Pics of the gauge cluster after the pinstripes. The lower part Isn’t really seen once it’s together but it’s ok

 

Nice pinstripe. Well done

 

Gauges are installed and I actually have great oil pressure I think I must’ve fried the stock oil pressure gauge

 

Nice personalization

 

My exhaust is done I didn’t get any pics because I was rushed and nothing was going according to plan that night but here’s how I laid it out I chose to run 2 glass packs because I don’t trust a muffler I can’t see through but I didn’t want it too noisy so the first one I put right after the catalytic converter to act as a bit of a resonator and then I ran the exhaust back and up close to the bed for maximum clearance and put the second glass pack in and I gotta say it’s maybe a tad loud when you smash on it but if you’re just cruising it is nice and quiet like you can’t even tell the engine is running which is what I like. I did cut the structure out of the hood but the engine was still rubbing so I pulled the hood and panel bonded the structure to the skin to reinforce it back up and yesterday I finally committed and cut after measuring 12 times and it still ended up being a bit of a bigger hole than I wanted but it will still work fine. I did get the scoop shot with peg cre321 which probably wasn’t necessary but it’s what I had now I just got to sand it and shoot it black and then glue it on

 

Painted the hood scoop yesterday and I went to shoot clear coat and just decided to experiment with leaving the base coat in the gun because I’ve seen people add black to clear coat to smoke lights out and I figured it would be fine for the first coat of clear and then I decided to add some rust oleum glitter spray paint into the second coat of clear but I kind of wanted to add a bit of blue into it but this worked out alright and I thought it was a good little project to do something like this with. I did do a final coat of clear without anything added to it just to seal it all up and you can tell I got a bit carried away with the clear coat and had it running off the edges but I don’t care too much

 

Installed the hood temporarily so that the sun would bake the panel bond on and took it for a spin to the store where it didn’t want to start for some weird reason it seemed like it wasn’t getting fuel but eventually it started and I got it home where I had the hood open and my panel bond started giving and now it’s no longer attached on the passenger side, I’m not sure how I’m going to fix that and I’m not sure why it didn’t want to start but I added an extra ground off the battery to the fender

 

Pretty sure I found the problem with the not wanting to start. I only had one bolt grounding the igniter and it started coming loose so I added another one and sucked it down tight. I considered adding another ground wire right to block but I didn’t (I get crazy with adding ground wires everywhere) but I also got the cruise control put back in.

 

Update ran 3 tanks of gas through it pulled 17 mpg out of the first tank. Took it hunting on the second and only pulled 10 mpg and ran it mostly highway on the third and got 17.5.

still haven’t hooked up any of the evap stuff so I might still get better but currently it’s still almost double what I was getting out of the 3vz

 

Been putting on some trail miles, this is the smooth part of the road, the rest of it is pretty rough but nothing the little feller can’t manage. So far it’s done well but I do get a nasty noise from the warn hubs once in awhile which may be related to my c/v angle with the ball joint spacers and no axle drop but nothing too serious.

Even though it does pretty good I’m going to stick with my 1980/84 full size bronco for the hunting/wheeling just because it has more room for passengers and rides smoother and makes more power and gets about the same mileage but the yota is better at being a daily driver and having a bed

 

well it looks like I own a dog again, this guy was found on the mountain hungry and scared by a friend of mine and he attempted to take him up the mountain to see if he was one of the sheep herders dogs but he bailed out and my friend couldn’t find him again. He made it to our camp site and was waiting on the porch of the trailer house where he got fed and made friends with my parents dogs. We posted all over social media trying to find his owner and ultimately gave up when nobody replied so he got taken to the vet to get a check up and shots and one of the vet techs recognized him and knew the owner and called him and the owner didn’t want him because he wasn’t a good herding dog and he had just ran off when they got on the mountain but that still disgusted me I think the owner didn’t really look for him and just left him up there instead of finding him a new home. But it doesn’t matter now the dog is mine and he ain’t going anywhere his name is now Dutch because he was originally found by my friend in a place called Dutchman’s flat and he still has some issues with listening but he is still a pup and he will learn.

Anyway back to the truck I took it up to my G/F’s family cabin for the Labor Day weekend so I could go bow hunting and it was great until Labor Day when it rained like crazy which I absolutely love but the mud in the canyon isn’t exactly normal it’s got a lot of clay in it so it just balls up on your tires and you sliding all over if you’re not careful it can end up bad and I had a close call in a couple spots but we made it. There was one spot where the water runs down the road and makes a good rut and then the road forks and goes downhill so it was basically a giant wash and I was in the rut trying to get out but I wasn’t happening for a bit so I ended up backing up about 20 feet and cut my wheels and hammered down I was able to pull out of the rut but I was going down the road sideways and my back tires were getting close to the rut but I just gave er some more beans and we pulled through. Then there was another spot headed home that normally isn’t bad but someone else had problems and they went into the rut and it almost caused me to get sucked into it too but just a little bit of steering input and a touch of throttle and was able to stay out of it. This place has taut me a lot about off-roading the first thing is if you’re moving you ain’t stuck and the second is the skinny pedal is your best friend and your worst enemy at the same time and manual transmission is and will always be king for going downhill here and also ignore the brake pedal



we also found 3 of these little dudes around the cabin but the hunt for deer wasn’t too successful I found 2 bucks but was so small isn’t wasn’t legal to shoot him and the other one was barley legal and offered me a great shot but I feel like he should be a kids first buck or just get bigger I did see about 30 head of does and fawns but I don’t have a permit for them lol

 

Finally put the evap stuff in the other day, I ended trimming my cruise control bracket down a little bit to make more room and I cut and flipped the purge valve bracket around and mounted it on the firewall and I had a bracket I saved from a th350 shifter kit I installed in a friend’s truck a while back that worked out for mounting the evap canister and I used a custom radio bracket that was in my girlfriend’s 71 charger for the lower bracket even though it isn’t the prettiest thing in world it holds it and I’m fine with that


Purge valve location need to loom the wires still

Just angle iron with a couple holes

Evap in I just left the vent alone

Spare shifter bracket that lined up perfectly

Used radio mounting bracket bent and installed

 

With winter approaching it’s time to start bringing home firewood so I repurposed these side boards that used to fit the 88 ford until it also got a flatbed. I do already have some firewood but I want something that will burn longer than the aspen I have

 

did a little bit of custom painting with rattle cans to cover up the brand on the door

 

First decent load of firewood, would like to get at least one more like this

 

Did my first oil change since the engine swap and just in general have been driving the snot out of it I also and installed seats from a Mazda protege that are in excellent shape and are much more comfortable I just elongated the holes on the rear of the Mazda seat on the passenger side and drilled the spot welds on the front of the Mazda seats and the oem toyota seats and just swapped the bracket and bolted it onto the Mazda rail with 1/4 inch bolts and then I noticed the seat wasn’t straight so I ended up taking one of the rear brackets off the Toyota seat and getting custom with flat strap it’s still not perfect but I’ll fix it later. I took all of the brackets off the Toyota seat on the drivers side because I could make the seat sit back a little farther and I’m 6’5 so 1/2 inch of extra room makes a big difference to me

I still got a few things I’d like to take care of but it runs and drives great it’s just some stupid little things that need to be addressed before bigger problems occur like the fuel line that somebody cut and put a compression fitting on and the mangled flare nuts at the fuel filter I may just relocate the filter, I would also like to build a grille guard for it and put in some good headlights and a winch

New seat