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Looking good! I have an IFS frame so slightly different from yours. My max up travel was first limited by my passenger frame rail so I notched it. Then my oil pan so I raised the (3.4) engine a bit. Then the upper link was kissing the slave cylinder so I had to put pan head bolts to mount it AND cut back the thicker tube to clear and have the thinner inner telescoping tube alongside the slave. (My upper tube from 4WU was two piece) The next limit was the lower link will hit the bottom of the frame.
I have the Cobra shock towers but no mater what I would have used, the driver side shock is right under my master cylinder. If I tilted it out, the spring would hit the tire at full articulation. Any further in it would hit the frame. I had to notch the top of the tower to be able to remove or install the booster. I had to notch the tower and weld in a tube to run my steering shaft through it. Tiny changes matter so don't weld anything until you're POSITIVE the location works. I have an OEM 85 axle so a wider axle will be different.
I had to do some trimming on my passenger steering arm to clear the upper link bracket at full left steering.
I think I wore my shocks out just cycling suspension to check clearances before welding.
Oh, my 37's cleared my front fenders without trimming! BUT..........they hit the inner fenders bad where they step it for the battery on one side and the air box on the other. I had to make new inner fenders and put my battery elsewhere and no way to fit the airbox so I fabricated a new intake.
Had to trim the outer ends of the radiator support for tire clearance too. Already did the pinch welds at the firewall side for 35's years ago.
My tire even came close to hitting my steering box fitting for hydro assist so I had to plug it and drill in another location.
I'm running 17 x 8 steel beadlocks with 3.5" back space with 37-12.50 MT Baja Boss X tires and they almost touch the lower links at full steer. If you have a wider axle probably not an issue for you.
My WMS is wider than original though as I am using IFS hubs so I could use slip on rotors and larger brakes.
Just some points to check that I found the hard way. I hope you get yours together as planned.
I've spent some time designing, installing, and refining my A/V/screen setup, so I thought I'd chime-in in case anything I've done is a useful starting point for you. I'm using a PLX devices multigauge with their bluetooth link. This allows me to have AFR, water temp, exhaust gas temp, etc. gauges on my phone. Their system is super buggy; it's working OK for me, I don't know if anyone is making anything similar. Then I added a touchscreen that velcroes to the dash and connects to my android phone's USB C connection. Connecting the phone to the touchscreen with current technology is a little onerous and requires a USB hub with a HDMI out (if you could find a touchscreen with USB C input this wouldn't be necessary). But the phone charges while connected to the touchscreen, which really works quite well with Samsung DEX. This gives me the full functionality of my phone, more or less: Pandora, maps, phone (using a bluetooth earpiece), etc. Plus the gauges, and if I want to add any gauges it's pretty easy with the PLX system. As for the stereo, I just use a bluetooth speaker, which is nice because it's portable for tailgating. The screen also has a BNC input, which is wired to my 4 channel DVR, so I can change inputs if I'm hooking up a trailer or otherwise want to view my cameras. In my opinion the best way to future-proof these setups is to figure out something that works with your phone. Bluetooth speaker Velcro bracket. Far side of the screen is shimmed to angle towards the driver. PLX android app. Samsung DEX Phone holder-needs to be out of the sun
UPDATE:
Links are still coming together. We've needed to make some shifts to the accommodate the link kit with the Rock Assault housing. To clear the diff housing, we need to push the tie rod out further from the axle so we're having to use an offset hiem joint. In addition, the upper 3rd link mount on the diff housing needs to be notched to make way for the Panhard bar. Photos to come when this all gets settled. We're moving the engine up about 1", which should split the 14" of travel in the front end about 50/50.
Cage work has begun. This is the plan: Engine cage has nowhere to land on the front of the frame due to the relocated steering box. I do not want to have the bumper tied into the engine cage. Mostly because it is not necessary, as this is not a race truck and if I do wreck, I'd prefer to have a structural 'fuse' between the bumper and rest of the truck so that the forces to not find their way into the rest of the truck and bend the entire cage. The crossmember above the engine will be removable. The details of that are currently TBD.
Last edited by sdavis1244; Nov 10, 2025 at 07:39 AM.
AND NOW A QUESTION ABOUT WHEELS:
I've been pretty deadset on 16" wheels. I'm not a fan of how big wheels have gotten, I don't think my little truck needs bigger brakes and so I'd like to keep as much tire as possible and not go up to 17". The issue is that the world has left me behind. Looking for 16" wheels is a lot harder these days and once I try to make them true beadlock wheels, the options literally go to 0 (Given that I'm being very particular with the aesthetics of this build). Luckily I've found OMF performance out in Riverside that does beadlock conversions onto wheels, so I'm leaning into using them to make this happen. The additional issue I'm running into is the center bore diameter on the wheels I have. Currently I have a set of SCS Ray 10s that used to be on my 2016 Tacoma that I could use for this build. Once those get a chrome or aluminum finished beadlock on them, they're the exact aesthetic I'm looking for. The other option I've weighed is using the TRD beadlock style wheel that I currently have on my Tacoma. Again, this would get converted to a real beadlock, and is maybe a bit too modern of a wheel for this build, but I think I'd like it. The issue with both is the center bore diameter. Both don't fit the 106mm required for the hub on the 85 so the question now is:
Has anyone, or WOULD anyone, bore out the center of a wheel to make it fit? I've seen it done before, but obviously I'm worried about cracking between the center and the lug nuts. Also, I've had wheels on the 85 that I didn't need to bore out and still cracked on their own...
How are you keeping the factory dash, A/C and heater with the cage? Are you eliminating the factory cab mounts?
Factory dash will be modified to fit the tubing. So far, the A-Pillars are shooting above the vents so that they can still function. The ducts running to the vents will have to be modified to accommodate the tubing. The front speaker locations are gone. The speaker covers will remain, so you wont see the cage back there, but there is no room for the speakers. So far, we're staying close to the cab walls so we shouldn't have issues with much else. The harness is going to be modified pretty substantially so the fuse box will be moved as well. We've eliminated the rear cab mounts, and will be designing new ones to mount to the cage. The front mounts will remain (for now), but the mount will be modified to accommodate the tubing from the cage and rock rails.
How are you keeping the factory dash, A/C and heater with the cage? Are you eliminating the factory cab mounts?
We'll be getting creative with the AC and heater. We'll be cutting into the dash to accommodate the tubing, and find new mounting locations for the fuse box and AC components that sit where the A-Pillar tubes meet the frame. Any vent ducts that run into the tubing will also be made custom once the location of the cage is settled. We'll scan the cage and print a custom duct that 'avoids' the cage. The airflow may not be as ideal, but I think it'll work, it's a small cab, its not hard to correct the climate in there.
Yes the cab mounts are gone. We'll be making new cab mounts located off of the cage. We want to keep the cab supported by a more typical cab mount to keep it and the dash isolated from some vibration. Haven't gotten there yet...
Update on the wheels. They're done.
As it turned out SCS and OMF have done many collaborations over the years and had full confidence in modifying my SCS wheel as needed for the truck. So we bored out the center to 108mm and did the beadlock conversion. Ultimately the modifications to the wheel left some areas completely un-coated and exposed which I'd like to fix by powder coating the wheel black, but for now, we've taken possession of the wheels so we can continue to mock up the suspension. They look better than any wheel I had settled on putting on the truck. I feel like I've been chasing this aesthetic ever since the original steelies came off the truck back in 2005. We're modifying the links to re-center the wheel in the wheel well. The link set up was designed for a bigger wheel so it was essentially designed to push a 37" tire out past the cab.
After a lot of back and forth, I ended up going with the Corbeau Sport Seat instead of the GTS II. It's a tight fit, so we're modifying the seat mounts to lower it a little bit, but I couldn't even get my legs between the wheel and seat walls with the GTS II. Essentially we're cutting into the cab floor and having tubing running flush with the floor of the cab for seat mounts. Here's where it sits with the stock mounts:
Couple things, what camera are you using or settings? Everything looks like it’s a rock crawler toy, one of those rc cars. That’s pretty wild
as far as por, I’d absolutely por15, but I don’t believe it’s a finished topcoat. It chalks up and maybe oxidizes. I’d coat it with por15 , let it fully cure and then paint it with something else. If your bashing on it, I’d probably just use some chassis and roll bar paint from a spray can like vht roll bar and chassis.
if your concerned with the inside and are t dipping it, some coating like nh oil or wool wax.
Couple things, what camera are you using or settings? Everything looks like it’s a rock crawler toy, one of those rc cars. That’s pretty wild
as far as por, I’d absolutely por15, but I don’t believe it’s a finished topcoat. It chalks up and maybe oxidizes. I’d coat it with por15 , let it fully cure and then paint it with something else. If your bashing on it, I’d probably just use some chassis and roll bar paint from a spray can like vht roll bar and chassis.
if your concerned with the inside and are t dipping it, some coating like nh oil or wool wax.
The shop is always pretty dark and I hate denoising, so I'm using a lens with an F of 1.0, it just produces a super shallow depth of field.
I think the play is to either use steel-it or POR15 and then paint over it to delay any fading.
Last edited by sdavis1244; Jan 3, 2026 at 09:25 AM.
As the cage is progressing I've been working on the design of the back panel. The primary reason this back panel was introduced was to hide sound dampening in the cab, but given the location of the cage, it is introducing other opportunities and challenges that seem like interesting ones to solve. Given the idea of the build, which is to imagine if Toyota had built a pickup consumer oriented truck with a linked front end and roll cage from the factory back in 1985, I think the rear panel would have been integrated into the cage. So I'd like it to largely cover the back panel under the rear window and wrap around the side walls ending at the door, so it's covering the parts of the cage that are in this area which I think is sort of a cool look. Due to the absolute tiny volume of the cage, it seems like a huge loss to lose any area I have to store even the smallest bags or tools, so I'd like to have the panel open up in the dead spaces between the cage tubes. This would also help to stiffen the rear panel from deflecting and warping, and ultimately from banging around and making noise, defeating the whole purpose of the thing. I'd like to have 'caps' for these cavities but I haven't designed that yet. Mounting locations, thickness of the material area TBD but seem like fairly easyto solve once the cage is done and the primary shape of this thing is settled. Anyways, any insight or advice would be helpful. Here's a snapshot of where it's at:
looking amazing!!!!!
Aug 5, 2025 | 10:53 AM
