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Got the grill finished today! However, I think Ill have to take one of my emblem mounts back to the Machine shop and fix it, because it hits one of the lines behind there and the center bottom most clip doesn't reach.
Oh, and here's the part number of the emblem I used: 75311-90K00
Y'all are probably wondering, "Is this guy gonna talk all day or are we gonna see some pics?!?!?"
Well, here they are!
These are the clip/mounts attached on the back of the grill I made custom for the emblem in my machine tool class.
I zip tied the mesh right to the grill just for safety.
I'd say it looks pretty mint, what do y'all think?
Hopefully more to come when all this darned snow melts!!
Last edited by LiebeYotas4X4; 03-19-2014 at 12:30 PM.
So most of the snow here in Maine is gone YAAAAAAAY!!!! There's still some piles of snow here'n there, but mostly just in the heavily shaded areas, and there's the occasional ice chunk floating in the river, but I think mother nature has a plan for them
Anyways, the satoshi grill mod has been holding up great, and I have no complaints regarding the square sticky zip tie things, except for the fact that human error and negligence don't do them very much good
And by that I mean sanding the area before applying them would have helped, and not tightening the zip ties so much that the adhesive gave up (probably because it was trying to stick to dust and debris, and not plastic )
Oh well. the grill itself hasn't fallen apart yet, so its all good!!
Mechanically, my runner decided to produce a rather loud and obnoxious noise from underneath her over time, which both my redneck friends, and my dad told me sounded like an exhaust leak. To my own pleasant surprise, this turned out to be very accurate.
Looking good bro. That's a nice runner right there! Someday I'm gonna pick up one of theses. For exhaust go for a magnaflow complete exhaust. Sounds amazing. If you need a sound clip check out the 2 or 3rd page of my build thread.
Exhaust leak is fixed!! Used some of that high temp paste stuff and "welded" her right back togethah! Also got a new stickah for the rear window, and a new fuel filter!!
So its been a little while since I've posted here, mainly because I've been
busy at college in Florida without a vehicle, and I haven't been home a whole
lot to drive the baby However, a lot has happened since I left, Including a
new paint job!!!!!
This included having allllll the body work done, so it looks like I wont be
doing any really heavy trail riding in this one
But, an occasional stretch doesnt hurt, just to make sure she's still got it
I plan on transferring out of my current school (Florida Tech) to one that is
more close to home (somewhere in the New England area) next semester, so
hopefully I'll be posting more often in the future for those of you who have
enjoyed my thread in the past.
I'm also building a 3d printer, so I'm saying goodbye to having to buy or
order silly little parts that are hard to find.
Ill probably be back to modding in a couple months.
Upon going to have the yearly great ol'e State of Maine inspection, The sickah guy said there was rust on the frame. Sweeet.
So went to have a look for myself, aaaand here's what I found.
So, I took it to a shop in Scarborough, and to my surprise, there were actually 4 spots on the frame that were rusted, or cracked. Since I'm a full-time student, I elected to have them do the work, and about a grand and a week wait later, It's ready to be picked up. I'm headed to town to get it tomorrow, and hopefully, the horrible highway shake is gone for good!!
Repairs came out great!! Inspected and ready for another year of regular driving and being treated nicely
So I know she's not much of a highway vehicle, but I've noticed a shake that produces a 12Hz frequency @ 65 Mph (Android vibration app), which I've been told is the tires, however I've had them balanced twice, once when they were put on, and other time a few months later. I'll probably just take'm somewhere else and have them balanced again for good measure before I rule out anything else.
Repairs came out great!! Inspected and ready for another year of regular driving and being treated nicely
So I know she's not much of a highway vehicle, but I've noticed a shake that produces a 12Hz frequency @ 65 Mph (Android vibration app), which I've been told is the tires, however I've had them balanced twice, once when they were put on, and other time a few months later. I'll probably just take'm somewhere else and have them balanced again for good measure before I rule out anything else.
Check you driveshafts and bearings in the T-case outputs and the rear diff if the tires aren't causing the vibration.
Sooooo let's talk about the transmission and the radiator.
I honestly should have seen this coming.
Truck started making clunking noises every now & then when shifting from park to drive, or reverse, ect.
October break came around, I was headed to see one of my sister's soccer games doing about 60 on 295. Got about 10-12 miles down the road, in cruise control, all of the sudden truck starts reving like crazy.
So, I take it off cruise, try giving it gas, nothing. Put the flashers on, pull over & try 4-high and 4-low. Nothing. No reverse, no forward, just dead.
At first, I'd thought my torque converter had crapped out, so alright, this sucks but hopefully it won't be that bad & I can get it back on the road fairly quick. Managed to get another car to go back up to school & got the bill the next day.
$2500. Needs a whole new transmission. Um.... What? "Yeah, we drained the fluid and it was black, you're gonna need a new trans" Huh. Didn't know trans fluid could be black. But okay.
So, they found a used one out of a 00', with just under 93k on it. Cool. They slapped it in, got a 30k mile warranty, perfect. Except the bill. Which, I can't really complain about, since I needed to be back up at school the next day, and didn't have time to do a trans swap at the time.
Here they are. Coincidentally the Porsche died 3 hours before the transmission died, so overall bad day 😅 This was in October 2018 for record.
But! The rig kept up all winter without issue and even towed a 19 foot center console boat in a foot of snow down a dirt road. So. Not too shabby for an 18 year old SUV.
Flash forward to June 2019
Now, for the fun stuff. Got pretty hot the other day here in Maine, decided it's time to check the fluids.
Trans oil was pretty high.... Hm. Took a look at the coolant reservoir. Hm. That's a little low. Yikes
Time for an auxiliary cooler.
One problem during the install. Trans oil started to drip from the inlet tube from the cooler. Hmm. Better take a look.
Bubble rust. So, took a pipe cutter to it, and used the flare kit I bought earlier last year, clamped some tubing on it, haven't lost any fluid since.
Flash forward to July.
Stock radio days are over
1200W rms 4channel amplifier for the doors & tweeters
600w rms subwoofer amplifier for a 12" Skar ddx12 d2v3 (soon, box build in progress)
Kenwood Excelon DPX series head unit.
4 Gauge power wire with appropriate fusing
Yeah I know, Rockville is the "cheap eBay amp" but ya know what, it works and it hasn't broken yet so I'm sending it until it does!
Tl;dr- The transmission went out on the interstate last October, spent way too much money to have it replaced, installed an oil cooler and new stereo this summer. Things are going good.
Times change and people move on, but I'm not. We're nearing the decade mark of ownership with this 3rd gen, and the build has only just begun.
This is my daily and has been for most of my driving life. It's carried me through college and now it deserves a well-needed make-over. The timeline? Not sure, but my plans include a custom bumper build, roof rack, sliders, rear axle swap with driveline re-alignment, headlight conversion, headers, cats, and lots of body work. I decided to chop the running boards and rockers out due to their swiss cheese nature this past summer and unfortunately was unable to "finish" the project, but this summer I'll button it up and make it pretty, dont worry. I also installed the Panhard Drop Kit from SRQ fabrication, which was very straight forward if you can weld somewhat proficiently. The laser cut and precision bent parts supplied fit perfectly and my truck drives so much better. No more squirelyness!
03-19-2014, 12:19 PM
There's still some piles of snow here'n there, but mostly just in the heavily shaded areas, and there's the occasional ice chunk floating in the river, but I think mother nature has a plan for them 
)
However, a lot has happened since I left, Including a
