That's one bad ass 4Runner!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Very nice indeed...any complications with the front drive shaft? I notice it isn't installed yet and that is the one thing that I am worried about before I even think about the swap. I'm going to read up on your site before battering you with questions, but one more thing, how did you get the rear up that high? 3.5inch lift springs w/spacers? I'm thinking if the rear is raised somewhat easily, then using the Taco front trailmaster lift along with however u did the rear would make for a easy'er 6 or so inch lift.


Overall great job man!

 

Wow, I have a ton of time into this project. I couldn't even begin to estimate how much. All the welding is taken care of by my roommate but as for everything else to do with fabbing, metal prepping and, well, everything, that is 99.9% me. I just call my roomie when I need something zapped together. He is a great welder and I am lucky to have him at my disposal. I only consider myself a "decent" welder.

It has been a blast for the most part. There have been times where I just wanted to freakin cry I was so frustrated with things not coming together and stuff. I ran into a TON of problems during this project just getting ahold of stuff that should normally be very easy to get. Just terrible luck around every corner.

I used a ton of vendors during this project and only a select few gave me no trouble at all. Tim at ShakerBuilt definately pulled my butt out of the fire when he came through with my drag link in record time when another vendor dropped the ball on it. Not only was his link cheaper, but it was better. Tim is definately the man to go to for all your steering linkage needs as I can speak to the quality of those directly.

Mike from xtreme-offroad was another wonderful vending experience. Nothing special, but he did his job. I ordered something from him and he was wonderful to deal with and he got my entire order to me in a decent time, no BS. While that might seem to some fairly basic to some, that never happened during this project for me minus a couple vendors and he was one of them.

Dave at Cornfed suspension also did his job and got his stuff to me with no BS. While they didn't fit, that wasn't his fault as they had never been tested on my coils before and I was able to get them fixed by a friend so no worries.

Notice all these guys are probably the smallest companies i dealt with during the whole thing. I think that says something to the level of commitment of these small guys to their customers.

 

The front shaft is ready to rock. I sent it off to Jesse at high angle driveline and he retubed it for me. right now the tranny crossmember is in the way of the front shaft and I need to rework that. Obviously that is not a big deal for me to get it on the road for DD duty so it is not on the top of my list of things to do right now, but it will probably be done within the next week or so.

Spacers:
http://www.4x4wire.com/cgi-bin/ultim...;f=13;t=016690

 

well after looking at those I need to go change myself, cause that is freakin' awsome. Way to go on the nice rig. I'm jealous!

 

nice. that rig is awesome, it must be unstoppable offroad. good job with all the work you put into it.

 

You might want to call Marlin and have them record your info on the MC09 in his book. They did not record your unit.

It goes from #13 (Ronn Erickson) to #16, which is me. I assume you are either #14 or #15. It also looks like they did not stamp all the info on your unit like they did on mine. Who cares, but kinda looks like yours was indeed rushed out the door incomplete, which does not really surprise me.

Looks like they forgot to give you the low profile drain plugs as well. That place is really disorganized.

 

Have you not read my HUGE thread about all the freakin problems I had with that bad boy? They left everything out of the kit, took a month and 3 more shipments to get me all the parts I needed. I'm still not sure if I got everything I was supposed to get, just know I got everything I NEED to make it work.

Mine is #15, there is an 015 stamped on the unit and I believe some other stuff. What info is supposed to be stamped on there? I only took note of the #15 cause that was all that mattered to me, I couldn't even tell you what else is on there other than I know there is some other stuff.

It would probably scare me to see what that shop actually looks like. I am very happy with the unit in general, just wasn't happy with the unbelievable hassle I went through to get all the parts for it.

Here is the thread:
http://www.4x4wire.com/ubb/ultimateb...=010543#000000

What did you do with your e-brake Steve and what gears did you end up using in the front case?

 

Front case on mine has 4.7 Japanese made gears. So everything "inside" the front case is new.

They made me 2 custom shift levers, so the brake handle & 1 cup holder stayed intact. All I lost was 1-cup holder.

I have pics of the place. You had better believe they will scare you. Basically it's a Toyota drive train junkyard.

 

Very interesting. i would like to see all your pics.

Its funny, I thought of fabbing something to move the back shift over to the left but i thought it would be kind of a PITA. Turns out my "easier" way, was probably just as hard if not harder. Live and learn i guess. I made end up going with something different in the long run but for now it works and works well. Just no cup holder

 

I want it.

 

I certailny looks like it could take you to some "out of the way" places.

Do you have a guess of what you have spent to make the whole thing happen. Of course that would mean the hardware, since you did all of the work yourself. Could you imagine what you would have spent in labor???

 

Not really, but it was a whole lot.

If you JUST count the big dollar items like the crawler, the lockers, and the tires, you are looking at close to 4 grand.

Then add the 2 something grand talked about earlier and then the stuff for the rear, I am probably sitting over 6 grand. No wonder it took me 2 years to pull this off...

 

Ahh the smell of gear oil... It's too bad that place is such a zoo. If I won the lottery I'd invest in Marlin Crawler, with a little bit of VC money and Marlins knowledge that place could really be a cash cow, and I'd like nothing more that to put All Pro out of business.

Steve I want to see pics!!!

 

https://www.yotatech.com/forums/show...threadid=10942

 

Freaky looking Runner......freaky in a good way....