Thanks Corey!

Oh no, this thing will be driven. I plan on using it as a semi daily driver as much as possible. With a two year old and a bun in the oven, I suppose my Tundra (or a new Double Cab Tacoma, if I get one) will be used more for the family vehicle so I'm not too sure how much practical daily use I will get out of it. My son is getting to the age where we will be able to do more of the outdoors father/son type stuff so hopefully it'll get a lot of hunting, fishing, surfing and beach use with him. We'll see... Thanks for the compliment though

Thanks! The hood is smooth, but the blotches you see are from where the filler sucks up the epoxy. Filler is very porous and soaks up an insane amount of moisture - that's the reason why you really want to seal it with epoxy or some other type of sealer before you top coat. The picture was taken in between coats, but the second coat got rid of the blotchiness (is that a word??). My friend is a professional bodyman and he says that it's a good rule of thumb to lay down epoxy until you can't see the blotches which usually go away after two coats.

 

More photos for your viewing pleasure...

Seam sealed the folded edge of the fenders. I just used brushable seam sealer and masked the edges to get a neat straight line. Also seam sealed the back side of my plug welds in the emblem holes since they'll never be seen and I didn't feel it necessary to grind them flat:





Then some color. I laid down three coats since I mixed up a little extra paint - at least it'll be some extra protection:




And the backside of the valance got some love too:


While I was waiting for the fenders to flash in between coats, I shot the hood with some urethane surfacer (perks of having multiple guns). My panels are pretty straight and I'm not looking for that perfect "laser straight" show car finish on the concourse at Pebble Beach so it's not absolutely necessary to spray surfacer, but it does help eliminate any small pin holes I may have missed and sands a lot easier prior to top coating. Plus it helps with color hold out and uniformity.



I have to wait for the paint and primer to cure so I'll probably give the hood and fenders a couple days rest before proceeding on them. Meanwhile, I'll likely tackle the seam sealer on the doors and inside of the cab.

 

Awesome work man!!

 

Underside of the hood sanded to 320 grit dry and then to just shy of 600 with a grey scotchbrite pad:


What a PITA! All the nooks and crannies of the braces and such took a while to get completely sanded, but it's ready for some color - hopefully tomorrow night, but the O's are playing game 1 of the ALDS so I'll have to wait until at least after the game.

 

So do you want that inner fender plastic front and back

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Not right now, I have other priorities

 

ok thought you might want them now that your doing your fenders they are nice and free

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Well if they are free and in good condition, I'll take them. I'm just kind of tight with cash right now after paying some stuff off. Shoot me a PM for shipping details. Thanks!

 

they are in great shape the rears are perfect and yes free just clean them out them on and smile they are very hard to find in good shape
On another note sent my tundra in for the under coat they said mine was fine they checked the frame also said it was good while I was waiting though I was snooping around the new ones 0% he says so I bought the all black 4 door and now need to sell my silver
I sicken myself sometimes I still think I wanted a taco in a couple years

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Don't you hate it when that happens?? Go to a dealership for something free and then leave with a new truck and a payment... I'd love to have another Tundra, but the gas mileage kills me. I'm holding out to see what they do with the Tacoma redesign and go from there. I heard they may be doing a diesel! I'll PM you my address shortly.

 

Here we go again...

Seam sealed the hood:




And colored between the lines a little:



Paint laid down reeeeeally nice, but unfortunately I had some dust trapped in the braces that ended up in my paint. Despite blowing it out and tack clothing it for nearly a half hour, it still happened. Luckily it's just very light sanding dust so it will wet sand out really easily, if I even worry about it at all - after all, it's not like it's the top of the hood so it won't be seen much. Knowing my OCD behavior, I'll end up sanding and polishing it smooth....

 

Love the red! Also kinda an older question: when you did the rear brake swap what did you end up going with for an e-brake? Also did you have to use one of those proportioning valves?

 

Thanks! I haven't addressed the e-brake issue yet. I will likely get a transfer case e-brake or I have even thought about the idea of running a manual line-lock into the cab, but I'll get to that once I have everything back together.

I will be getting a manual load proportioning valve, but haven't yet because I either want to plumb it next to the master cylinder or into the cab so I need to get it put back together to determine the location.

 

I was reading throught the LCE monthly newsletter and got a little surprise. Look at this, I'm famous! Woot woot!

http://www.lcengineering.com/LCNewsl..._TECHNOTE.html

LCE used my write-up in one of their tech bulletins! I had no clue that they were going to do this, but it's pretty cool feeling that one of the leaders in Toyota performance is using my write-up. I suppose I must have done something right...

 

i tried I wanted a Tacoma but this pickup or should I say truck is so inviting

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That is so sweet
They owed you something for keeping their doors open
Fame works lol

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Ok, good deal. Well looking forward to seeing this bad boy become a truck!!!

 

Epoxied the outside of the fenders tonight:




The valance also:


Tomorrow the surfacer will go down. I must say, this really sucks painting piece by piece - prep, spray, flash, spray, clean up... Over and over and over! But it's the only way I can go right now so I have to deal with it I suppose

 

Wait so is it supposed to be red or gray?!

 

I've been waiting for Toyota to jump BACK into the Diesel truck market for years. Unfortunately, only a ridiculously huge V8 is in the pipeline, if anything.

Dodge Ram 1500 Ecodiesel is the closest thing to rational we get these days, and even they are hard to find except crewcab versions loaded with expensive extras!

I looked at Fuelly and one single entry was all I could find, and it wasn't getting the "28mpg" Dodge claims. Maybe the best way to create a fuel efficient torquey little Toyota Diesel is to do a TDI conversion (VW ALH 1.9 or 2.0L I4). That would be sweet!