Chad ya we just hacked that pipe off to get it outta the way. I'm gonna have a new tailpipe made as soon as I get it home.

Here's the latest on the rest... bit of a rant really....
Tried most of the day on Sunday to get the T-case in.. The coupler was really really tight going onto the input shaft of the T-case. Gave up and called Marlin monday morning. They knew what it was right away.. I guess a while back they got a handful of shafts that were a little bit out of spec on the big side. Turns out I got one. Now if it were my company and I knew I had some bogus input shafts floating around I think I would test fit the coupler onto the shaft before I spent the time to build up the entire crawler box. Yesterday UPS came and boxed it up so it can go back to their shop and get fixed. They are claiming it will be back by Friday... we'll see.

On my gears I was having issues finding somebody local to set them up because I bought all my stuff online and not from them. I finally decided to go with the guy that built my bumper for me. To save a 1.5 hour drive I just mailed my locker, gears, and install kit to him and he was going to set them up in one of his thirds and then I'll just give him mine when I went to pick it up. Well USPS dropped the ball it took 8 days to mail that box 100 miles.. WTF?? The guy finally got em and calls me a day later to say something is up with the stuff it's not going together right.. wrong locker or wrong R&P. That was Saturday and I haven't heard from him since.

So that is where I'm sitting.. so close yet so far. I knew this project was cooking along too smooth. There is always problems that pop up when building this kind of stuff but it's starting to get old.

 

Need to learn how to build your own stuff so you dont have to rely on anyone else to do your work. Building 3rds is'nt really that hard. Then you would have more money to buy goodies!!!!

 

Is that a 54/55 buick in the driveway?

 

Yup it's a 54 with 14,000 original miles. The guy working on my truck rescued it from a little ol lady's garage. He also has a hurst and some kind of old wagon that is about 30 feet long.

 

I would love that car!!! But, back on target, nice work on the buildup!!!! One day soon mine will get some treatment like this!

 

dude, i have to say - impressive bumpers. did you actually make those yourself?
and if so - how much to make anothe set?!?!

 

The rear bumper is from Marlin www.marlincrawler.com and the front was made by Dave at www.davezoffroadperformance.com About $700 for the two of them.

 

Joey, did you make sure you got the correct 4cyl and 6cyl ring and pinion?

 

Sorry to hear you are having issues.....but believe me, you will always be tweaking on it now. It seems every time I have mine dialed in, and go wheeling...I spend the next couple weeks making more adjustments.

I guess it is all part of the fun.....

 

It's Marlin, get used to it. I had a coupler issue FOR A YEAR. They made it right, but dang.

On the gear stuff, that is what you ought to expect buying elsewhere to save a buck then going local for install. Support your local emperor, dude.

On the rest of the stuff, why hurry? I took a year to do the swap I wanted and I am still tweaking, a week here or there is no worries as long as you have something else to drive, etc.

Keep up the good work!

 

Ya Adrian I am learning some lessons as I go. I jumped on the bandwagon over at TTORA on what at the time looked like a good package deal on gears and a locker. Last time I'll ever do that for sure. As far as being in a hurry.... there is a local run every weekend this month and March/April are the best months to play around here before the dust comes. It was 75 here yesterday. I've already missed several sweet snow runs recently. Anyways I'm getting close.. it'll all come together.

 

looking good dude. you're always going to run into problems like this... just comes with the territory. i wouldn't sweat the problem with Marlin's stuff too much. he's a great guy, i know he'll make sure your problem is fixed. good luck on the rest of the build. can't wait to see this thing on the trail. one of these days we'll have to get all the 2nd gen SAS'd Runners together for a trip.

 

Yup you hit the nail on the head. Everything went so smooth during the fabrication stage that I got a false sense of hope I think..haha. That would be awesome to set up a trip with all of us sometime. It wouldn't be hard at all to get Tofer, Yourself and me together sometime.

 

I'll burst your utopia, you NEVER get it finished!

You sell it or you die.

You've made it a lot further than others who have tried and quit. Looking good thus far.

Some things you should always buy local.

 

Oh man that is great Wabbit.. can I put that in my sig line!!

 

Welcome to the MONEY PIT!!!!!!!

 

Quick update.. The crawler box and third member saga continues. I been waiting on these two things for 2 weeks now. My crawler box didn't show up on friday as expected... The guy working on my truck finally got ahold of them today and after a 15 minute search they found my box in the back of the shop untouched. We were assured again it would be out the door tommorrow. I'm not holding my breath. I was really hoping to have some completed pics of it by now.

I'm going to the shop where my third member is on Thursday and either bringing home a third or a box of parts. I am tired of waiting.

The worst part is it's sitting in a shop 35 miles from here so I can't really tinker on it. I still need to paint the running gear, get my bumpers mounted, wire the winch, and a few other little things here and there. Oh well it'll be fast and furious when I finally do get it home safe and sound.

 

New update.. today was good. Crawler box made it in and is being installed as I type this. I also picked up my third member today and got it to the truck. Gonna finish up the crawler box tonite and put the third in tomorrow. Gotta bleed the brakes and she'll be ready to drive home tomorrow from the shop!! woohoo.. it still will need some work before I get pics. It's on 33's with no bumpers, fender flares, or roof rack right now.

 

Sweet....glad to hear things are coming together again. I bet your drive home tomorrow will be different. Waiting for pics.

 

nice, great to hear man, cant wait to see some pics