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Rust Bucket 1st Gen Taco build thread

I sold my nicest, newest vehicle to my dad a few weeks back, so obviously I needed to go wheel my 23 year old, 290k mile DD as soon as possible. Went and did small tire stuff in the woods with my friends yesterday with the 4Runner instead of working on this shit heap Tacoma.

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My goal this weekend is to get the rear shocks mounted and rear brake lines done.

Is this shock mount setup dumb? 5.5” of chrome showing with no fuel tank and nothing in the bed. That will drop to 4” or so with it moderately loaded. Shocks are 11.7” travel, and leaned back about 20 degrees.

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Mine are mounted about the same.

Where are you putting bumps? I’d wait in welding the lower lints until bumps are done, in case you need more than 4” of up travel.
 
rockota said:
Mine are mounted about the same.

Where are you putting bumps? I’d wait in welding the lower lints until bumps are done, in case you need more than 4” of up travel.
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Yeah that’s fair. I’m planning to do some basic rubber bumps on the spring pads, but nothing set in stone. I’m thinking maybe it makes more sense to limit droop instead of bump from a ride quality perspective.

Kind of a moot point now that I’m on generator power for probably a few days. Crazy storm came through about lunchtime and knocked a ton of trees down all over town, one of which took out the power lines behind my house. So that’s cool.
 
I did some more math while the power was out and came to the conclusion that 4” was dumb. Power is finally back on so I rocked the lower shock mounts down so I’ve got 7” of uptravel with the truck totally unloaded. I think it’ll be closer to 5” with the fuel tank and armor in it and some crap in the bed. The shocks run out of droop travel about 1/4” before the springs do, but I’d rather need some limit straps than have two inches before I get into the bumps.

My plan for the bumps is some cheap daystar 4.5” pyramid bumps mounted to an inch or two of square tube welded to the top of the spring plates.

Y’all see anything wrong with that?
 
thezentree said:
I sold my nicest, newest vehicle to my dad a few weeks back, so obviously I needed to go wheel my 23 year old, 290k mile DD as soon as possible. Went and did small tire stuff in the woods with my friends yesterday with the 4Runner instead of working on this shit heap Tacoma.

IMG_9277.jpeg


My goal this weekend is to get the rear shocks mounted and rear brake lines done.

Is this shock mount setup dumb? 5.5” of chrome showing with no fuel tank and nothing in the bed. That will drop to 4” or so with it moderately loaded. Shocks are 11.7” travel, and leaned back about 20 degrees.

IMG_5657.jpeg
IMG_5656.jpeg
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Mine are mounted the same. I actually need to move my axle side mounts higher as I am leaving some down travel on the table. I think I just went with 50% up and down and figured I would change it from there as needed. Don't overthink it, you are building a SE rock crawler, not a KOH rig, if it doesn't work, cut the mounts off and re do them after the shakedown run

As for the bumps, I ran that same setup you want to forever and liked it, I only swapped to airbumps recently because DINK life and why not.
 
Cool, I’m pretty close to just sending it. I’m just trying to limit the amount of time I spend in the garage so I my also DINK lifestyle doesn’t turn into SINK+alimony lol
 
thezentree said:
Cool, I’m pretty close to just sending it. I’m just trying to limit the amount of time I spend in the garage so I my also DINK lifestyle doesn’t turn into SINK+alimony lol
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Yea I hear that man!! I was getting hints of that during my winter project!!
 
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Lower shock mounts are burned in, brake lines mostly done, brake hoses are ordered, and bump stops showed up today. I need to pull the bed off and finish weld the upper shock mounts and the shackle hangers so I can paint the frame, but I’m getting sorta close to putting this thing back together. For now it’s not gonna have a parking brake, which I don’t love, but that’s a later problem.

For bump stop mounts I’m planning to weld 3 inches of extra 1.5” .250 wall DOM to the top of the U bolt plates, and weld a short section of 3/16” plate to the top of the tube to get the bump stops to contact the frame before the shocks bottom out:

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In case anyone is curious, you can fit at least four mounted 37s in the back of a 3rd gen 4Runner.

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…which is about all I’ve accomplished on the taco so far. I did rear brakes on the 4Runner and went to the creek instead of sweating in the garage this weekend.


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Ready to burn everything in, paint the frame, and put it all back together.

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If it would stop being a thousand degrees outside I might be willing to spend more than a few minutes in the garage.
 
Frame is painted and reassembly started. I bought a new muffler and tailpipe, then found out I gotta take it to an exhaust shop to unfuck the horrendous angle the PO welded the cat onto the header, but I can just run the crusty old glass pack for now to get it driving.







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After wondering why my driveshaft is too long, I found the factory frame diagram I’d spent a month trying to find with my first attempt today. Turns out I put the spring hangers like 1.5” too far forward somehow.

Someone check my math before I start cutting, because I apparently fail at basic algebra. The way I read this diagram the tape should say 35-7/16”.




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I don't trust this frame diagram. I measured the (direct, not horizontal) distance between the spring hanger and the shackle mount on my frame as a sanity check and got 53.25". According to this diagram, it should be 49.32"

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So I asked around and on a 98 reg cab, the distance from that hole to the spring hanger is 34" ...which is where mine was. The direct distance between the spring hanger and shackle mount on the 98 was also 53.25, not 49.32"

If 34" horizontally is actually the right location for that spring hanger, why did that shorten the wheelbase? The wheel isn't centered in the wheel well and the driveshaft is almost an inch too long fully collapsed to even bolt in place. Horizontally nothing should have changed, and there is very little vertical change, certainly within the range of travel of the axle when it was factory, so what do?
 
The spring to shackle distance is irrelevant in your case as that will be moved to get the proper shackle angle and will differ than a stock truck. Did you mark where the axle centerline was before you started chopping?
 
rockota said:
What year is the diagram from? IIRC, 1995.5-1997 had a different spring hanger location than 1998+
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1999 based on the label in the top right, but it's just a pic I found on the internet (tacomaworld, IIRC) so who knows if it's accurate. At this point I don't think it is.
Slander said:
The spring to shackle distance is irrelevant in your case as that will be moved to get the proper shackle angle and will differ than a stock truck. Did you mark where the axle centerline was before you started chopping?
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Oh I know, that was just a "hey let me make sure this thing matches the parts of the frame I can measure just to make sure this diagram is accurate" ...and it doesn't match.

I did mark the axle CL as best I could, but the drivers side spring hanger was totally broken off, and the passenger side was bent and about to fall off, so best I could to was eyeball it straight and go from there. The wheelbase was like 2.5" different from left to right side. I assumed that the spring hanger locations would be better anyway since the springs would dictate the axle CL, so I really tried to get a good measurement off the passenger side hanger.

What I don't get is that if that guy on the other forum measured his 98 correctly, it matched what I had, but that was clearly not right since I couldn't collapse the driveshaft enough to even fit it between the pinion and t case flange.
 
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thezentree said:
1999 based on the label in the top right, but it's just a pic I found on the internet (tacomaworld, IIRC) so who knows if it's accurate. At this point I don't think it is.
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Doh! Didn’t even see that.


Edit: what’s the wheelbase as it sits?
 
rockota said:
Doh! Didn’t even see that.


Edit: what’s the wheelbase as it sits?
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Hah it happens. I regularly fail at reading comprehension and get “per my previous email..” responses all the time.

I cut the spring hangers off this morning, but it was right at 103.5”. That said, it’s 3 linked and I don’t know where the front axle is in relation to the OEM front end. It could be an inch or two forward of factory, so I don’t know if that’s a good datum.
 
Google says factory is 103”. Really seems like yours rear axle got moved forward a bit? 🤷‍♂️
 
Has to have been moved forward but I can't figure out how if that 34" measurement is right.

As for the diagram, I'm starting to think the dimensions came off a 96-97 frame and whoever made it just assumed a 99 was the same.
 
thezentree said:
Hah it happens. I regularly fail at reading comprehension and get “per my previous email..” responses all the time.

I cut the spring hangers off this morning, but it was right at 103.5”. That said, it’s 3 linked and I don’t know where the front axle is in relation to the OEM front end. It could be an inch or two forward of factory, so I don’t know if that’s a good datum.
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I tried to use wheelbase for mine and all it did was fuck me up at one point. What I ended up doing (and still had one side somehow 1.5" further forward than the other) is figure out where you want you rear axle to land and burn the leaf spring hangars in based off that. So figure out where the beds going to be, burn those mounts on and then swing the axle under it and place your spring mounts that way.

There's a few ways to skin the cat here, it may just take a while and you messed up somethibg pretty common, most people just don't post it when you read build threads.
 
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I think that’s gonna be the ticket. The bed mounts are burned in, so I just gotta get someone help me get it back on the truck.

I really would like to figure out what happened though since it might throw other measurements off, but oh well
 
I mean it could even be something as stupid as the driveshaft that was in there from the PO was too long and now you have everything in the right spot, and that's messing you up. Never know buying someone else's stuff.
 
Truth. The slip joint in the driveshaft is about done anyway, so I have the "opportunity" to have a new driveshaft made anyway.

I've got a buddy coming over tomorrow afternoon to help me get the bed back on it, so I think I'm just gonna center the wheels in the wheel wells and send it. Not sure what else to do. Fingers crossed the shock mounts still work haha.
 
Confirmed the spring hanger was in the correct horizontal location for a stock truck, and my measurements were good. Put the bed on and also confirmed that the stock truck location is not right.

Currently waiting on ruffstuff to put the spring hangersI ordered on Saturday morning in a box and send them to me so I can start mocking up where they're actually going to go, because I can't do shit without putting weight on the springs.
 
PSA: iphone screens don't appreciate weld spatter. At least only one of the spring hangers is tacked in the wrong place while I ruined my phone.

I'm doing great, guys.

I did find the sweet spot, centered the axle in the wheel well with weight on the axle, driveshaft fits, pinion angle is good, and I think I can get away with not having to move the shackle mount. I just need to learn how to read a damn tape measure consistently. I'll post pics when I get a chance to fix the one spring hanger, then I'll delete this post and act like I did it right the first time and it didn't cause a $1k trip to the apple store.
 
thezentree said:
PSA: iphone screens don't appreciate weld spatter. At least only one of the spring hangers is tacked in the wrong place while I ruined my phone.

I'm doing great, guys.

I did find the sweet spot, centered the axle in the wheel well with weight on the axle, driveshaft fits, pinion angle is good, and I think I can get away with not having to move the shackle mount. I just need to learn how to read a damn tape measure consistently. I'll post pics when I get a chance to fix the one spring hanger, then I'll delete this post and act like I did it right the first time and it didn't cause a $1k trip to the apple store.
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:flipoff2:

I can't use a tape measure either, hence why my junk pile is on leafs still:laughing:
 
Leafs are cool. I suspect I’m gonna be cussing the link setup on the front of this thing if I ever get to the point that I can stop fucking with the back half
 
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Spring hangers are tacked in what I think is their final home. I’m hoping I can get them burned in and painted later this week and maybe start it on Sunday. I think I’m pretty close to being done with the back half of the truck. Maybe. Probably not. Oh well.

Wheelbase is 106” with maybe 1/16” difference side to side. The rear axle is maybe 1/4” behind the center of the wheel well at ride height, and I’m fine with that. The bed is going to get trimmed for a bumper before I go wheeling anyway. The driveshaft slip joint is completely trashed, but at ride height it’s got plenty of slip to compress to full stuff, so I’m happy with that. I’m less thrilled about needing a new driveshaft instead of a few u joints.

I still don’t know for sure why the factory measurement I took was wrong, but I assume it’s some combination of factors like the frame section height being smaller, the frame angling up at 25 degrees instead of the factory 20 degrees, shackle mount not being exactly where it was, etc. Whatever. I don’t care anymore, I just wanna drive this shit heap.
 
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