HDJ100 Zimbo

[Shane Drummond]

With new big intercooler I have finally remounted my winch, and when putting the bumper back on The front, I have had to cut a new winch hole





Anyone else doing this, there are markings inside the plastic bumper that help to line it all up, but measure twice and cut once. I went 10cm vertical instead of 10cm at an angle and the end result was the top lined up nice but an extra 2cm at the bottom, it is still a little tight but I am thinking to cut extra 2cm on the sides and put a liner on the bumper to make it look OEM





That's inside Front Runner Kyalami, I Went with an advised 1950mm long rack, 1345mm wide, width is good, length... The advise sounded right at the time but I would rather have full use of the roof window for the kids to climb in & out of the roof top tent... An idea I got from the Zapp family who have been driving around The world in a 1928 Graham Paige, and have had 4 kids on their journey. www.sparkyourdream.net if you want to see where the have been. Here is a shot of this incredible vehicle




He extended it between the 2 doors in 2004, to add a bench seat behind the drivers seats for the kids in the back. He has done over 250,000km in 13 years and stayed in over 2500 homes with people & families from all walks of life & religion

The mileage before the start if this incredible journey was unknown... But my cruiser has a great buddy to look upto whilest they stay with us





We are at Zimbabwe Spring Steel, where the guys have done an incredible job remaking the leaf springs to suit his longer GP and bigger family with The added weight. The skills of these men are incredible, and largely go unused now that this once great country is ironically very similar to Argentina in that its leaders change the rules for votes and decimate the jobs & economy...

 

[Shane Drummond]

Ok FlammableFishie I have a solution to the water tank problem, very simple & easy, where the running boards were mounted inside the underbelly of the cab, I will mount PVC pipes, not sure what size to go for yet, will depend in the sliders, they do this alot in Aussie for water tanks, except they mount them on the roof, which I may also do as gravity is best with water, but I want the option of holding the water low for travelling, and pumping it high for showering & camping, so will work on a dual system, the frontrunner 40l rack tank seems the simplest option

 

[Shane Drummond]

Pulled the trigger on a Rockford Forsgate speaker & amp setup... Pricey, but the sound is incredible... Only affordable as I can swap for chicken... Clarity is good, replaced the tweeters with Prime R1 component speakers, and all 4 door speakers with Prime R1 full range speakers, put a RF amp for the door speakers under the drivers seat, looks like a Prime R600-4D, had to cut into my storage back right to mount 2 by 8" P1-SVC Punch subs, and I have another Prime R600-4D amp supplying what the subs need, all in all I am very happy with the outcome

 

[e9999]

Pulled the trigger on a Rockford Forsgate speaker & amp setup...

View attachment 840380

Pricey, but the sound is incredible... Only affordable as I can swap for chicken... Clarity is good, replaced the tweeters, and all 4 door speakers, put a RF amp for the door speakers under the drivers seat, had to cut into my storage back right to mount 2 by 8" subs, and they have another amp supplying what they need, all in all I am very happy with the outcome

geez... who said that life is rough in Africa...?

 

[Shane Drummond]

It is, but every now & then u get to go to the Zambezi river, or get some good sound, or just get out & into the bush

 

[Sverige]

Only affordable as I can swap for chicken...

Dude, you have to explain this.

 

[2000UZJ]

Dude, you have to explain this.

This. I can buy a container of chicken from china for $1400. Can I trade you for a LC?

 

[LostAfrican]

I grew up in Zimbabwe and half my family is still there ...Hi Shane...

I think you'll find that what Shane means is that due to the <sarcasm/on> fantastic <sarcasm/off> economic climate in Zim a lot of business is done with bartering instead of actual cash. To be fair, I think things are somewhat better than they have been but, its a cycle. So in Shane's case - he has chicken, lots of it, and he can get a lot for his chickens....

My family does duck (the asian population is growing in Zim and they like duck) ...and horse training and riding lessons....and a whole host of other stuff.

Zim is a country of contrasts, amazing opportunities and unique challenges, but man its beautiful and I miss it every day.

 

[Shane Drummond]

Hey Sverige & 2000UZJ, ok yes it's pretty much like Lost African says, my next door Neighbour likes Chicken, and his mom runs a catering business. I have a beautiful farm on Lake Manyame where we grow about 30k chickens a week, when there is good business, so from Jan to Aug we grew double our usual production and after elections business slowly died as more than a billion in cash left our borders, so we are down to about $200 million circling amongst the current population and that works out to 50c a day per person from about $3 a day per person... So every business except debit cards has come to a grinding halt.

My Neighbour Deen owns Spraytech, one of the top spraypainting & panel beating shops in town, with his brother Raul, who fits the pioneer app radio with Rockford Fosgate sound.

They offered a free removal of my "stickers" with a polish, so I said ok, but those stickers remove paint... So we bartered a paint Job for Chicken, I am lucky his mom is such a good chef & in demand for weddings etc and I get to pay off the paint job with what she needs, it will take another month or 2 to settle though as a professional paint job here is $3k or 1000kg of frozen chicken

Just after the respray which has my HDJ-101 looking brand spanking new, they got the agency for RF, and 9 months ago I had been pondering a speaker upgrade to go with my iPhone working Pioneer AVH 5550BT, but it was in the region of $1500, so I had stayed with the OEM Toyota speakers, that had no sub under seat and sounded ok for a while.

So with a little savings & Christmas on the way, Raul said he could do a RF sound upgrade on special for $1400 which was equivalent to what I had seen around town about 9 months ago. I said I wanted crystal clear sound quality, and not a rolling thunder cloud of bass that hurts my ears, but also the perfect bass. I also requested we fit 2 by 8 inch subs into the box on the left where the US amp & sub sit as I had remembered seeing something similar on mud...

Well what followed was quite tough to see and a few quick trips to the shop as plans changed from left to right hand side for the sub & cutting into the plastic panel

The door covers were removed & the OEM speakers were slaughtered to get the speaker mounts for the new door speakers, same thing with the tweeters and all I saw was the old destroyed ones... I was a little worried...

It took 3 days of solid work from Raul's team and what followed was a work of art, I really love the sound and I am enjoying listening perfect sound with all doors open on a Saturday with my Kids and we dance and have alot of fun for a couple hours whilst going through the playlist...

All in, speakers $1470 as I went for 2x8" vs 1 by 10" sub, and cables & fitting etc another 300 and I put in a reverse camera for $30, so very happy with it and it was well worth it for the fun I am now enjoying from it

 

[Shane Drummond]

I grew up in Zimbabwe and half my family is still there ...Hi Shane... I think you'll find that what Shane means is that due to the <sarcasm/on> fantastic <sarcasm/off> economic climate in Zim a lot of business is done with bartering instead of actual cash. To be fair, I think things are somewhat better than they have been but, its a cycle. So in Shane's case - he has chicken, lots of it, and he can get a lot for his chickens.... My family does duck (the asian population is growing in Zim and they like duck) ...and horse training and riding lessons....and a whole host of other stuff. Zim is a country of contrasts, amazing opportunities and unique challenges, but man its beautiful and I miss it every day.

Hi Lost African, I saw your post on "what did u do to your hundy today" and wondered which part of Africa you Hailed from, good to know it is from this magic place. I always wonder if the grass is greener there, as does my princess, especially in tough times like we are going through now... But then even if we have a Month away in a first world country, Portugal 4 years ago or Aussie 7 years ago, we start to miss Zim.

The pressure is building up though and it does start to grind away at you and slowly but surely Politics sneaks up on you to take everything you have spent years building up away from you and you have to start all over again... But the challenge is fun and we get back to basics, "make a plan" and get on with it. Kariba on a houseboat, especially a boat like the Zambezi Trader, which we sold last year, is something special, and I am not sure how many other lakes around the world give you that much wild beauty with the Elephant, buffalo, Lion! Croc's & Antelope that always visit the waters edge. That call of a fish Eagle when you have a rod in your hand, and a cold drink in the other makes you feel like a God made this place just for Fun! And just to make us happy! Especially after a hard days fishing, to come back to the houseboat and watch the sun go down for those special Kariba Sunsets and have a meal ready...

Then further down the Zambezi at Mana Pools is another kind of special, where elephant walk through camp as you have breakfast, eating pods from the ground a couple meters away while you sit frozen still and whisper to your 4 year old daughter what is that? And she whispers "elephant"... It's Beautiful! Then lion walk through camp at night whilst you either are happily lying in a cruiser knowing your little girl is safe, and wonder how safe I little tent is that is less than a mm thick but seems to protect terrified occupants that think a lodge or vehicle is possibly a better place to sleep than the large but terrifying tent they currently occupy!

It's what removes any thought of work & problems & worries and makes life so incredible, and a week a year in that kinda place leaves you with something special

 

[Shane Drummond]

Added a couple double jerry can holders to the front of the front runner rack, also moved it forward about 60mm, as much as I could, the plan is to use the double jerry can holders to create the strength needed so I can cut out a piece of the centre cross bar over the sun roof, which gives my kids access to the roof rack from inside the cruiser, and I don't have to worry if they need to go to the toilet at night with Hyena or lion walking around, as they gotta get past us and wake us up for that... Safer that way... Just gotta make a magnetic mosquito flap that's easy to use...

Also got the piping necessary if I wanna mount 2 by 45 liter water tanks up on those double jerry can holders, instead of extra fuel... Gotta get the tanks next

 

[Shane Drummond]

Mounted the rooftop tent. First to hang over the back, but the back door that opens up was hitting with the break light, so I re-drilled through the floor board and it now opens to the side





Tried to mount 2 Jerry cans for water onto the double Jerry can holder but it looks as though Front runner designed the Jerry can holder with the spout on the RHS when looking from the front of the cruiser, and when you put the Jerry can long side down, the spout ends up on the LHS, so the aluminum straps to lock down the Jerry cans don't fit as they new mounting holes & slots... Cut the middle piece out between the double Jerry can holders and the kids can now access the roof rack

 

[Shane Drummond]

Received the GMC XUV Envoy TruckTent in the mail this week, tried to fit it onto the back of the cruiser & failed... Need to make some adjustments to the bottom end... May need to take some off the top too as it doesn't work too well with the FR RR, pics to follow