Unner's Build, 2001 T4R 4x4

[LittleCaesar]

The longer the road the better without sounding cliche; a 4oz weight and at least a 2/0 hook. If you can catch a blue crab or two use them as bait.

I'd go home to Bama and get the kayak and bring it down to any of the cities along the SC coast. Be careful though, I read where one 20 year old drowned in a local river last month.

The ladies love Charleston. Food, atmosphere, etc. I'd wait and bring the lady with me.

There is no exploring with the 4runner along the coast. North Carolina is all that if that is your cup of tea.

 

[Unner]

The longer the road the better without sounding cliche; a 4oz weight and at least a 2/0 hook. If you can catch a blue crab or two use them as bait.

I'd go home to Bama and get the kayak and bring it down to any of the cities along the SC coast. Be careful though, I read where one 20 year old drowned in a local river last month.

The ladies love Charleston. Food, atmosphere, etc. I'd wait and bring the lady with me.

There is no exploring with the 4runner along the coast. North Carolina is all that if that is your cup of tea.

I would bring the kayak back up here, but I'm leaving next weekend to go back for the summer. I'll be working for a different company doing an internship over the summer and then in august I'll be back here with BMW. Definitely bringing the kayak that time.

I would bring her along, but she's not available so that won't work. I mostly want to get out of the house because I hate my roomate, can't wait to not have to deal with him anymore. I wish NC was closer, but at 7 hours I don't think it makes sense without it being a long weekend but who knows, I've done crazier things just to get parts for this truck haha

 

[LittleCaesar]

An old friend of mine from college lives in Hilton Head but loves Hunting Island. Neat place to visit and makes it easy to set up to camp there overnight. I have been there a dozen times, always fun but bring repellent except in winter. Beaufort is cheap too, at least compared to Charleston. Have fun regardless....

Camping at Hunting Island State Park

 

[Unner]

An old friend of mine from college lives in Hilton Head but loves Hunting Island. Neat place to visit and makes it easy to set up to camp there overnight. I have been there a dozen times, always fun but bring repellent except in winter. Beaufort is cheap too, at least compared to Charleston. Have fun regardless....

Camping at Hunting Island State Park

[MENTION=69868]LittleCaesar[/MENTION]

Well I ended up taking your advice and skipped Charleston. Mostly because I couldn't find a place for less than $50 a night to sleep in a parking lot in my truck. Nope. I'll go sometime with the lady like you said.

Soooo, instead I went to the Blue Ridge Parkway. I fell in love with it and ended up driving the southern most 190 miles of it in one day. I spent 12 hours Sunday driving, and I have no regrets. It was beautiful. Many many pics below.

DSC03932 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
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The picture below is my favorite "Nature Picture" I got while I was there.
DSC04044 by Unner Unner, on Flickr

And this is one of my favorites of the truck.
DSC04050 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
DSC04054 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
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[Unner]

Really like this one too.

DSC04091 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
DSC04093 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
DSC04095 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
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This should definitely be on your bucket list if you're into driving, mountains, beautiful views, pretty much anything. Parts of it really did remind me of the Alps. You don't need a sporty car to enjoy it either, it was a blast to drive in the 4Runner and all it's glory.

Mount Mitchell is really neat too. It was about 50* and windy at the top, the only time I had the windows up in the truck. Other than that I had all the windows down at least some. 65* and sunny, everything blooming, it was a great day trip.

And for whatever reason these pictures look way better/brighter on my phone than laptop. Not sure why, but they look clearer and brighter. It's easier to see the grill on my phone for example.

 

[LittleCaesar]

I am glad you did. Save some $$$ and bring the woman another time. Nothing anymore is cheap in Charleston, according to my uncle who lives there.

Hunting Island is rather rustic, and offers cheap beach fun, especially in non summer months when the kids head back to school in the fall but the ocean is still warm.

There is a General Store in Little Swiss that serves great coffee. Neat place.

If you make it back to the BRP, go in the fall and try and get to Linville Falls outside of Newland. If you like water it is a majestic place to visit. Grandfather Mountain State Park is one of my favorites, sitting atop of Calloway's Peak.

 

[Unner]

I am glad you did. Save some $$$ and bring the woman another time. Nothing anymore is cheap in Charleston, according to my uncle who lives there.

Hunting Island is rather rustic, and offers cheap beach fun, especially in non summer months when the kids head back to school in the fall but the ocean is still warm.

There is a General Store in Little Swiss that serves great coffee. Neat place.

If you make it back to the BRP, go in the fall and try and get to Linville Falls outside of Newland. If you like water it is a majestic place to visit. Grandfather Mountain State Park is one of my favorites, sitting atop of Calloway's Peak.

I figured I would be able to stay at one of those state parks that's not really close to Charleston for cheaper than $50 and for less than a two night reservation. Kinda crazy for what it really is. Then they add stupid stuff like WiFi across all the campgrounds. Who needs that, you're "camping"?

I stopped at the General store there but they were closed as I was there after 5:00 on a Sunday. I would have grabbed a coffee and some postcards for relatives in Switzerland who would have got a kick out of the small NC city. Had to settle for sending them a few pictures instead.

I passed through Linville Falls and Grandfather Mountain but it was getting kinda late so I just kept cruising on the parkway. I certainly plan to go in the fall, I can only imagine how beautiful it is with the leaves changing color.

 

[MattJakobs]

My dad travels to Charleston every other week and says it can get very expensive.

The pictures look great, what are you shooting with? They make me want to head west to Skyline Drive, which looks to be our version of what you just did.

 

[Unner]

My dad travels to Charleston every other week and says it can get very expensive.

The pictures look great, what are you shooting with? They make me want to head west to Skyline Drive, which looks to be our version of what you just did.

Thanks man, I'd like to do Skyline Drive some day too.

My camera is a Sony Alpha 3000. It's nothing too fancy, but I love the pictures it takes and it's easy to use. I think I paid like $200 for it new on Ebay a year ago.

 

[Clark27]

Beautiful truck Unner! Quick question - were you running the trail edition wheels with stock suspension before you lifted? I am up in the air about lifting but want to get the TE wheels.

Thanks!

 

[Unner]

Beautiful truck Unner! Quick question - were you running the trail edition wheels with stock suspension before you lifted? I am up in the air about lifting but want to get the TE wheels.

Thanks!

[MENTION=137059]Clark27[/MENTION]

Yes, the wheels themselves will fit just fine without a lift. It's just a 17" wheel. I had the 255/75/17's before the lift too and they fit fine, only very very minimal trimming.

Thanks for the PM on the locker diff, I'll hold off on it for now. It was a little more than I want to spend right now, I've got a couple other things I need to get sorted with the truck first.

 

[Kyle Reese]

Dude I saw you at sonic today haha

 

[Unner]

Dude I saw you at sonic today haha

Yup, we were headed out. Too many people trying to compensate for something. Someone should tell people that loud does not equal cool...

 

[Kyle Reese]

Yup, we were headed out. Too many people trying to compensate for something. Someone should tell people that loud does not equal cool...

Yeah there were a lot of JC kids there but that's expected on a summer night at 11 haha

 

[Unner]

Finally got rid of my clunking noise. It was my transfer case hitting my skid plates due to a bad transmission mount. More details in this thread if you're interested.

http://www.toyota-4runner.org/3rd-gen-t4rs/220314-low-speed-clunking.html

I also changed the oil, transmission fluid, front diff, and transfer case fluids while the skid plates were off as well as the transfer case output shaft seal on the front driveshaft. Now that all the maintenance stuff is done and that clunking noise is gone as well I can go back to focusing on other stuff, like mounting this winch I've had sitting in the box for a couple months.

I plan to go out and measure the length of cable I need to remote mount the solenoid in the passenger side of the engine bay at the back where there is space and then just order some cables in the right gauge premade to the correct length with lugs installed already. I don't feel like messing with it for this and that will make the install of the winch much easier.

I also think I am going to have the frame of my grill done in line-x. I went and talked to the local dealer here and he said it would be $75 and I think it will hold up much better on the front than the paint that is currently on it and chipping pretty badly from bugs and rocks on the interstate.

I really want to get out and do a little off-roading but with highs in the mid 90's and the humidity down here it makes it kinda difficult to actually enjoy being outside.

 

[Road Bull]

Ugh.. the 90s... I don't miss living in Florida for that very reason. Today is a little bit out of the norm here in Washington, however, we are looking at a 67/49 degree split. I can certainly live with that. It will get warm here soon enough.

Now that you have been running this set up for a while, how is your lift (front & rear) and tires holding up? Oh, as I am sure that it rains a bit in SC, how do your MTs treat you in the rain?

 

[Unner]

Ugh.. the 90s... I don't miss living in Florida for that very reason. Today is a little bit out of the norm here in Washington, however, we are looking at a 67/49 degree split. I can certainly live with that. It will get warm here soon enough.

Now that you have been running this set up for a while, how is your lift (front & rear) and tires holding up? Oh, as I am sure that it rains a bit in SC, how do your MTs treat you in the rain?

I would love temps like that. I hate that I can't go camping here in the summer because anything over like 70* at night is absolutely miserable to be camping in with the humidity.

The lift is doing great. I really like the coilovers up front and the adjustability. Well worth the extra cost. The rear is good too, maybe a little stiff, but not bad. On a smooth road it rides really well, on rough roads it's a little rough, but that comes with bad roads also... I think with a rear bumper these shocks would be the perfect stiffness in the rear, but I'd probably need to get a set of OME LC coils for the rear to keep my rake the way it is. I like the rake haha

So far the tires have held up great. I don't notice any increase in noise from them really, no cupping or abnormal wear. I rotate every 4k miles or so though religiously. They've got 25k miles on them right now and they probably still have at least another 25k miles in them, but I don't know if I will get that far with them before they come off for 33's...

In the rain they do fine, the only time I spin them is pulling away from a stop light or so if I'm sitting on a painted line. Maybe a little slick too doing a really fast stop in the rain, but nothing dangerous I would say. Just keep good distances, slow down if it is really raining, and know it's not an M3 on Pirelli's. Keep in mind also these tires come stock on Jeep Rubicons and they are everywhere. If they weren't safe for the average driver to have on their mall crawler Jeep they wouldn't put them on there.

It handles really well for what it is too, I love driving through the mountain switchbacks, even in a lifted 4Runner on M/T's haha

 

[Unner]

Here's a couple pics from just now since I washed the 4Runner and it's all nice and shiny!
DSC04176 by Unner Unner, on Flickr
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Also wen't camping a few weekends ago in Mississippi. Nothing really to take pictures of in Mississippi so this is the only one... There's a reason I lived in Alabama for 9 years and hadn't been to Mississippi except for when we crossed through when we moved from Texas...

DSC04167 by Unner Unner, on Flickr

While we were there we met a cool dude with a built 80 series land cruiser. 35's, snorkel, rack, front and rear bumpers, the whole 9 yards. Talked to him for a bit, he said he liked the bumper and grille and took pictures because he is trying to convince his nephew to get a 3rd gen instead of a big LC like his for his first car. He was only there for the night as he was on his way back to North Carolina from his cross country trip to Oregon, Moab, the grand canyon, arches, etc. Kinda jealous of his trip and if you're reading this LC owner whose name I don't remember, nice truck and good to meet you!

 

[Unner]

Stock grill is currently in the truck and my custom grill is taken apart to have the frame part dropped off for linex tomorrow. I think it'll look good. Should also be getting in my wires this week or early next to finally get this winch wired up. Pics to come!

 

[jgd99]

[MENTION=116387]Unner[/MENTION] Were you by chance in Birmingham this past Feb for a church function called D-Now put on by Dawson? If so, I think I saw you and your truck. Just now realized that it might have been you