Bandit Runner's Build Thread

[Bandit Runner]

Well, the weather has been pretty nice lately, so I've been doing a lot of painting. Pulled the front bumper off the 4Runner and put a fresh coat of paint on it. Also working on getting the winch installed in the bumper.

I took off the all the skidplates (front, flat belly, gas tank, rear diff, and rear control arm mount). I put a fresh coat of POR-15 on all of those and my new rear upper and lower control arms.

I finally ordered the Whiteline bushings for the rear upper control arms. A pic of the painted arms and the bushings:

And the bushings installed:

I got those installed on the truck, but no pics. When I went to install them, the ends of the arms would not fit in between the mounts. It seems that the Whiteline bushings have a slightly wider flange than the OEM bushings. I had to pry the mounts apart a little bit, and then I was able to get the arms in place. They fit VERY snug.

I still need to order the bushings for the rear lower control arms.

 

[SIN-Japan]

Beautiful stuff Bandit as always, now that the weather is better can you post up a few long awaited pics of your rock lights and where you installed them.


Just your friendly fan reminder request!

 

[fourfive]

I got those installed on the truck, but no pics. When I went to install them, the ends of the arms would not fit in between the mounts. It seems that the Whiteline bushings have a slightly wider flange than the OEM bushings. I had to pry the mounts apart a little bit, and then I was able to get the arms in place. They fit VERY snug.

I know exactly what you mean by the the SNUG fit. I installed my whiteline bushings on my rear lca & uca this wkend too. I didnt pry the mounts apart but used a lot of force to get them in place. Unfortunetly i had to put my stock uca back in bc the used uca's i got were about 1/2" too short... I'm thinking they may have been for a 2wd. Luckily i was able to remove the poly bushings from the uca's so I could reuse them when i get the correct size.

I do feel like the handling has improved with the whitelines in just the rear lowers, especially on the highway. Feels more stabile with less sway.

 

[Bandit Runner]

Beautiful stuff Bandit as always, now that the weather is better can you post up a few long awaited pics of your rock lights and where you installed them.


Just your friendly fan reminder request!

Thanks for the reminder. I'll see what I can do.

 

[Bandit Runner]

I know exactly what you mean by the the SNUG fit. I installed my whiteline bushings on my rear lca & uca this wkend too. I didnt pry the mounts apart but used a lot of force to get them in place. Unfortunetly i had to put my stock uca back in bc the used uca's i got were about 1/2" too short... I'm thinking they may have been for a 2wd. Luckily i was able to remove the poly bushings from the uca's so I could reuse them when i get the correct size.

I do feel like the handling has improved with the whitelines in just the rear lowers, especially on the highway. Feels more stabile with less sway.

Man I don't know how you got those in without prying the mounts apart. I hammered on them for a while, but they weren't budging.

I saw your post on the arms being too short. Bummer! I still have my stock upper arms if you want to buy them. They're rusty but could be cleaned up.

 

[fourfive]

Man I don't know how you got those in without prying the mounts apart. I hammered on them for a while, but they weren't budging.

I put some grease on the sides of the bushing flanges before installing so that probably helped a good bit. Did that mainly to minimize squeaking.

I saw your post on the arms being too short. Bummer! I still have my stock upper arms if you want to buy them. They're rusty but could be cleaned up.

Theres a member looking into a set for me but will take you up on that if it falls through. Thanks for looking out.

...if you end up having any of those nifty little grease packs that the whitelines come with left over i'd gladly take those off your hands. I think i accidentally threw mine out when i was cleaning up.

 

[D Farms]

do you have links for these bushings? also all surfaces should be greased when using poly.

 

[Bandit Runner]

Theres a member looking into a set for me but will take you up on that if it falls through. Thanks for looking out.

...if you end up having any of those nifty little grease packs that the whitelines come with left over i'd gladly take those off your hands. I think i accidentally threw mine out when i was cleaning up.

OK, Let me know. Sorry, I used all my grease. You can buy it on Amazon though:
DuPont Krytox GPL 215 EP Grease with Molybdenum Disulfide, 0.5 oz Tube: Amazon.com:

 

[Bandit Runner]

do you have links for these bushings? also all surfaces should be greased when using poly.

Found them on Amazon:
Amazon.com: Whiteline W63379 Rear Trailing Arm Bushing: Automotive

I greased everything except the ends of the bushings, where they mate with the mounts. Is that gonna be a problem?

 

[fourfive]

do you have links for these bushings? also all surfaces should be greased when using poly.

Currently no (except the ones on my 4runner) but waiting on a set that hopefully will come through soon. Thanks for the grease tip. I never know which surfaces grease should be applied with polys. For instance, with the steering rack bushings, ES told me to apply to all surfaces but then I've heard from other members to not apply any to poly steering rack bushings. So far I've been applying grease to all surfaces but good to hear that is how it should be done.

 

[fourfive]

Found them on Amazon:
Amazon.com: Whiteline W63379 Rear Trailing Arm Bushing: Automotive

ahh, wasn't sure if he meant link to bushings or control arm links

I greased everything except the ends of the bushings, where they mate with the mounts. Is that gonna be a problem?

After my experience with having to wrestle those bad boys into place, I would just smear some on any surfaces you can reach otherwise just leave it unless it starts squeaking.

 

[D Farms]

Found them on Amazon:
Amazon.com: Whiteline W63379 Rear Trailing Arm Bushing: Automotive

I greased everything except the ends of the bushings, where they mate with the mounts. Is that gonna be a problem?

wow thats a lot, but i guess they do just go right in. when i made my links at first I used 4th gen poly bushings which were a 3 part design, I made the bushing cups to 4th gen spec. the 3 part design sucks because the lips of the bushings would slip out of the cup and rip as soon as I flexed the truck. I ended up getting some generic bushings from energy suspension and they seem to be working very well for the lower links, haven't had time to do the uppers though. they flex perfectly fine and do not bind at all.

 

[Bandit Runner]

Painted a few parts to get ready for the winch install. Aluminum hawse fairlead, the "Prolink" that I made, and a bracket for mounting the winch controller in the bumper.

Also the Whiteline poly rear lower control arm bushings came in:

Installed in my beefed up control arms:

Haven't had a chance to install them on the truck yet though.

 

[Bandit Runner]

Beautiful stuff Bandit as always, now that the weather is better can you post up a few long awaited pics of your rock lights and where you installed them.


Just your friendly fan reminder request!

I used 9 lights for each side of the truck located like this:
- 1 near the front body mount in front of the front tire.
- 2 in the front wheel well.
- 1 just behind the front tire.
- 1 midway between front and rear tires.
- 1 just in front of the rear tire.
- 2 in the rear wheel well.
- 1 near the rear body mount behind the rear tire.

As you can see, this gave me a fairly nice even distribution of light all around the truck.

The mounting varied depending on what I was attaching them to. I bought a roll of metal strap with the holes in it. Its the stuff plumbers/electricians/hvac guys use to hang pipe/conduit/ducts from unistrut. I basically cut a short piece of the strap and bent it to fit where I needed to mount it (it bends really easy, but is stiff enough to hold its shape). I used a small bolt and nut to attach the rock light to one of the end holes in the strap. I used another bolt/nut in the other end hole of the strap to mount to the truck (where there was an existing hole in the truck to use). In some places where there was no hole (wheel wells) I used drill point screws to attach the strap to the truck.

Here's a few crappy pics of the mounting:
By the front body mount (bumper is currently off due to installing a winch):

By the middle slider position:

Two in each wheel well:

Hope this helps.

 

[Bandit Runner]

Got a few things done this past weekend. First I finally installed the beefed up rear lower control arms with poly bushings. The rear end feels a little more solid now.

I also finished painting the gas tank skid, and got that installed also:

In non-4Runner news, my wife picked up a new distraction for the family:

8-week old kitten. My son named him "Pepper". He's a riot. He's either sleeping or bouncing off the walls like a spaz. There is no inbetween. The dog likes him too:

Mmmm. He tastes good!

 

[Bandit Runner]

I need more LED lights like a need another hole in my head, but I took advantage of the Rigid Industries group buy. I just ordered (2) 10" SR series hyperspot lights:

I'm going to put these on the front of my roof rack for long distance lighting.

I'll have to remove the current 6" lights up there now, and rework the front of the rack a little to fit the bigger lights, but it shouldn't be too bad.

 

[Bandit Runner]

I got the winch installed!

First things first, while the bumper was off the truck, I took the opportunity to repaint the grille. I hated driving around like this without a bumper for the last few weeks.

I wound the winch line by hand for now, but I still need to re-spool it under load. Here's the winch and controller installed in the bumper. I safely routed all the wires and zip tied them in place.

I reinstalled the bumper on the truck. Here you can see in the winch access opening on the left, the red controller on/off switch and the plug-in port for the remote control cable. In the right opening, I can reach in and turn the clutch lever for free spool or engage.

All buttoned up, and installed my homemade "Prolink". The mesh covers for the winch access openings just snap in and out for easy access.

Can't wait to use it now.

 

[Konkordmusk]

Can't wait to use it now.

But hopefully you don't have to!
About to PM you.

 

[Bandit Runner]

My lights came in:

Probably start modifying the roof rack to fit them this weekend.

 

[Bandit Runner]

I pulled off the roof rack to start making the changes necessary to mount the new 10" lights. I cut off the center section tubes.

In the new design, the lower tube will go straight all the way across. The two curved pieces will be reused, but in a different position. They will be trimmed and run vertically near the center between the upper and lower tubes.

Since the roof rack was off, I took the opportunity to wash and wax the truck. It looks weird to me without the roof rack on.