aemravan's build thread - project TacoRunner

[aemravan]

The drawer build has taken a lot more time and money to complete than I expected, but is finally in the finishing stages, and I can't wait to put it all together.

Took some time to seal the mdf yesterday before giving it a fee coats of black lacquer wood paint. A part of me wanted to keep it with the wood look, but it's just more practical and ultimately more durable to be painted with a few extra layers of black paint.

The new gas stove showed up yesterday too and fits I'm right at home in the primary draw pull.

I have not built the side cupboards like in the adventure index plans I bought since I have different ideas about how to secure the main carcass down and not need to cut and install 2 additional long sides. Once everything is in the car I do plan on closing off the sides, possibly also with a lid but it will be hinged off of the 2 main boxes instead of being standalone.

I have some carpet material on the way as well to cover the tops to allow for easier sliding of the cooler and what not. Also have some cooler tie downs coming to make sure it doesn't slide or bounce around offroad.

There are definitely some things I could improve the second time around, and mainly wish wood wasn't so pricey so I didn't have to use mdf, but overall for a first-time cabinet build it came out pretty sweet.

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[waught10]

Thanks ! Quality for 130 bucks is pretty decent. Definitely oem but neither is half my car lol.

For metal, I got half my metal through a work vendor in Gastonia. The other metal came from online metals.com. I'm looking for a local vendor where I can get some skid plate material at the moment though.

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The only place I know of besides friends at their work is metal supermarkets. We used to insure some locations and they usually have everything you would need in stock.

 

[aemravan]

Getting very close. Spent a few hours assembling everything once the paint dried. Have some tweaks to do and also cover the top with carpeting, but I have functional-ish drawers and I think they came out pretty sweet

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[aemravan]

So close to finished. Got a few more finishing touches but the drawers are pretty much complete and came out pretty sweet.

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[aemravan]

With most of my 4runner projects complete, or waiting on parts to he complete, I was finally able to get my other peoject back on the road.

Its the complete opposite of a lifted 4x4 but is my first guilty pleasure and I just hit 17 years of ownership this year. 1995 turbo supra.

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[dahveeed]

With most of my 4runner projects complete, or waiting on parts to he complete, I was finally able to get my other peoject back on the road.

Its the complete opposite of a lifted 4x4 but is my first guilty pleasure and I just hit 17 years of ownership this year. 1995 turbo supra.

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Wow that a nice Supra !


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[aemravan]

Got an unexpected early delivery of the rear icon adjustable shocks...finally !!

Took a few hours this morning to swap them over. One huge step closer to done.

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[xtremewlr]

Surprised to see that you are still running sway bars. Ditched my front ASAP and just ditched the rear when I finished up my ADS/MetalTech rear suspension. Rides so much nicer now and the suspension actually works offroad, not being limited by the sway bars.

 

[aemravan]

Surprised to see that you are still running sway bars. Ditched my front ASAP and just ditched the rear when I finished up my ADS/MetalTech rear suspension. Rides so much nicer now and the suspension actually works offroad, not being limited by the sway bars.

My biggest concern is that 95% of the time this is a daily driven, street/highway rig. Not having sway bars for regular driving may not be a big deal, but I feel like making an evasive lane change with an RTT being as high as I am with no sway bars wouldn't be much fun...

Next time I'm going offroad I do plan on taking off both front and rear to get the full articulation I have available so I guess we'll see how it handles on the way to and from the trails lol. I don't think it would take me more than 15 minutes to take off the bars and about the same to put them on.

 

[xtremewlr]

My 4Runner is 100% daily driven as it's my only vehicle currently. But, I don't run my RTT on it since I can't get the truck in or out of the garage if I did put it up there.

 

[aemravan]

Took my wife and her brother out on a quick day trip to the woods. The off-roading wasn't as big of a hit as the Philly cheese steak I made on the new set up lol

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[momo.75]

Which shock did you have up front?

 

[aemravan]

Which shock did you have up front?

Icon 2.5 front and rear, the front just don't have the adjustable control valve. I was given a lead time anywhere from 8 to 24 weeks on those so decided it wasn't worth the additional wait, plus got a good discount on the non adjustable ones since they had the others showing in stock at the time of purchase so I was OK with it. Or are you talking about from before? If so, I was running the Bilstein 5100 front and rear with the OME heavy springs on all 4 corners.

 

[thight]

Just read this whole thread and just have to say.... HELL YEAH BROTHER!!

Amazing setup, quality work and badass rig. Definitely taking some of what you've done and implementing it into my build.

I do have a question though, where did you find those taco headlights? Could you provide a link? Didn't seem to find this throughout the thread, unless I overlooked it.

 

[aemravan]

Just read this whole thread and just have to say.... HELL YEAH BROTHER!!



Amazing setup, quality work and badass rig. Definitely taking some of what you've done and implementing it into my build.



I do have a question though, where did you find those taco headlights? Could you provide a link? Didn't seem to find this throughout the thread, unless I overlooked it.

Thanks man, very much appreciated. Been a very involved, fast paced journey and I couldn't be happier with how it sits so far.

The headlights are from eBay, heres a screen shot below.

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[aemravan]

Still need to install the extended rear brake lines to do a full test once the rear controls arms are fabricated, but thus far... I'd have to say I need more flex lol.

The rear appears to be much better on the ICONS however I don't have actual testing that I've done.

The front is more than likely severely limited by thr sway bar, so once I fab up the rear links I'll drop both sway bars and repeat the test. I'm assuming I should be able to see the front tire tucked a lot more if it's allowed to. But we'll see I guess. No going SAS now lol

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[aemravan]

While waiting on some time to fab the control arms I had a chance to put together my fire pit wind deflector I had designed since I didn't feel like paying 400 bucks for a made one.

And finally, 2 months later, I got my replacement molle panels for the rear windows. Paint is currently drying.

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[ThirdCoastStroker]

Just read through this build thread. i am searching for a 4runner right now. beautiful build my freind.

 

[aemravan]

Had some spare time after getting off early and decided to tackle the rear link build.

The dom tubing is 1.5"od and .25" wall, the heims are from ruffstuff.

Looks like I very slightly misunderstood the sizing of the misalignment spacers and will need to shave a bit off a couple of then, but otherwise it's all cut, drilled and prepped for welding in the morning. Excited to get these done. Hopefully they work decent lol.

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[aemravan]

Well... Hopefully they don't pull apart lol.

Waiting for them to cool so I can clean them up and get some paint in them.

Threads don't look warped or anything so hopefully no issue with getting the heims in.

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