Builds Family haulin' (6 Viewers)

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Hey Boots4!

Looking great. One of the overlooked sources of noise on the
4bt is the oil pan. You can cut somewhere around 3-5 dB, depending upon the deadener used.

Covering the pan with bedliner does very little. The most effective
acoustic suppressor would be something like a second oil pan over
the original with padding in-between. Some foil-covered sound mats can do this.

Very nice work, you will soon have it street legal!:beer:

George
 
Great to see (and hear) the baby running. Anymore videos to brag about? How is the noise curbing procedure going?
 
I'll have some short vids next week on sound. The initial testing tells me I'll probably need to rig a bottom skirt to really cut down the sound but it already sounds quieter in the cab. I've been focusing on this but may take a break and get some progress done on my vacuum setup for the tranny. Wife wants some time for herself on saturday (she definitely deserves it) so I'll be watching the kids but am hoping to get some time in on the cruiser, maybe they'll get an extra nap from dad. :hmm:
 
Very Nice Work
 
weekly update

The sound deadening showed up and I just had to open it up.

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This is barrier 104 in the 1.25" flavor. He said the thicker the better as long as you've got space for it. This is my thumb (my fattest finger) for reference. You can see the mylar coating, absorbant foam, a sound barrier and a foam backing that makes up this product.

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This is the dexdamp. It comes in 12"x24" strips and has adhesive on the backside.

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I pulled the original hoodliner and it looked like something tried making a nest at one point. The PO must have parked this for a little while. The hood was dirty so I cleaned and dried it before I started putting the dexdamp down.

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Dexdamp is now on the hood. This is a dampener meant to keep the sheetmetal from vibrating which causes sound. This goes on first and then barrier 104. It doesn't take very long but having a little wooden roller helps to lay it on and get good contact for the adhesive.

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Then I noticed my floor board was a little wet. It was no big deal (since I've got a gutter or windshield gasket leak) until I looked closer and realized it was coolant. I immediately dreaded the idea of a leaking heater core.

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After further investigation I found the inlet to the heater control valve wasn't sealing. When I pulled the hose off I found out why. I must have overtightened the hose clamp and pinched the brass fitting. Somehow this was leaking into the cab (at least that is what I am hoping and am now monitoring).

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I checked online and called a few places and no one had one. I'm sure another car like a camery used the same part but I didn't want to do the research to find out or hunt one down at the junkyard if I didn't have to so I opened up the hole and rounded it out. I didn't crack anything so I put it back in and it seems to be sealing. Again, I'll be watching this part and my coolant level to see if this was the leak.

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I put some dexdamp down on the driver fenderwell and then decided to find a spot for my Ford PS vacuum pump. I decided on the firewall. I use one hole that already had a bolt in it, lined it up to mark the other hole, and put the drill through the firewall.

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Here it is mounted to the firewall.

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I must have missed the pic of the barrier 104 installed. I picked up some 3M 90 contact cement (following recommendation but an ouch @ $20 a spray can) at the local hardware store. I was skeptical that it would hold the weight of the barrier (must be ~20lbs) but by following instructions on the can for high strength it adhearded to the hood and kept the barrier in place. I bought two sheets and only used 1 for the hood. I'll find other places for the other sheet. Since it is pretty thick I ended up cutting out a recess for the intake and you can kind of get an idea of what it looks like.

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update cont.

With that stuff in place I started it up for a sound check. Above the hood there was a reduction in sound but unfortunately it was leaking right out the bottom. I was going to need a a skirt.

I had some extra work mats you put on the ground for cushioning that I decided to experiment with. I had some overhead shelving in the stepvan and cut a piece of that out to give me a base to attach this mat too. I then tailored the mat to fit the contour of the gap and attached it to the base with zip ties.

Heres a view from the top.

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Here's a view from the bottom.

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I put that front piece that comes on FJ60s back on and cut some foam to fit. Here's the bottom view.

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Here is a view from the top.

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I just did the front and the driver side. We went out to dinner that night and took the cruiser and that made an audible difference. I also lined the tranny access panel with dexdamp and even with it not being bolted down yet (meaning there is a gap for sound to leak) that too made a difference. Once I get that panel bolted down the in cab sound at idle will be very comfortable. When I have the engine spinning there is a droning in the cab but that is caused by that stepvan muffler so I still want to get a different one to reduce or eliminate that. I'm not done deadening the engine bay but that's all I got done last weekend. If I want to keep that skirt around the engine in place I think I'll go with more durable material just in case of heat. I'd be concerned about keeping that stuff in there during the hot summer months. I'm going to use some barrier product on the fender well and part of the firewall in attempts to absorb more sound. I'm going to this level of absorption because of my intended use as a DD and highway traveler. Boomy exhaust is fun at first but gets old on a long trip so I'm trying to deaden more than probably what is needed. I'm tempted to take it in to DEQ now and sound test again to see what the difference is.

Shifting gears I decided to look at hooking up some linkage for the shifters. That way I could get the tranny panel bolted down. I did some quick measurements and found some stuff laying around and came up with these.

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I ran into clearance problems on the actual shifters and I'm not sure the rod material is strong enough so I'll do a redesign. These two will be easy because straight rods will work, the 2-4wd shifter will need to be bent for clearance so I didn't try anything for that yet. This week I'll do some calling about some mufflers/silencers I'm looking at.
 
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^^I have to agree.^^ As usual, great work. Always love to see the progress.

X3 get enought time to carefully read each step ..
 
Watch that rear shock mount. The stock tubing is fairly thin. The added leverage might be enough to rip it to shreads..
 
Thanks for the warning, I'll keep an eye on it.
 
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I haven't focused on them yet (we're talking about the front packs for those who are curious) but my thinking is to find another set of ranger packs (should be cheap) for some more options. Right now I'm thinking of going ranger main, ranger second, shortened ranger third, stepvan leaf with retainers 4th, shorter stepvan leaf 5th, and possibly one more at the bottom from the stepvan for 6th or perhaps an overload leaf from the ranger pack. I want to keep it about the same height and same thickness as the current pack and take some stress off that main leaf. That's my initial plan but that's the beauty of leafs they're tunable, just takes a little wrenchin'. Maybe I can recruit your help when I get there.
 
yep yep... I'll get those spring holders from my neighbor. :)

I'm adding some aals to my front this weekend. The springs are now inverted. Hopefully the aals will just get the springs back to where they should be... Depending on how much they add I may break out my cutoff wheel... again. :)

I think big blue get scared every time I turn on my compressor now.
 
I added stepvan leafs to my packs on my cummins conversion. It made the front shackle angle much better. I added two leaves to the front. In the rear it helped the the tired main leaves. Not sure how it rides since I am still working on putting the whole thing back together. I added one leaf to the back. This was on dearched OME 2.5" lift springs. The stepvan springs are a little narrower, maybe a 1/4".
 
Yeah the stepvan leaves are good to play with. For me they have a little more arch than the ranger main leaf that I'm using up front plus the way I have them stacked is putting more stress on the main leaf and causing it to bow off the rest of the pack. It's functional now but once I start wheeling it I can see how it will fatigue my main leaf. I'll get some pics this weekend to show what I'm talking about. Now that I have it on the ground I have a better idea of what to try next so that the pack flexes together. Droop is fine, it's the compression that will be a problem so when I originally hung them from the frame all looked well. It was once I got the weight on it that I could see some more tuning was necessary.
 

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