Builds Do I need to buy a flat bill now? Chap79 Tacoma Build (5 Viewers)

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Would I trust my life with this weld... I’m guessing the tab will break first. It’s not bad for 115, I miss having 230v in the shop. this dead power leg is killing me
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A flat bill welding hood maybe? We need you back here to fab for us!!
I’ll drive out there anytime someone wants to augment my trip expenses. I’m currently sitting at 160+ hrs of use or lose vacation time I need to burn up by the first of the year.
We definitely miss living out there. Friends, family, and the outdoors.

Just trying to make the best of the opportunities presented to us. Hopefully we’ll be able to get out that way in the near future without sinking a rig in a river or blowing up a motor.
 
Bouncing back and forth between different projects. Got the bumper, winch, and light bar mounted on the truck.
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Which meant I needed to start thinking about my accessory circuits. Bent up some more stainless and made a “power tray.” I have 4awg going from the house battery through a MIDI fuse to the Blue Sea 50/50 switched fuse panel to the B leg (always hot). I used an 80amp relay to provide power to the switched side A Leg (ACC Power) and used an add a fuse in the factory engine bay panel to trigger the relay. The relay is mounted under the tray in the rear. I have the tray setup with enough space for 5 40amp relays on the top. Hopefully that’s enough for expansion. I was I. A bit of a rush this evening and used the wiring that came with the light bar to hook it up. I’ll redo it in the future with a weatherproof relay when I have more time.
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Still need to wire in a new circuit for power to the bed for the air compressor and fridge. One step at a time.
 
Bouncing back and forth between different projects. Got the bumper, winch, and light bar mounted on the truck. View attachment 2443383Which meant I needed to start thinking about my accessory circuits. Bent up some more stainless and made a “power tray.” I have 4awg going from the house battery through a MIDI fuse to the Blue Sea 50/50 switched fuse panel to the B leg (always hot). I used an 80amp relay to provide power to the switched side A Leg (ACC Power) and used an add a fuse in the factory engine bay panel to trigger the relay. The relay is mounted under the tray in the rear. I have the tray setup with enough space for 5 40amp relays on the top. Hopefully that’s enough for expansion. I was I. A bit of a rush this evening and used the wiring that came with the light bar to hook it up. I’ll redo it in the future with a weatherproof relay when I have more time.
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Still need to wire in a new circuit for power to the bed for the air compressor and fridge. One step at a time.
Any link to the HD battery terminals? Again nice fab.
 
I’d been trying to come up with an idea of where to put a fuse panel in the rear of the truck for power to the fridge and air compressor. I’m going to try this and hope I don’t burn the truck to the ground. I carefully ran 4 gauge from the house battery along the driver side frame rail following the factory loom to the bottom of the bed. I mounted a Harbor Freight “weatherproof” case under the bed in the rear for the fuse panel and circuit breaker.
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good thing I don’t frequent boarder crossings.
 
I’d been trying to come up with an idea of where to put a fuse panel in the rear of the truck for power to the fridge and air compressor. I’m going to try this and hope I don’t burn the truck to the ground. I carefully ran 4 gauge from the house battery along the driver side frame rail following the factory loom to the bottom of the bed. I mounted a Harbor Freight “weatherproof” case under the bed in the rear for the fuse panel and circuit breaker.
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good thing I don’t frequent boarder crossings.

Ha!
Seems clever - does the box have a gasket? On my phone, tough to see. Since water and snow will be flung there.

People modify Pelican boxes and small Ammo cans into junction boxes for marine applications.
 
Ha!
Seems clever - does the box have a gasket? On my phone, tough to see. Since water and snow will be flung there.

People modify Pelican boxes and small Ammo cans into junction boxes for marine applications.
Yes, it has a gasket. It just doesn’t have the higher end cam style locks like a real Pelican Case. Otherwise the construction is pretty good. Time will tell though.
 
Finally installed in the bed of the Tacoma. I hope the composite bed holds up.
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I wanted more auxiliary ports in the front for the dash cam, Garmin GLO GPS receiver, etc. I know I could just cut the ends off the cables and wire them in directly but I like having options. On my LX450 build I had made a aux port mount in the driver kick panel so I figured I’d do the same here. Stainless steel seems to be my main media lately since I have a scrap sheet of 14ga.

Cardboard Aid Design again to dial in a prototype before cutting it out with the metal shears, a little hole saw action, some bending, and voila! A mounting bracket!

Added the Blue Sea aux ports, now just need to wire it.
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A little more progress. Made a bracket to hold the Anderson SB50’s for the fridge and air compressor in the bed of the Tacoma. Hopefully the environmental boots will keep the moisture out. Cut a hole in the bed to mount it, the drywall attachment on the Dremel worked perfectly.
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Finished up the bracket and wiring this morning, installed in the truck. 15amps to the fridge and 80amps to the air compressor. (Compressor peaks around 65 at startup then runs at 35).
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Finally got around to wiring in the dual voltmeter. I purchased the voltmeter from SolidKits out of Australia as it was the only one I could find that would fit a factory dash blank. After a quick bench test to see how if functioned since it didn’t come with any instructions I found that both displays are hot all the time. So I was going to need some relays.

The Main display I wired up to the start battery (pin 30-pos of battery w/in-line fuse, 85-gnd, 86-to switch power of the stinger relay for the auxiliary fuse block, 87-to voltmeter). The Aux display was much easier, direct to the switched power side of the auxiliary fuse block w/in-line fuse. Both displays are grounded by tapping into the BlueSea remote dash switch ground that goes back the the House battery.

I wired it this way so that the displays are both pulling directly from the batteries without going through the factory harness so I shouldn’t see voltage drops. Truck idling with the switch set to automatic shows a steady 13.9 to both batteries.

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Manually disconnected and left to sit for a few hours.
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To make you feel more sure of your ironman purchase, I’ve been using the Ironman springs and FCPs on my Hilux for 2.5 years now and they are good. I went to them after being underwhelmed by a set of fox 2.0.

They have done huge road trips including off-road up into our alpine regions, towed a 24ft van, carted bobcat bucket loads of gravel and sand in both the tray and trailer and get a frequent punishment on my local beach.
They reach their limit doing 100kph beach runs but that’s not something I do too often.
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To make you feel more sure of your ironman purchase, I’ve been using the Ironman springs and FCPs on my Hilux for 2.5 years now and they are good. I went to them after being underwhelmed by a set of fox 2.0.

They have done huge road trips including off-road up into our alpine regions, towed a 24ft van, carted bobcat bucket loads of gravel and sand in both the tray and trailer and get a frequent punishment on my local beach.
They reach their limit doing 100kph beach runs but that’s not something I do too often.
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I’ve had my lift on for about 8k miles now, almost all highway. It performed just as advised when I’ve loaded it up coming home from the hardware stores and when I did finally get it off road. I do get a little bit of a squeak from the front coils where they meet at the top of the perch. But I just spray it with motorcycle chain lube every few months so it doesn’t bother me.
 
Yep, sold the 80, just waiting on the shipping company to pick her up. But I sold our ‘08 Tundra too. Went back and forth between the taco and T4R trying to decide what to get next. Ultimately the need for the pickup bed won.
Chap, we will miss you in the 80 section !!!!!!
 
Chap, we will miss you in the 80 section !!!!!!
I still hop over there every now and again. I have a lot of knowledge trapped in my skull and try to pass it on to others when I can.

And my old 80 is alive and well living on the left coast.
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The Taco is looking great. I will caution you though, as based on the photos from 4WD Toyota Owners thread, you are on a slippery slope. I’d say you are only a dorkel and supercharger away...

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