MrWhite's Tacoma Flippac Adventure Rig - pic heavy

[MrWhite]

Greetings ExpeditionPortal!

Let's just start with a bunch of pictures of the rig in it's current state (or close to it):





A couple years ago we decided to get back outside more. After much talk about what we wanted to do we converged on a Tacoma w/ Flippac as a camping solution. I've owned many Toyota trucks and loved every one, so as a base vehicle this was a no-brainer. Shortly, we were owners of a new 2013 Tacoma DCLB with a Flippac on order. The choice of double-cab is probably obvious given it is a family vehicle. The choice of long bed was simply because I wanted to be able to stealth camp in the back and thus needed a six-foot bed length.

I've done a lot of improvements to the vehicle in the year-and-a-half that we've owned it, many of them inspired or copied directly from build threads I've seen on this site. But some of these mods are unique, so I thought I'd give back to the community that inspired me by showing what I've done with this platform. I'll use this thread to talk about the truck portion of the build and create another thread in the Popup Campers section for the Flippac build-out.

It may take me some time to show everything I've done, and of course it is always a work in progress. Below is a listing of mods and I'll put up some follow-on posts detailing some of them. Feel free to ask questions or offer suggestions for improvements. Please say hi if you see us in the wild!

Suspension & Wheels:
Truck sits with about a 2.5” lift
Sway-A-Way 2.0 front coil-overs w/ Wheeler super bumps, 700# springs
Wheelers custom rear spring pack
Bilstein 5100 rear shocks (may soon go)
Firestone RideRite helper airbags, custom mounted on axle
Daystar cradles
Maxxis Bighorn 255/85R16 tires on stock Toyota aluminum wheels, painted black

Armor & Recovery:
Pelfreybilt front bumper with full hoops
Pelfreybilt high clearance rear bumper with custom modular swing-out gate
Pelfreybilt full skids
Relentless Fabrication DIY sliders
Engo e10000s winch

Electrical:
Sears Diehard Platinum dual batteries in engine bay (group size 35)
Blue Sea remote fuse boxes and circuit breakers (one set under hood and one set in camper)
In-dash winch controls
Garmin nuvi GPS
Samsung Galaxy Tab S 8.4" running AlpineQuest for off road navigation

Exterior:
Monstaliner painted rocker panels and fender flares
Debaged
Plasti-dipped grill
EGR window vents
15% tinted front windows

Interior:
Upgraded speakers
Kenwood TM-v71A dual band radio
Wet Okole seat covers
Weathertech floor mats

Misc. Mods:
VIA compressor mounted in engine bay
Diff-breather extension
Rear-view camera anytime mod
ABS disable switch
Yellow-wire mod

Next-up:
Regear to 4.56
ARB lockers front and rear
35's??? oh boy...

 

[tacozord]

Another DCLB! Looks good.

I don't see any mention of gears or lockers. So you're running stock gears with open diffs? And how do you like the long wheel base off road?

 

[MrWhite]

Correct, open diffs currently. My next major upgrade will be regearing to 4.56 and adding ARB lockers front and rear.

Honestly, so far the long bed has been fine off-road. I can't say that I've really pushed it in this area though, with the most difficult off-road trail probably being up to the Salt Tram and down to Cerro Gordo in the Inyo range. So far I've found it harder navigating around tight parking lots than off-road. We'll see how that keeps going though. The lift, armor, and big tires help a lot.

 

[Watt maker]

Love those Flip-pacs! I'm thinking of building a taco very similar to this.

 

[brianjwilson]

Correct, open diffs currently. My next major upgrade will be regearing to 4.56 and adding ARB lockers front and rear.

Honestly, so far the long bed has been fine off-road. I can't say that I've really pushed it in this area though, with the most difficult off-road trail probably being up to the Salt Tram and down to Cerro Gordo in the Inyo range. So far I've found it harder navigating around tight parking lots than off-road. We'll see how that keeps going though. The lift, armor, and big tires help a lot.

No major complaints about gearing with the tires for now? I'm planning on running 255s and keep imagining that it will be horribly undergeared and I will be locking out overdrive. Gears/lockers were in the early plans but now they will likely be next year...

Great looking setup by the way!


Oh I see you have an ABS disable setup, have you done the mod to use TRAC (traction control) in 4 low? It should be a very easy thing to do, nothing like a locker but it would help in the mean time.

 

[MrWhite]

Major complaints on gearing? No. It's liveable, having been like this for the last year and a half, but just barely. I added a lot of weight with the bumpers, full armor, and Flippac build out. The transmission hunts a lot pushing uphill or into headwinds. I'd like to resolve that with a gearing change to put the engine back into its torque/rpm sweet spot. Plus, I might go to 35's on my next set of tires...

Thanks for reminding me about the yellow-wire mod ... yes, I've done that too. Honestly though, I have yet to see it kick into TRAC mode in 4-Lo, even though I think I've put the truck in situations where it should have.

 

[MrWhite]

Sliders...

After tires and suspension the next thing I did to the truck was sliders. I purchased a DIY kit from Relentless Fabrications for a few reasons: 1) lead time on fully-built sliders was long, 2) I wanted to customize the angle and offset from the frame, 3) I have a good friend who is a great welder and thus had resources.

Putting the sliders in the right place:


My buddy getting a sore neck welding them on (I definitely owed him big on this project):


You will notice in that second photo the rocker panels have been painted, stay tuned for more on that.

It took me a while to figure out a good paint/coating solution for the sliders that wouldn't get blasted off when driving long distances on dirt roads or in winter conditions where they sand/salt the road. I finally found that Chassis Saver from Monstaliner works really well here. It is super durable, similar to POR15 I guess, and easy to apply and touch-up. I used a base coat of the aluminum color followed by a coat of satin black and then Rustoleum spray-on bed liner. It's held up really well so far.

Chassis Saver is also what I applied to the frame after welding on the sliders.

 

[MrWhite]

Rocker panel paint...

This is the first white vehicle I've owned and I didn't want it to look like a commercial refrigerator driving down the road, so I thought a little custom paint and additional protection to the rocker panels would look good. After a lot of research and thinking about costs, I decided to do this myself instead of paying someone to spray-on bed liner. The product I ended up using is called Monstaliner, and I chose it simply because it looked easy to apply and received good reviews. This stuff is basically a two-part epoxy paint that can be rolled on using a special foam roller, which is what gives it the texture. I've been super pleased with the durability and look, it's quite unique. With that said, it took me four days to complete the job and I think I'd just pay someone next time.

Masking:


Door details:


Finished:


Now I just need the bumpers...

 

[brianjwilson]

The sliders look great. Bolt on from relentless seems like it may stick out too far from my liking. It is tough to find good pictures from the top down angle.

 

[DVexile]

I can't say that I've really pushed it in this area though, with the most difficult off-road trail probably being up to the Salt Tram and down to Cerro Gordo in the Inyo range.

Woah. When did you do that run? And do you mean from Swansea up to the crest of the Inyos, south a bit to the tram and then further south to Cerro Gordo? I did that years ago and the road from the tram to Cerro Gordo was frankly terrifying in a truck rather smaller than a DCLB Tacoma. And I'd heard the road was in poor condition of after the summer of '13 thunderstorms in the area. I'd love to tackle in a DCSB with a Flip Pac so I'm very interested in how it went for you!

And nice build!

 

[MrWhite]

Yes sir, up from Swansea then south past the salt tram to Cerro Gordo. We ran that in August of 2014. That was an awesome trip, really a lot of fun. Going down the steep switchbacks to Cerro Gordo was probably the most hair-raising, but not the hardest technical section. The truck did just fine.

Thanks for the nice comments about the truck and what you've seen of it so far. More to come...

 

[MrWhite]

MrWhite's Tacoma Flippac Adventure Rig

While waiting for bumpers and armor to arrive I had a couple other items on my list. First up was an on-board air system. I decided to go with a 100% duty cycle VIAIR compressor, no air tank (yet - that will come with lockers in the future). Looking around I found a nice little spot where it would fit behind the passenger side head light in the engine bay:


I had to make a couple very simple brackets to hold it that you can see in the pictures. There is a nice OTRATTW switch mounted on the dashboard.

For the outlets I ran air hose to a couple bulkhead fittings on each side of the frame, mid-way between the tires. There are quick-disconnects screwed into the bulkhead fittings. I carry a short length of hose with a gauge and air chuck fitting, with which I can reach both front and both rear tires.


I'll pose pictures of the hose assembly the next time I have it out.

 

[MTaco]

Nice set up! You're not wasting any time on this build. I love that you're running Sway-A-Ways, I thought I was the only one left! LOL...

 

[soonenough]

Nice truck!

 

[robert]

Seeing your compressor mounting location caused me to have one of those "Huh, why didn't I think of that when I was trying to figure out a mounting location" moments. My Warn control box is mounted there now.

Those chuck locations are going to get trashed up under the truck and with no covers on them, at least the one I had under the rear of my old Tacoma did. I used the plastic caps on both of mine and the front chuck was on a braided hose zip tied behind the front ARB and the rear I ended up moving into the bed after finding it full of crud. Obviously make sure your hose is long enough to reach where you need it to go if you move them.