Now presenting "Rock Taco"!! Its just a toyota.....

Well I found myself bored and decided to post up a build thread of sorts on my truck.

Maybe its a way to motivate myself to get this thing done. As of late I have found it hard to build up the motivation to get it done. I have even thought about selling it and getting out of wheeling altogether. Then I realize where I now live and have not really done any off roading here at all and think of all of the things I would be missing out on. This has been one of those projects that have just lingered on to long. There have been a number of factors that have contributed. Some are legit other not so much... Anyways here it goes.

I bought this truck with only 17000 miles on it. It is the closest thing to new I have ever bought.

I will have to dig out some hard copies of pics before any modifications to add in here.

ADD PHOTO

This is after my first modifications. A revtek spacer, add a leaf, and 32" BFG all terains. It was alot of fun. and I drove it this way for a while on lots of trips through out California and Nevada. You can see see I should have mad another addition prior to a prevoius trip than this but we live and learn. This was just the first of more to come. Cool easy trail with lots of history. http://goo.gl/maps/WH2HH

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It served its purpose as a daily driver/weekend warrior for a few years until I figured I could hang with the go fast crowd. So we decided to go play at Sand Mountain in Nevada. http://goo.gl/maps/hb3gp

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It was totally driver error... :sick:

After the 3rd or 4th time over (I lost count) this is how it landed. Don't worry don't worry no one was hurt! It had 3 of the 4 tires blown off the bead but was still running! After turning it off and making sure all were uninjured (except my pride) We proceeded to pick up the yard sale and figure out what to do to get it back to California. All of us had driven out so no trailer or trucks to pull it with. After pushing the roof back up, airing the tires back up and a short drive back around to the front side where we camped it was decided it was still road worthy. So we jumped on the road to make the 4 hours back to the Rocklin, CA.

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It drove great! We had to keep stopping to add air to the tires because we had failed to get all of the sand out of the beads of the tires. Oh and it was raining and snowing since it was late Oct over the Sierra Nevada Mtns. We just turned the stereo up and drove. Well until we had to add air to the tires again.

So as I said before this was my daily driver so you can imagine the looks I got when I drove this to work the next couple of days! That is until I could find something else to drive in what was supposed to be the short term. Well since I was still making payments on it I couldn't just afford to go out and buy something else at the moment. Plus I was even sure what to do with this. I called my insurance company the next day ( I don't remember who I had at the time) and told them what had happened and they told me that I was not covered because I was not on a "road" well that made my decision easier. I had to keep my short term transportation a little longer and rebuild it! "We can rebuild him. We have the technology!" (some of you old guys like me will get that one) :D

It sat for awhile while I was looking for some new sheet metal on the cheap.

ADD PHOTO

After I had located new sheet metal and cut up the old and sold for scrap I started collecting parts. There was no way I was gonna rebuild this back to the way it was before! Here is my pile of parts!

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This wasn't everything but it was enough to get started. I got a few more things ordered and loaded it up to have Bent-Up do the solid axle swap on it.

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Rock Taco

Well-Known Member
Location
Sandy
AJ was great to have do my swap. I thought it was really awesome to be able to have a hand in doing this build. Since he had a full time job it was done at night and on weekends. Which worked out great for me to be able to be there every night after work.

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Let the cutting begin!

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Cutting off the old suspension.

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If I was to do it again I think just cutting off the front of the frame and welding on new 2"x 3" in the front (just in front of the cab)would have been easier and taken a little less time. It would also benefit from thicker material and be able to get more up travel and lower ride height.

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We reinforced the frame in the rear with some plates from Demello.

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When i first started this build I was planing on going with dual cases from Marlin or Inchworm and they both have great products but i decided to go with an Atlas II with 5:1 gear ratio after some mild encouragement from a friend.

I was able to clock it up (with the help from a BFH) the worst part about the Atlas is that to get my speedo to work I had to put a jeep speedo gear in it. :ugh:

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Next we started on the rear so we could build the front to match the rear. Now I went with what was suggested to me at the time as far as lift spring height. If I remember right its 8" which is too much in my opinion now but thats what I ordered. I went with Alcan http://www.alcanspring.com/ and they were great to work with. I got the Orbit eyes in the back in the spring only for more articulation. Every inch helps! :D

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When it came to shocks I wanted the 13" travel BBC's http://www.polyperformance.com/shop/BBCS-Shocks-p-84.html from Poly Performance. I had heard really good things about them and the name was cool! :greg: They didnt have them in stock at the time and they made me a good deal on these 14" travel Fox's.

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I forgot to mention I had a 2" body lift on this truck which is still on it. If I was to do it again I would have removed it. Here is the rear shock mount.

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and the rear is basically complete! On to the front!

The axle is a Diamond Axle with a high pinon 3rd, ARB, knuckle gussets, solid stops, 4:88 gears, custom length Longfield 30 spline axles and High Steer. I bought it made to 63 WMS to WMS. The high steer was originally from Marlin but we ended up going with arms from 4x4 Labs.

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The Marlin Arms were to short and were causing problems with the panhard bar because they were to short in this packaging. We toyed with the idea of going with Frombe arms but the high pinion third was in the way.

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We ended up with the 4x4 Labs http://www.4x4labs.com/ arms. One thing that really sold me was that they manufacture their arms to have the correct ackerman angle. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ackermann_steering_geometry

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Now the plan was to push the axle as far forward as possible to have that great approach angle for climbing big rocks and ledges. We decided to go with a forward swinging steering box to be able to make that happen. On the right is a FJ80 box and on the left is a Scout box that we ended up using mainly because it was already tapped for hydro assist from PSC.

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ricsrx

Well-Known Member
I have alway wanted to go to Sand Mountain NV.

What a great way to salvage a bad day at the dunes!
 

Rock Taco

Well-Known Member
Location
Sandy
A little (thanks Carl and Davy) but not much. Im just very motivated with it right now, nor is it very convenient to work on currently. I also have been a bit distracted lately. I know I know all terrible excuses. But it looks sweet sitting in the garage with the suspension all cranked down! :D
 

193kyle

Well-Known Member
Location
Chattanooga, TN
A little (thanks Carl and Davy) but not much. Im just very motivated with it right now, nor is it very convenient to work on currently. I also have been a bit distracted lately. I know I know all terrible excuses. But it looks sweet sitting in the garage with the suspension all cranked down! :D

Well, you should at least update this thread with some pics of it in it's current state, maybe we can help motivate you. What all do you have left? I know it's close....
 

blznnp

Well-Known Member
Location
Herriman
let us know where we can help troy, would love to see this thing on the trail (of course mine is not ready for trail either so I can't talk much)
 

Rock Taco

Well-Known Member
Location
Sandy
Amazing dude! I hope I see ya on the road/trails Someday!!

Thanks I appreciate it.

Well, you should at least update this thread with some pics of it in it's current state, maybe we can help motivate you. What all do you have left? I know it's close....

I guess I should get this thread at least current. I will see what I can accomplish this weekend.


let us know where we can help troy, would love to see this thing on the trail (of course mine is not ready for trail either so I can't talk much)

I thought you had the blazer on back on the trail? What are you doing to it now?
 

blznnp

Well-Known Member
Location
Herriman
I did, but then I pulled the propane off, put a rebuilt tranny in (mine had a lot of metal shinnyness in the pan) and a 6.0 lq4. Putting a fuel system back in...all the stuff I ripped out.
 
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