"The Blue Truck"

[rattlewagon]

I have this on other forums, but wanted it here too. The truck has never really had a name expect " The blue truck "

I also consider this my learning truck. The welds I did on it in 2010 look way different than the welds I did over the summer.

Ive owned this truck since march of 07. Bought it as a DD in college, kept it on the road till it started getting too beat up to pass yearly state inspections around 2012, then it got turned into a shitbox crawler around 2014 and ive been wheeling it ever since.

Heres the cliff notes:

3.g0 from a 95 4runner with a top end rebuild (done in 2011) Punched out Harley sportster exhaust where the cat should be.

38TSLs SX on Procomp steelies with Margison Metal Works DIY beadlocks

Front is 85 Front axle with all the TG Armor, OldManEmu/RUF springs. Sky hanger/shackles, 30 RCVs, Creeper Flanges, 5th Stud high steer arms, 8" long spring perches, RuffStuff 7/8th Heim joint steering. IFS hubs ground down used with Tacoma slip on rotors for a 3"wider stance. 4.10 high pinion and a welded diff. Ford 12" shocks and towers, TG extended brake lines. Daystar mini bumps

Rear is welded with 4.10s with some armor. Ford 12" shocks and mounts, Chevy 63s bastard pack with Sky hangers/shackles

Dual gear drive t-case with 2.28/4.7 gears, tg twin stick. Advanced adapters plates held up with a Bud Built 1.5" lift v6 skid plate and some 4xI sliders.

10 gal summit plastic tank with e2000 pump.

TG winch plate based front bumper with a Warn XD9000I and amazon synthetic line.

126" Wheel base

First time wheeling the truck, spring of 07

Went through the normal getting into wheeling motions.

33s

Next phase was no lift, cut fenders and 35s, 4xinnovation sliders, Downey off road read springs, Budbuilt single case v6 skid and a rear spool, and a winch.

Around 2012 the front spider gears let go, and it was easier to cut everything off than unbolt it, and thats what started its transformation to it current state, which ill go over in the fowling posts.

This is the truck today:

 

[rattlewagon]

The rear end is simple. Chevy 63 and skys hanger kit. F250 shocks. TG armor, and fresh brakes. Done around 2013.

Realized how bad the frame was, pulled the bed and plated the frame

Cutting plated

My fancy jig for moving the hanger forward

Followed the 4x4 wire instructions on how to make a bearing pullter to change the rear axle bearings, works mint!

Ran it like that till about 2019 when a leaf spring broke. Rear pack is now" 63 chevy main leaf, for ranger AAL, 2 toyota leafs from an old ruf pack and then chevy over load.

I also added bumpstops at this time, only 5 years after lol. Super simple, just day stars and some 2" tube.

And a little repaint

The drain plug was also riped out around this time, so the plug hole has been welded closed and ground smooth.

 

[rattlewagon]

The front axle. Circa 2013

85 front, striped.

Truss connected to the spring perch.

Blob Job welding. Extended perches, Knuckle gussets connected to perch, lower ubolt grabber trimmed,

Looks better painted

5th stud , used 1/2 inch bolts.

Nut welded to the back of the knuckle

Running IFS hubs , heres the hub ground down and in the taco rotor

Brake caliper opened up to fit over the slightly wider rotor.

Creeper flanges/dowel pins on..

 

[rattlewagon]

Had a heck of a time finding longer wheel studs needed for the deeper aluminum rims I was running at the time. Didnt want to drop the $$ for ARPs and they dont "just make longer studs". So this is what I found:

Dorman Part #98458 is the stock IFS front stud is a .559" Knurl and a .3149 shoulder depth. Length of 40 mm.

Part # 610-312 is a stock rear stud, with a knurl diameter of .5578" and shoulder depth of .4921. 44.5mm long

Part # 610-463. Rear stud off of a Awd Toyota Matrix. Same .559 knurl but a shoulder depth just over an inch, it makes the whole stud 55mm.

Stock on the left, stock rear in the middle, and martix on the right.

with the rotor on

and together

All bearing and stuff were from a Marlin rebuild kit, and got a set of these right before TG bought em.

Went through a few junkyard low pinion diffs, they seemed to last about 10 months before they destructed.

Around 2017 I bought a hp diff from off the old sites classifieds, and ive been running that ever since.

2018 the front drain plug ripped out, so it was welded closed and ground smooth.

2021, broke both OG longfields about three weeks apart, Tried running a used set of TG birfs, but they were already starting to click. and am now running RCVs (with a TG long side shaft because I had it already)

 

[rattlewagon]

Steering box and pump are stock. Steering is hard when not moving, obviously. Ruff stuff 7/8 heims on the axle end. The large heims do touch when turning full driver. Ive ground them down a but and played with the misalignment spacers, but really one or noth of them should be smaller.

Stock VS ruff stuff

Steering box was pushed to the rad support and plated, frame notched for the heim bolt.

Plan was to go full hydro, I just havent done it yet.

 

[rattlewagon]

The front suspension is again, Sky low profile hanger and shackles. Went through a few RUF packs, they sat flat and flexed great, but would break about a leaf a year.

Good ole days of IFS wheelin

Mock up:

Hanger on:

Front frame plates

Flex test for shocks

Ford shocks and towers.

Ford shock info

Same daystar mini bumps in the front. Around 2017 got tired of bending weak old main leafs and and got some OME cs009r springs, but they sat too tall and were wicked stiff. through trial and error, I changed the leaf packs to be 1st and meafs are ome, and the rest are from a old ruf packs, and now they flex great, and dont sit up so high.

 

[rattlewagon]

First time out after 2 winters of working on it. Up to Spring of 2014 now

Cut the back of the cab down so I could see the back of the frame from the driver seat

And down to a friends house for a cage. This was my first time bendiing tube, learned alot doing it.

Sliders make great scaffolding for roof work

Left the cab exposed so I could keep denting it up.

Back at the home shop, pulled it off to fully weld it.

 

[rattlewagon]

Back on

Made a "bed" from a piece of pallet rack, welded to the frame.

 

[rattlewagon]

Drive train:

Square front shaft and 2.5 schedule 40 rear. Got rid of the always failing carrier bearing for a 1 piece shaft.

Stock vs the schedule 40

3.0 ripped a motor mount first time out with the new set up, so they got through bolted

Ran the stock 3.0/chain drive until 2016, bought a used AA r150 to gear drive adapter off old site classifieds. Started with a single case to keep my budbuilt and drive shafts with TG 23 spline 4.7 gears and a twin stick.

Clearenced the housing for the larger 4.7 gear

Glad the top shift kit came clearenced already for the bigger gears.

Had to chop a shift rail

 

[rattlewagon]

Had to chop a shift rail, but the biggest problem was that the shifter hit each other, and you couldnt go into 3rd with the case in low range.

Had to bend the 5 speed shifter to clear.

It bolted right up to the stock location just like the intenet said it would

2018 I added a doubler, AA adapter again, 23 spline , Dual TG mounts on a V6 budbuilt 1.5 lift skid.

Stock was about 30:1 Crawl ratio. With just the single case 4.7, I was around 80:1, now with the duals were at 160:1

The TG 4.7 gears broke in 2020, and were replaced with SUMO 4.7 gears.

Been good so far!

Other things, the TG mounts are shot and need to be replaced. I did end up welding them right to the skid, as the little bolts kept coming loose and stripping out mounts. When they get replaced, ill be going with 4xi mounts.

 

[rattlewagon]

The stock fuel pump took a dump around 2016? and was replaced by a summit fuel cell and artek s2000 pump, been working great. I did take the foam out, as the gas was breaking it down and I was changing a fuel filter after every run.

My original 38 tsl were very dry rotted, had tubes (one had the tube poking out of the sidwewall) so they were retired for spares, and i got another set of 38 TSL SX and figured Id give beadlocks a try. I had a friend with a shop make them for me.

Valve stem hole welded closed and re drilled out from behind the ring

Saw online about using roof tar for a bead sealer. figured Id give it a try, so far has been working great

 

[rattlewagon]

My high dollar rock lights

I freakin love snow wheelin, and tire chains CHANGED how we winter wheel. Been running chains since 2018 and have got others around to jump on the chain gang. We dont get depths of snow the west does (im in Vermont) but we go get ice. They work so well that I get sad in the spring when they come off. I made them from a set of old plow truck chains.

 

[rattlewagon]

Im sure ill make edits above, I kinda threw this together. But for now, im just gonna dump random pictures below.

The ole welded locker. She wont slip anymore!

 

[rattlewagon]

 

[rattlewagon]

The wife winching an oil tank out of our basement.

Truck sledding

 

[rattlewagon]

Put a truck bed hoist on a receiver hitch..Now its a crane!

 

[rattlewagon]

 

[rattlewagon]

 

[rattlewagon]

 

[rattlewagon]

Some Vids,

High idle, but with just the 4.7 case, about 73:1



And the dual cases, 168:1 crawl ratio

 

[rattlewagon]

 

[rattlewagon]

Toyota Broken Locker

Working the bugs out. Rear locker is ratcheting under load.

youtu.be

 

[D.Dixon]

Love reading through the progression of an old wheeler!

Thing about blue trucks, everyone just calls them "the blue truck", think we might be a cult or something

 

[ToyodaAddict1980]

I thought I was the only one with "The blue truck"

Rattlewagon, how are those little bump stops holding up?

 

[rattlewagon]

I thought I was the only one with "The blue truck"

Rattlewagon, how are those little bump stops holding up?

Thing about blue trucks, everyone just calls them "the blue truck", think we might be a cult or something

Wahoo! Blue trucks rule!

The bumps hold up alright. you can cut them down easy which is nice, my fronts currently have the top three layers cut off. Ive gone through a few of them through the years, sometimes on a hard hit on a cold day they will split in half. But for like $12 bucks a pair, you cant beat em.

Heres a few from Hallowheelin last Saturday

 

[TRINDU]

Always cool to see a 10 year build in 10 minutes.

I own its rust free twin, same color, decals, v6.

 

[rattlewagon]

Harley exhaust was finally beat and venting into the cab really bad. Spent 50$ on some flex pipe and a cherry bomb and used some EMT for a tail pipe. I expect the flex pipe to crush and come apart so the long section under the truck will probably be replaced with solid pipe, but I wanted to see how it holds up for now.

One clamp on the tail pipe, one on the muffler both welded right to the frame. its super solid. and believe it or not, its a lot quieter with the new set up.

 

[rattlewagon]

Long overdue, but got some real harnesses. Hand me downs from a race car friend. Harness bar welded to the body with some 4x8 plates and some right angle brackets to attach it to the floor using the rear seat mount bolt.

 

[rattlewagon]

Been wheeling a bunch.. and the 3.0 is getting a little tired. Shes been nose up too long too much and getting a little knocky. Going to keep limping it along and start prepping a 3.4 to go in. Ive gotten 10 years of solid wheeling out of this ole 3.0.



Same climb from the other side. Local hard climb (at the jungle in Bethel Vermont) , this was my first time making it. I havent even tried in years because of how quickly it can go bad. But it was hot and the rocks were sticky and the wife and i strapped in and gave it ago.

 

[simmons3067]

How is your ride with the Monroe shocks? I used the same shocks on my Toyota and it rides stiff as hell.