing will be to finish up the skids, install the 3rd Gen TRD Offroad fronts (little more lift), finish wiring up the lights, then figure out how I'm gonna sleep in it later this month!

[Styner89]

Nice build. I have been looking at some mild skid plates to replace the factory ones on my 04. Where did you get the ARB skids from?

[JVC8790]

Originally Posted by Styner89

Nice build. I have been looking at some mild skid plates to replace the factory ones on my 04. Where did you get the ARB skids from?

I ended up ordering from Morris 4x4 on Labor Day. The only reason is because they had a 15% off anything Labor Day coupon that brought the delivered total to $377 instead of $418+tax.

They arrived pretty much next day since they shipped from Jasper, IN and I'm just in Ohio. Google was my friend in finding the best deal out there at the time.

[Styner89]

Originally Posted by JVC8790

I ended up ordering from Morris 4x4 on Labor Day. The only reason is because they had a 15% off anything Labor Day coupon that brought the delivered total to $377 instead of $418+tax.

They arrived pretty much next day since they shipped from Jasper, IN and I'm just in Ohio. Google was my friend in finding the best deal out there at the time.

Thanks for the quick reply. I will look around.

[JVC8790]

Update!

Got the remainder of the skids installed yesterday after drilling out/tapping a few of the bolt holes.

Started by getting the one bolt out that had been rounded off. Used a grinder to re-shape the bolt head, pounded on a 10mm wrench, then heated it up and worked it loose. Glad to not have to drill this one out!





Got the 2nd skid mounted up!



3rd Skid Brace Bracket Mounted


Mounted up the 3rd skid and had some clearance issues with the Y pipe. After reading further, this seems like a common problem on 03-04 V8 models.



This spacer bar is supposed to sit against the frame there to retain clearance of the exhaust, however with this exhaust, the bracket doesn't help at all.



Instead I took a piece of 1" square tube, drilled 2 holes through it to use as a spacer and found some longer hardware from my spare stash.





This did angle the skid plate a little bit, but it provided the clearance I needed to fit. The angle looks more drastic because the truck is on ramps, it does sit at a little angle but nothing too wild once the truck is leveled out.





And here's the final product! I still haven't fit the little skid they gave for the transfer case, but I'll pop that on one of these days.





Overall pretty happy with the install from the fitment standpoint. The price point is definitely good and although these aren't the beefiest skids out there, they're certainly better than nothing and based on this price, I still have money to play with!

Unfortunately, it looks like this upcoming weekend will be spent doing brakes on the truck. It sounds like I have a dragging caliper in the rear and I'm pretty sure one of my fronts is seized (vibration when braking). So I'm looking into the Powerstop front and rear kit due to the price point mostly. I've used powerstop on a previous car and it seemed pretty good. The alternate option is RockAuto for pads/rotors and a local source for calipers so I can warranty if need be easily. Any insight or thoughts?

[JVC8790]

Well, it was only a matter of time until this post.

Front right caliper is sticking pretty bad now, and the rear left is starting to drag. So that's my weekend project!

Ordered Powerstop pads/rotors for front and rear along with Centric soft line replacements from Amazon for about $190 total.

Then I did a bunch of reading and research and determined that the NAPA calipers are the best option with the best warranty for replacement. I placed an order for all 4 and I'm hopeful their 2-5 day shipping is closer to 2 and not 5 since I'm hoping to get started working on it Friday after work and finish by end of day Sunday (with time on and off, not working straight).

Anyone have any suggestions besides to drench all the bolts and line fittings in PB Blaster as soon as possible?

[JVC8790]

I've been dousing the brake lines and bolts in PB blaster for a few days, and then yesterday my bottle of Seafoam Deep Creep showed up, so they've been getting that since.



That's everything going on! Napa calipers look great and are a nice black finish, pads are ceramic, rotors are blanks (not drilled/slotted), and the Centric boxes are new soft lines for front and rear (if needed).

Wish me luck tonight!

[montijo505]

Originally Posted by JVC8790

I've been dousing the brake lines and bolts in PB blaster for a few days, and then yesterday my bottle of Seafoam Deep Creep showed up, so they've been getting that since.







That's everything going on! Napa calipers look great and are a nice black finish, pads are ceramic, rotors are blanks (not drilled/slotted), and the Centric boxes are new soft lines for front and rear (if needed).



Wish me luck tonight!

You’ve got your hands full! Only (maybe obvious) recommendation is flare nut wrenches for the brake line fittings, especially since your truck seems to have some rust issues. Good luck!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[JVC8790]

Originally Posted by montijo505

You’ve got your hands full! Only (maybe obvious) recommendation is flare nut wrenches for the brake line fittings, especially since your truck seems to have some rust issues. Good luck!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thanks! Luckily I'm here to report the brake job went well (for the most part). I had picked up a 10mm flare nut wrench which was a good choice, although the drivers rear line was still a bit rounded off and I ended up succeeding with vice grips.

No pics of the front, did those Friday night, but here are a few pics of the rear work!

Before




You could say it was time...



Reassembled with new brake lines as well



Wrapped up and cleaned up the wheels!





Gave the truck a wash afterwards!



Also popped in some super cheap LED headlights, we'll see how they hold up, but for $8 I can't complain.



First test drive impressions are amazing, the truck feels brand new and this change was overdue. I'm looking forward to seeing how this impacts my fuel mileage from having the seized caliper and getting pretty crappy mileage.

[JShipps]

Originally Posted by JVC8790

Thanks! Next thing will be to finish up the skids, install the 3rd Gen TRD Offroad fronts (little more lift), finish wiring up the lights, then figure out how I'm gonna sleep in it later this month!

Great build thread! Inspires me to do more with mine. I'm especially interested in the 3rd Gen TRD suspension build. My 07 has original shocks/springs so I'm looking to do a Tacoma swap to save some money, get a little lift and improve my ride. My dilemma is between 2nd Gen and 3rd gen. They're both pretty available so I can't decide which to go with. I'm not going big on wheels and tires like you. It's my daily driver and I'll probably always have street tires on it.

[JVC8790]

Originally Posted by JShipps

Great build thread! Inspires me to do more with mine. I'm especially interested in the 3rd Gen TRD suspension build. My 07 has original shocks/springs so I'm looking to do a Tacoma swap to save some money, get a little lift and improve my ride. My dilemma is between 2nd Gen and 3rd gen. They're both pretty available so I can't decide which to go with. I'm not going big on wheels and tires like you. It's my daily driver and I'll probably always have street tires on it.

Thanks!!

If you're not going to do any rear springs, 2nd gen should be fine. If you're planning to do rear springs (FJ or anything) then I'd look for 3rd gen. I bought 3rd gen but haven't put those in yet (to replace the 2nd gen).

[JShipps]

If you're not going to do any rear springs, 2nd gen should be fine. If you're planning to do rear springs (FJ or anything) then I'd look for 3rd gen. I bought 3rd gen but haven't put those in yet (to replace the 2nd gen).[/QUOTE]

I'm definitely planning on doing new rear springs. That's another question I have. When I look up FJ springs, I see Moog and a few other brands, but some say they're "Variable Rate" and others are "Constant Rate". Any idea what the difference is and which I'm supposed to get?

[JVC8790]

Originally Posted by JShipps

I'm definitely planning on doing new rear springs. That's another question I have. When I look up FJ springs, I see Moog and a few other brands, but some say they're "Variable Rate" and others are "Constant Rate". Any idea what the difference is and which I'm supposed to get?

To be honest, I'm not sure... I was going to buy the Moog ones, but ended up buying some used FJ Trail Teams ones from a forum member for a few bucks cheaper than the Moog units.

[JVC8790]

Here goes my first trip report from this past weekend! Finally got this thing off-road and it did great!

Started off Friday after work heading down to London, KY area and stayed the night at Levi Jackson State Park. We were going to be riding on the Kentucky Adventure Tour which is a 900 mile loop of mixed roads throughout Kentucky and partially into Tennessee/West Virginia.

Tossed an air mattress in the back and moved my extra gear into the front seats for the night. This worked out great and took just as much time to set up as it did my buddy to set up his Smittybilt RTT on his Xterra. It was a little warm/humid, so next time I'll be sure to bring a fan. I bought the window screens on Amazon for $13 and they worked out great, only piece of advice is to air them our before using the first time, the smell of glue/plastic was a little overwhelming when I took them out of the bag.



RTT on my friends Xterra



The trails consisted of a mix of paved, gravel, and dirt roads with a few cool sites to see. One of which was the Wildcat Battlefield monument from the Civil war era.



The trails got a bit "tougher" after the civil war monument, but were easily tackled.



We came across a cave on the trail.







Made a few stops along the route just to stretch our legs and let the trucks cool down.





Along the route, we came along the Pumpkin Hollow Road section. After getting to the top of the hill, I looked down over a section that looked a bit more difficult (remember I'm a noob).

I took a little video, although you can't really tell, but this area was very rutted and some folks had said it would likely be impassable with a stock vehicle (we found that out later). Both the 4Runner and Xterra are largely stock with oversized tires compared to some of the trail rigs people take out.

Here's a shot from where we stopped at the end of the trail.



I'm working on uploading a few quick clips from the drive, I'll add them here when I can.

Overall, this was a great first experience! We put down about 170 miles (lots of that was paved/gravel), and spent from 9am-5pm on the trail system enjoying the time outdoors. We started at the bottom left (Main 2) and ended at the very north point (Main 1).



Needless to say, we have a trip planned for November 15-17th and will hopefully bring along a few other friends that didn't make it out this time. If anyone else wants to join us just let me know!

[JVC8790]

Got some work done this weekend, nothing major.

Took some time to swap out my SWI-JACK steering wheel control interface in favor of the SWI-RC to work with my new headunit. While in there, I used a 1/4 to 1/8 headphone adapter to utilize the mic from my old headunit that had already been routed so that it could be used with the bluetooth on my new headunit. Tested it out and it worked perfectly! Bluetooth functionality for calls will be nice for roadtrips and taking work calls while out and about during the week.



Also finished up the assembly of my custom Fog Light Housings/ Element LED Amber Cannons, go check that out in the thread I made below!

Fog Light Retrofit - Element LED Amber Cannons!

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