M1010 expo build. The Mountain Turtle

[stevo-mt]

I mounted up my 37s onto the H1 rims to see what I would need to cut out from the fenders. The pictures don't quite do it justice for how much more aggressive the truck is! A few things that I have decided I'm going to change are the front hubs and stub shafts. I've decided to put 35 spline shafts and hubs so I decided while I'm at it I will put DRW front hubs. I am going to find some steel spacers for the rear axle. The aluminum spacers that are on it now are 2" and will work for temporary mounting to get some of the dimensions to trim the fenders. I did some minor cutting on the front fenders and when I get back I'll wrap them up and do some nice bodywork to clean it up.

I got a few other parts coming so I'm pretty excited. I have an espar hydronic heater and a rear heat ex-changer system ordered. I'll set it up with the ability to heat the engine coolant, the rear of the box, and also heat the box from the engines heat while driving. Should be a fun install. The complete stereo system should be showing up tomorrow, and I ordered a bunch more winch parts for the rear winch. All the on board air equipment showed up, my refrigerator insulation improvement box is complete, and I have a bunch of the parts for wiring the cab's rear batteries are showing up.

So now just to get to work!

 

[bknudtsen]

Cool project!

 

[Cody1771]

i want one... stupid rules saying us Canucks can't import vehicles from south of our border.

 

[kfgk14]

Why the DRW front hubs? ridiculous back-spacing on the H1 rims?

 

[tcdent]

...the injector pump is the most expensive part on the vehicle, $1000 bucks easy.

Check out Badger Diesel on eBay if you're looking for a spare. $250 for their basic rebuild is a steal.

Why the DRW front hubs? ridiculous back-spacing on the H1 rims?

That's typically what guys do with "stock" H1 rims; the backspacing is pretty extreme for full width axles.

 

[LTLDEMONZ]

Nice truck you have there, much cleaner looking than stock camo. You might consider changing door and ignition locks, the military keyed them all alike so anyone with a CUCV key could possibly drive away with your ride.

 

[stevo-mt]

Somehow I lucked out and somewhere along the line the steering column was swapped out to a tilting one. When they did that they updated the keyset to a unique one. The box locks on the back and if you want the access door has a spot for a padlock. Most places I travel that isn't too big of a concern .

I finished my insulated box for the Norcold fridge. I built it so there is a cubby hold for plates, pots, and pans with some magnetic strips to hold utensils into place. The side has a accessible spice rack type area for whatever needs to go there. I positioned the feet on the bottom to hold it into place on the drivers side rear corner near the rear door. I plan to have the oven box and portable sink/kitchen unit I need to design fit next to that. The other idea I had was to build some small brackets to built the two aluminum racks into a dual shelf in the back. The main idea is to keep everything versatile and not do anything that I can't pull out on the trail. I've been tempted to investigate a MR. Heater portable on demand propane water heater. It would be used as a sink pump and also a portable shower unit. They are from an Aussy company called the Aquacube. Since I have a diesel coolant heater and a rear heat exchanger I was thinking I could build myself a nice little heat exchanger water tank to warm up water for a shower using excess coolant heat.


Next items on the list to get are 4 Odyssey PC2150 batteries. Two for under the hood and two for the rear. I bought a solenoid that will CLOSE and charge the rear batteries after the front batteries have been able to charge. It is the bi-directional model but I will be doing a little bit of modifying with the control switching to make it manual or auto. It will also charge the front batteries when the rear charger has been able to bring the voltage to 13.5 or so volts dc. I'll build some battery cables and route/rough in the winch leads to the front and back.

I will start the wiring diagram here once I finally figure out the majority of the electrical components I have. Since there will be AC and DC circuitry involved coming from the Inverter, generator, or utility power if its there I will wire in some interlocks with the relaying. Basically so you don't backfeed into your inverter with the generator. The 12v side of things will be fun. I bought a new LED interior light for the cab and have plans to turn the CFL in the rear into a long LED light. The little light pods in the rear will also be replaced with led bulbs. I will have to do a little lathe work to build some adapters, but it will keep that lighting in place. They are handy. I also ordered some LED work lights to go on the rear bumper or on top. I will probably get some more for the sides. My brothers truck has lights all around and they are terrific at night.

There is going to be 20 or so circuits that I have planned so far, nothing complicated but fun! I am a nerd with this stuff anyways! I plan on building a console for the new stereo and use that to place some of switches. I'll be able to hide relays there as well. Fortune tally I have good amount of the sealed aircraft toggle switches that I scrapped out of some equipment. They are about 30-40 bucks a piece from grainger, so free fifty was a good price. I found some good distributors for selling OEM style fuse panels, so this will not be a hack job by any means.

Good times as always!

 

[stevo-mt]

After sketching out the AC wiring for the vehicle on paper I put it into a digital version. Essentailly there will be a few recepticals throughout the truck for random stuff and a few relays to prevent back feed to the generator or inverter. I decided to wire in a relay for each of the engine block heaters. The heaters are 750w each and when your plugging into a 120v ac 20 amp outlet or generator you can quickly overload things. By having each heater controlled seperatally it can be varied for the temperature. The engine has two ways to heat it in the winter, the diesel Espar and electric block heaters for redundancy. With the Honda EU2000 it will operate the engine block heaters and help recharge the trucks batteries if needed. So as long as I have gas for the generator, there is a backup to get the diesel fired up in cold weather. The reason for all the redundancy for this stems from a weekend of camping out in the mountains. I had snow wheeled up into the mountains about 10 miles. From there we parked the truck and hiked in to build a snow cave. When I returned to my truck the battery was completely dead, not even 3 volts (don't ever buy and excide arbital!). I happened to been lucky enough to park down hill and have a cordless spotlight with me. I the 12v battery from the spotlight was enough to run the fuel pump while we cruised down the hill and popped the clutch! The old ford inline 6 came to life and we drove out! I even pulled a big diesel out of the ditch on the way out! Batteries go out it is just kind of a fact of life.

There are still a few minor kinks to work out but overall it should work quite well. Now to start on the 12v system! I think this is going to take several sheet! The console with the toggle switches is going to be crazy!

 

[stevo-mt]

It's been a while since I've been able to do any work or post anything on here, but it looks like I'll have a couple weeks to work on the old girl until I move to Alaska for the summer. Following that I will get to come back home to MT and complete the project, hopefully in time for elk hunting!

Since there was several inches of snow on the ground still I started working on one of my winches. My dad had found a pair of 24v Husky 10 winches. I found some good mostly American made 12V motors and replaced swapped that out. While there I changed the worm gear case oil over to Redline sythetic and also replaced the BP grease that comes with them with some Redline Red Moly grease. I found 12V Allbright solenoids from summit racing for a pretty reasonable price. They are listed as a superwinch part. Husky winches are Superwinches made in England. Beefy, slow, and heavy. Just what this truck needs! Also if anyone needs a 24V motor for their Husky let me know! The wireless remote setup is awesome! I am pretty happy with the setup.



I removed the old winch mount that was on the truck. The CUCV's have 1 1/2" x 2" square tubing that allow for the truck to have a place to pull on the front with shackles. The police dept. in Texas had welded the winch mount to these pieces of steel and so the whole assembly is being replaced. They did a fair enough job, but the Husky 10 is a beast and needs a little more clearance than what was in there. Unfortunately I have to figure out some mounting for the KC lights that are on there. I just bolted on some aluminum pieces to get by. With the new winch mount I'll incorporate an aluminum cover for the thing. Now that I've spent some money on these things I want to keep them out of the sunlight and relatively clean when they are not in use.



I will mimic this design somewhat for the new mounts but as usual I will probably over engineer it and make it ridiculously over stout. The grill guard needs a little re-enforcing after removing the winch mount they had welded a few straps to it and did some cutting at some key points on the mounts that hook it to the bumper.

Another fun project are my beadlocks. I am using the H1 wheels and some 37" MT/Rs. I ordered some PVC inserts for the wheels and installed the ones in the rear. I'll get the front's done here pretty quick. I forgot how much fun man handling big tires can be! If you are smart with your leverage and bars the inserts slip right into place. It took me a half hour to get the first one. Then the second one went in about 3 minutes.



As you can see in the picture there wasn't much clearance on the rear wheels. The front wheels were sketchy at best. I even did some cutting on the front, but I don't think that my original idea of redoing a bunch of the inner fender is going to pan out quite like I thought. So I ended up doing what I dread and ordered a 4" lift kit from Off road designs. I wasn't too keen on the idea at first, but I had to install air bags just to get to the point of being able to move the truck without the rear tires rubbing on the rear fenders. I will probably have to do a little cutting on these, but I will wait until I get the lift on it to see how it worked out. I also have some bushwacker fender flares coming for the front fenders to clean that up. The airbags I had were a pretty simple install. You just manually inflate to the pressure you want and your off to the races. I mainly have these in place now to just get the truck to the height that I need in case I have to move the truck or something. Turned out fairly well and after seeing the truck raise up a few inches so the idea of a 4" lift now seems like the only way to go! It makes the trucks stance look much more aggressive. Also it will give me a chance to replace all the old rotten rubber bushings in the springs. Along with the lift I ordered a set of 4 Blisten shocks. It should give that truck a much nicer ride with the 37s. So in cue is the winch mounting on the front, winch in the rear, lift kit, rear spare tire rack (still am not sure how I want to do this yet) and install some of the axle parts (rear steel spacers, front DRW hubs, 35 spline kit new hubs ARB locker etc.).

 

[Outback]

Looks great!

 

[stevo-mt]

The rear shackle flip showed up for the truck so I started on that project. The Offroad Designs 2.5" rear shackle flip with 6" hangers. It gives the truck around a good 4" of lift. While I had the rear wheels off I installed the steel wheel spacers I bought to replace the aluminum ones. They are hands down better quality and I wish I would have not been cheap in the beginning and just bought them to start out with.

Before


After

Once I figured out a quick way to get the old bushings out of the springs the rear lift install went pretty well. I'm still waiting for the front springs and the shocks to show up. I had to extend the rear exhaust to accommode the springs.

The front winch mount is finished, I just need to fab a aluminum cover and paint it.
I used the same spot that the truck originally had it tow anchor points. It should be plenty beefy I would prefer to have the winch in a little lower and in further, perhaps behind the bumper. If I would have had a different style of winch like a more compact Warn that would have been the answer. But oh well. The Husky's are a good winch and I couldn't beat the price.

I did some serious fender modifications to the truck. I ordered a set of bushwacker fender flares for the front. Instead of taking an inch off the front and rear of the fender well I cut out more from the rear. I had to make some adjustments to the inner structural members to get it to be as ridged as it was originally was. It was looking like I will have the clearance that the 37's need. Once it is lifted in the front then it should be good to go. I only got the passenger side finished but it was good progress. I'll get the driver's side taken care of and hopefully my springs and shocks show up next week. As always plenty of things to do!

 

[uscg2008]

Damn that thing is sweet

 

[stevo-mt]

I took the plunge trimmed the back fenders. I reinforced everything with some 2" x .125" aluminum angle and riveted everything together. It was a little tough cutting into the aluminum since it is a totally permanent modification. But oh well I guess. It helped out with the tire clearance quite a bit and didn't look half bad. With the rear lift installed I drove the truck over a berm to get the suspension to bottom out. I needed a couple extra inches and that was about the max I could cut out. The aluminum angle stiffened it up quite a bit. I was a little worried with the rigidity but after all the rivets and tying the other pieces together it is pretty stout.

I started on the ARB locker for the front axle. Since I had to put it up on blocks and everything else to swap out front springs I figured I might as well take care of everything up front. I pulled the kingpins and axle shafts. I pulled the carrier and am just waiting for the bearings to show up tomorrow to put it all back together. I am doing the 35 spline upgrade for the Dana 60 and while I'm there install new brakes since I have to do all the work swapping to the DRW hubs anyways. I swapped the front springs after I had all of the axle apart. Shocks and rest of the goodies from ORD will show up tomorrow as well. I'm hoping to have it driveablely lifted this weekend. The new steering stabilizer should show up too. All kinds of parts! It's tough to keep track of all of them.



The new springs have quite a bit more arch than the old ones! I'll install the sway bar disconnect kit tomorrow as well. I'm eager to get the axle work and suspension wrapped up so I can take it for a drive!

 

[uscg2008]

Any update?

 

[stevo-mt]

The ARB locker, 35 spline outers, warn hubs, new brake drums and pads, and the DRW hubs are all installed. I'll have my new wheel studs tomorrow morning since I had to remove the old ones in the hubs to clean up them up. All my shocks and sway bar parts will arrive tomorrow since they shipped Friday. I had to put a windshield into my brother's toyota pickup so it delayed a bit of work on the truck.

I've been working out some of the ideas for the camper in the back, which is too big of a project to take on now. When I get back from AK in the fall I will try to get that going.

There are two elevated areas with an open center in the back camper area. I am going to cut out the center area of the drivers side to make room for two people to sit down at a table, probably use a Lagun table or design something myself. I wasn't originally going to change any of that stuff, but it the frustration of how the inefficiency space and design are with the original truck box I would be hindering its possibilities by not modifying it. For example, the original diesel air heater is gigantic and takes up the space of what I could fit the espar hydronic and air heaters into the same position. Granted it can crank out some serious heat, but man when your trying to fit in a million of these different things such as onboard air and extra tanks every cubic inch of volume is precious. If the original air heater works will then I will leave it alone, but part of me wouldn't be opposed to the idea of upgrading to something with a better thermostat. That's down the road. I've come up with a pretty slick way where I can use the two aluminum gernies as bunks that will lower down from the ceiling when you want to use them. I'll have to draw it out and make sure everything will work, but you could still put some boards accross and make it a king size bed if you wanted to. I did that when I drove it back from Texas, which was super comfortable and spacey! I've been doing some other research into ocean hatches to give it a good view of the stars at night. Still haven't found quite the right one but I'm leaning towards a Lewmar 30" x 30" to give it a nice break opening in the top that can resist some serious weather. I'm still trying to figure out how that will do in snow, but I'm sure it wont be too bad.

But the fun never ends and I've got some more enjoyable wrenching tomorrow!