Wrenchin... Adventures under the hood... Put em here.

[lifelinksplit]

When I found out where they put the starter in my tundra I about punched somebody.

Since wife's 4th gen threw a rod, we picked up a higher mileage replacement but with the V8. Now I just need to swap over everything.....front/rear bumpers, sliders,roof rack, front/rear suspension, and gears/locker.

Got roof rack, front bumper, sliders, and front suspension pulled off and roof rack switched over. Want to swap suspension(lift) on to the "new" one before putting all the weight off accessories on. At least I'll have access to a garage for swapping parts to the new one.

Using some sweet jack stands a la bodywhomper. And yeah my neighbors love me.

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[bodywhomper]

Using some sweet jack stands a la bodywhomper. And yeah my neighbors love me.

hell yes!

[jamal]

Been up in canada for a few weeks with the grandparents. They're getting old and the relatives that live here don't seem to come around and do stuff quite as much as they should. So I've been doing a little work around the house like cleaning and throwing shit out and put some more handrails up on the stairs.

Grandpa's pickup was due for an oil change so I did that, noticed a trashed axle boot (I guess that's the slight vibration I felt), so put in a new axle today. Hardest part was just making sure I had all the tools i needed before starting because it's the only car here right now. Great grandpa was a mechanic and some of his old stuff is here but I still had to get a few things and rent a jack and stands.

Then just took the headlights out for the second time. First was new low beams and some aiming because I wasn't happy with how they were working, then I noticed one of the high beams was out. Fun process where you have to reach through the fender liner to undo a little clip and then remove the whole grille to get the lights out. It's a pickup truck, why can't the back of the headlight be easily accessible through the engine bay?

Plus side, got a few new tools out of the deal. Torque wrench, a couple socket sets, big fucking hammer, and some nice long ratcheting box ends that I didn't specifically need to do any of this but I've been looking for a set for awhile and they were a good deal.

[Rideski]

There’s a spot on my land that would be convenient to work on trucks but I don’t really want a whole concrete pad right there.

Anyone ever pour a 2’x6’ pad just to hold one set of jack stands?

[bodywhomper]

I highly recommend my style of jack stands. Very sturdy and wide.

What do you all do to protect environment? I’m concerned about accidental small spills on my gravel, dirt, and mud driveway. Drip pans?

I usually do fluids work in my friends concrete floor garage.

[refried]

Driving home in the rain last Friday I was thinking how crappy the sealed beam (incandescent) headlights were, and thought I should look into upgrading them but I ended up getting a cold over the weekend and forgot about it until I used the truck yesterday. About 10 miles from home the radio stopped working, then the Fasten Belts light came on and saw the volt meter pegged to the left side of the gauge, I killed the heater and wipers then lights when the engine stumbled with 5 miles to go turning them on only when needed. Today I replaced the alternator and bought a new battery for the Volvo 245 because it still tests good but it hasn't seen a new one in 5+ years, $235 alltogether (one of the pleasures of living on an island). Could have saved $100 and bought everything offisland but I they had the alternator and I didn't want to be the guy holding up the ferry line with a dead battery in the Volvo.

[highangle]

For the expense and pita to upgrade from sealed beams or otherwise olskool incadescents in some trucks...Maybe some LED aux lighting would get you more light while saving the classic appeal? Some replacement headlamp/marker assembly modules look trashy. eg An ol Chebby would look dollar store af with blackout projectors and halos.

PS: holy fuk them +wapitis!!1!!

[refried]

this truck only gets driven in the dark this time of year and I complain about the lights every year, this is the only one of my vehicles that I haven't gone completely overboard on headlights on. Maybe I;ll pick up another set of Hella conversion headlights like the Toyota and Ford van have, I've always been happy with them.

That's a friends tractor shed, I think they were all with a bow

[highangle]

You can score a 3-row 16" led, remote control harness, and a light mount bracket that bolts behind your front tag. Make about 40x the amount of light of old sealed beams, RC wiring harness makes for effortless and clean light installs, and you're looking at ~ $85 and ~4.5 minutes to install.

LEDs suck when there's a lot of snow or fog in the air tho. They all make too much halo and can't make real cutoff lines like you want in fog lights. Most light bar housings pack up with falling snow too. ...




Your tractor shed guy probably sneaks up on'em at night...so he can get milk samples from the cows while they ain't looking...to have it analyzed to help tailor his feeding program and supplement his CRP seedstocks...

[refried]

I'm thinking of going with Cibie H4 Ecode conversions instead of the Hellas, I really like the Ecode light pattern the 245 has and can get a set of Cibie's for about $50 more than the Hellas. The Cibies don't come with bulbs but I have a pretty good selection of Osram and other higher watt H4 bulbs from the other cars I have that use them.

[jamal]

I've thought of getting some euro or jdm headlights for my car (which are glass instead of plastic and some use projectors), and then swapping in an hid kit, but then I get out the plastx and give them a scrub and it's like, yeah, I guess these are fine with good bulbs and aim and clear lenses. Plus the legality of doing all that is, uh, questionable to no. But proper hid projectors and aim shouldn't cause issues for other cars.

Years ago I got into navigational road rallies, and had a set of big fuckoff spotlights on the front of my old subaru. They were hooked up with a switch and the highbeams, so when they were on and you hit the highbeams everything lit up. I do have four of them in a box somewhere, and keep thinking about figuring out a light bar for them.




And yeah, the beam pattern you want for fog and snow is completely different from what you want on a clear night. Former, low and close up, the latter, the less light right in front of the car the better. I even keep my dash lights about as dim as they'll go while visible.

[bodywhomper]

What’s y’all favorite thing to clean the haze from headlights?

[MakersTeleMark]

What’s y’all favorite thing to clean the haze from headlights?

New one's. The rotary solution is not really much of one.
Aftermarket glass works wonders as well.

[refried]

What’s y’all favorite thing to clean the haze from headlights?

I hit the Subaru headlight with a buffer and a light compound then wax about once a year, it's not a permanent cure but it keeps them clear.

[jamal]

Meguiar's plastX works pretty well. Clean the headlights, then put some on a shop towel or something, give the lens a good application and scrubbing, then wipe clean with a microfiber cloth.

[basinbeater]

Start with sandpaper. Massive putting all over the place? Start with 400 grit. Then go to 1500, then go to 2000, fhen get out the cutting compound. Then the polish. Polish those turds.

sent from Utah.

[Rideski]

Here’s an article about best headlight kits.
Haven’t tried anything yet, guess I should.
I was going to just throw new assembly in there but after watching the instructions less motivated. Appears they hide a couple bolts and clips in fucked up location on mine. Figured it would be easy on an old truck. My Jeep took all of like 10 minutes to swap.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/car...er-works-best/

[gravitylover]

Easiest ever was my 08 Volvo C30, same as the S40 I believe. You just pulled a pin, unplug the wires and that's it. It literally took 2 minutes to take the entire assembly out, change a bulb and put it back in. Replacing most of the new headlight assemblies is a pricey endeavor running into the hundreds of dollars even for the least expensive cars that's why the lenses on my Durango look so shitty. I just can't talk myself into spending that kind of money on headlights when there are so many other things I should do to it. I need a warm(ish) day soon so I can sand them down and polish them again, this will be the 4th time. Fuck plastic lenses on headlights

[El Chupacabra]

I'm thinking of going with Cibie H4 Ecode conversions instead of the Hellas, I really like the Ecode light pattern the 245 has and can get a set of Cibie's for about $50 more than the Hellas. The Cibies don't come with bulbs but I have a pretty good selection of Osram and other higher watt H4 bulbs from the other cars I have that use them.

I swapped in Hella H4 e-code glass headlamps on an old XJ Cherokee -- like this:
https://www.quadratec.com/products/97009_6010.htm

The Hella headlamps have a nice sharp horizontal cutoff, with a rising ramp on the right side. No glare above the cutoff. A massive improvement over the sealed beam H4 lamps.

I used 80/100 watt bulbs, and they were seriously bright. Like brighter than the factory HIDs on an Acura TL I had at the time. To make sure I didn't fry the wiring harness, I added a Painless Wiring headlight relay kit:
https://www.painlessperformance.com/wc/30815

If you're handy with soldering, you could make your own relay wiring harness. I recall the Painless harness not being so expensive back when I did it, but that was quite awhile ago.

[mattig]

The stock LED lights for RVs these days totally suck... Hospital-like color temp and a bunch of little mini-suns scattered around the interior, waiting to blind me. Been wanting to do a dimmable rgb light strip upgrade for a while, but didn't really know what the fuck I was doing or which components to get.

The LEDsupply website was super helpful. They even caught an error I made in ordering and fixed it for me proactively.

I have no idea how to take classy low light photos, outside the bedroom, so these pics don't do justice to the transformation. I can select any color and there's a good range of dimming. Mucho ( . )( . )'s



Next upgrade wasn't so much to the camper, but rather to the new Ford's incredibly horrible LED headlights. In snowstorms where I could drive 40mph in my tundra, I'm lucky to be doing 20mph in the Ford. I think it would be way better if I had the cheap, hot, stock halogen lights to melt snow and prevent it from accumulating in front of the lights. Fog lights, same problem.

Did some research and ended up with a KD Fabworks fog light bracket that allows for 2 pods on each side (either Ridgid or Baja Designs). Opted for Baja's squadron sports, 2x amber spot lights and 2x wide driving lights.

The driving lights are plumbed to the stock fog light switch, so I can run them solo if other cars are around. The spot lights are plumbed to the truck's upfitter switches, and I only plan to unleash that warm yellow supernova if there are no other vehicles in front of me (the conditions I needed these for tend to result in empty roads... i.e. midnight driving at transitional PNW altitudes with big, wet, heavy flakes on passes with zero additional lighting or reflective markers (looking at you Santiam).

High hopes for these, but they are yet to be tested. Based on driveway testing, I will not need to use the truck's stock headlights at all.



Only have a night shot of the spot lights, but will update with full spread if the results are interesting.



Other upgrades heading into the season have included torklift stable loads, hellwig rear sway, and rancho 9000 adjustables all around. Drives like a car now.

Next up is front hitch and generator box like this guy.



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[The Reverend Floater]

I can't get more than 6 volts to my headlights to save my life.

[snowaddict91]

I can't get more than 6 volts to my headlights to save my life.

On your OBS? Everything runs through the headlight switch, fixes are out there.

[The Reverend Floater]

No...1987 fj62 LC.

Got 11 going into relay, and apparently 5 coming out. Had the relay bench tested by shop and it’s fine. I’m not an electrical guy but I’ve installed headlight relays on the OBS plow truck and others...usually pretty easy. This is driving me insane.

[TAFKALVS]

Call me Monday morning and I'll put you on with my electrical wizard

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[bodywhomper]

Thanks for the recommendations on cleaning the headlight lenses. I need to make some time on a dry day and do some polishing.

Looking closely at one, there’s moisture inside of the headlight (matrix). Thoughts and feelings?