Dave Bennett
Adventurist
Seriously...
4RunAmok Build Thread
- Thread starter 4RunAmok
- Start date
Seriously...
4RunAmok
Explorer
Cellular Booster Update!
After having the cellular booster for awhile now, it's time I give an update...
I am very satisfied with this booster. Some out there aren't. And I have a pretty good idea why they aren't. You just have to understand a few things about the Wilson Electronics Booster.
First, understand how it's designed to work. The interior antenna and the exterior antenna need to have some distance from one another, otherwise they each reduce the effectiveness of the other. I've heard of installs where the interior antenna is placed above the headliner near the driver (theoretically where the driver might hold the phone while talking) but this is close to the installation of the exterior antenna on the roof. Wilson Electronics is also pretty clear that a sheet metal roof is part of the system, helping shield the two antennas from each other.
Second, know the limitations of the interior antenna. It is NO JOKE that the interior antenna has limited range, as I mentioned before, Wilson says up to 24 inches, but it is clearly less than this. My phone sits mounted to the dash in a RAM cradle with the interior antenna no more than 5 inches away. My wife, sitting in the passenger seat, can wind up with a phone that says "NO SERVICE" while mine sits there with 3 to 5 bars, and 3G connection! I can however turn on my wifi hotspot and she can connect through my phone to the internet!
Lastly, understand that this device can not create signal out of nothing. I can assure you that you will have signal long after others have lost theirs. It is a signal amplifier. But if you're too far from a tower, nothing is going to help you. Except ham radio ...and maybe smoke signals.
Overall: I'm happy with this device, knowing it's limitations, and working within them, it's kept me connected where others have "Searching..."
After having the cellular booster for awhile now, it's time I give an update...
I am very satisfied with this booster. Some out there aren't. And I have a pretty good idea why they aren't. You just have to understand a few things about the Wilson Electronics Booster.
First, understand how it's designed to work. The interior antenna and the exterior antenna need to have some distance from one another, otherwise they each reduce the effectiveness of the other. I've heard of installs where the interior antenna is placed above the headliner near the driver (theoretically where the driver might hold the phone while talking) but this is close to the installation of the exterior antenna on the roof. Wilson Electronics is also pretty clear that a sheet metal roof is part of the system, helping shield the two antennas from each other.
Second, know the limitations of the interior antenna. It is NO JOKE that the interior antenna has limited range, as I mentioned before, Wilson says up to 24 inches, but it is clearly less than this. My phone sits mounted to the dash in a RAM cradle with the interior antenna no more than 5 inches away. My wife, sitting in the passenger seat, can wind up with a phone that says "NO SERVICE" while mine sits there with 3 to 5 bars, and 3G connection! I can however turn on my wifi hotspot and she can connect through my phone to the internet!
Lastly, understand that this device can not create signal out of nothing. I can assure you that you will have signal long after others have lost theirs. It is a signal amplifier. But if you're too far from a tower, nothing is going to help you. Except ham radio
...and maybe smoke signals.Overall: I'm happy with this device, knowing it's limitations, and working within them, it's kept me connected where others have "Searching..."
4RunAmok
Explorer
Storage!
You can never have enough storage. Camping for four days in Death Valley really had me thinking about what I wanted from a storage system.
I know that buying one wouldn't suit my needs, and I would also miss out on making it myself.
So... Remember this thing???
(Click to enlarge)
Well forget about it... It's gone, it went into the trash today!
It did what I needed it to do for the time I had it, until I decided that we no longer had the need nor the space for our stereo system. The amps and rack are gone, and the huge heavy speaker box is gone. That will be replaced with a compact subwoofer box (14"x9"x3") sometime in the future.
I went to work on a more practical system, designed to eliminate the action packers entirely, or at least move them to "optional" status instead of required as they were up until now. What I dislike about the action packers is the wasted space. Instead of having 90° vertical walls, they have angled walls, causing a lot of wasted space between the containers. I will be able to fit everything from all three action packers into ONE 17.5"Wx35"Dx9"H drawer, leaving the other drawer for food and other items we currently use a large tote for.
Here's the progress I made today... Click to enlarge any pic.
Base and walls, with plenty of material removed for weight reduction...
Leaving enough material to attach the drawer slides to and support the deck.
Size 38" deep, 39" wide, 10 1/4" tall
Deck attached
Size 38" deep, 39" wide, 11" tall
Wings installed, shoring up the deck to the width of the interior.
Size 38" deep, 52 1/2" wide, 11" tall
The wings are easily removable with 1/4-20 hardware (threaded inserts on the wing side)
The space between the wheel wells is 39" wide, keeping the main body from moving side to side, and with the wings installed, movement from front to rear is near impossible, but I'll be using some turnbuckles to hold it all down when it's all finished.
Speaking of finish... what to do... I'm undecided. There's trunk liner carpeting.. There's Lon Coin (see example photo below)... There's Line-X... There's Raptor bed liner, but I'm waiting to see how Trump's finish comes together, since he's using the Raptor liner. If Raptor liner compares to Line-X, it will probably end up being the way I'll go, since going with Line-X is not the cheap way out!
(Lon Coin rubberized flooring example)
I got the drawers assembled, and the slides installed. I have two different types of the slides, locking and non-locking... I'm not pleased with the locking slides, they extend slightly longer than the non-locking, causing the drawer to lock sort of twisted... I'll be swapping them out for non-locking. I got a good deal on these slide sets, and I have more than I'm going to use (extras already claimed), so switching out to non-locking is not a problem.
The drawers extend nicely to the full length! No problem getting something out of the back of the drawer!
I also got the threaded eyelets installed for the turnbuckles, I just need to pick up a set up in the proper length.
You can never have enough storage. Camping for four days in Death Valley really had me thinking about what I wanted from a storage system.
I know that buying one wouldn't suit my needs, and I would also miss out on making it myself.
So... Remember this thing???
(Click to enlarge)
Well forget about it... It's gone, it went into the trash today!
It did what I needed it to do for the time I had it, until I decided that we no longer had the need nor the space for our stereo system. The amps and rack are gone, and the huge heavy speaker box is gone. That will be replaced with a compact subwoofer box (14"x9"x3") sometime in the future.
I went to work on a more practical system, designed to eliminate the action packers entirely, or at least move them to "optional" status instead of required as they were up until now. What I dislike about the action packers is the wasted space. Instead of having 90° vertical walls, they have angled walls, causing a lot of wasted space between the containers. I will be able to fit everything from all three action packers into ONE 17.5"Wx35"Dx9"H drawer, leaving the other drawer for food and other items we currently use a large tote for.
Here's the progress I made today... Click to enlarge any pic.
Base and walls, with plenty of material removed for weight reduction...
Leaving enough material to attach the drawer slides to and support the deck.
Size 38" deep, 39" wide, 10 1/4" tall
Deck attached
Size 38" deep, 39" wide, 11" tall
Wings installed, shoring up the deck to the width of the interior.
Size 38" deep, 52 1/2" wide, 11" tall
The wings are easily removable with 1/4-20 hardware (threaded inserts on the wing side)
The space between the wheel wells is 39" wide, keeping the main body from moving side to side, and with the wings installed, movement from front to rear is near impossible, but I'll be using some turnbuckles to hold it all down when it's all finished.
Speaking of finish... what to do... I'm undecided. There's trunk liner carpeting.. There's Lon Coin (see example photo below)... There's Line-X... There's Raptor bed liner, but I'm waiting to see how Trump's finish comes together, since he's using the Raptor liner. If Raptor liner compares to Line-X, it will probably end up being the way I'll go, since going with Line-X is not the cheap way out!
(Lon Coin rubberized flooring example)
I got the drawers assembled, and the slides installed. I have two different types of the slides, locking and non-locking... I'm not pleased with the locking slides, they extend slightly longer than the non-locking, causing the drawer to lock sort of twisted... I'll be swapping them out for non-locking. I got a good deal on these slide sets, and I have more than I'm going to use (extras already claimed
), so switching out to non-locking is not a problem.The drawers extend nicely to the full length! No problem getting something out of the back of the drawer!
I also got the threaded eyelets installed for the turnbuckles, I just need to pick up a set up in the proper length.
Last edited:
4RunAmok
Explorer
The drawers are finished; faced and sanded.
The grain kinda looks cool, but that will be covered with something, probably Line-X due to the Durability.
The drawers extend quite a bit, and will offer nice access to everything.
I still need to do sanding on the main box, and move on to the electronics compartment (dual battery placement, air compressor, Ham, cell booster, etc), this will be in the front of the box, in the space behind the drawers, shown here...
So far, I am VERY happy with how this is turning out... It was hard to actually visualize it all, even after drawing it in Sketchup, but as it came together piece by piece, it's exactly how I wanted it thus far.
Here is a sort of concept image of what I may end up doing. The "3rd level" shown will be supported using the mounts for the stock Toyota pull out cargo cover. Shown here is the drawer box, a pull out platform/storage area, and the 3rd level storage area.
We will see if I actually get that far.
The grain kinda looks cool, but that will be covered with something, probably Line-X due to the Durability.
The drawers extend quite a bit, and will offer nice access to everything.
I still need to do sanding on the main box, and move on to the electronics compartment (dual battery placement, air compressor, Ham, cell booster, etc), this will be in the front of the box, in the space behind the drawers, shown here...
So far, I am VERY happy with how this is turning out... It was hard to actually visualize it all, even after drawing it in Sketchup, but as it came together piece by piece, it's exactly how I wanted it thus far.
Here is a sort of concept image of what I may end up doing. The "3rd level" shown will be supported using the mounts for the stock Toyota pull out cargo cover. Shown here is the drawer box, a pull out platform/storage area, and the 3rd level storage area.
We will see if I actually get that far.
Dave Bennett
Adventurist
Awesome work :lurk:
4RunAmok
Explorer
The latches I was planning on using won't fit my drawer faces, so I'm looking at options. As of right now, there are two pads sticky taped to my rear door that hold the drawers shut while I drive around
I was looking at these
http://www.mcmaster.com/#standard-push-to-close-latches/=le5j8j (Fuggin McMaster doesn't allow direct link, so look for "Recessed-Handle Pull-to-Open Latches")
But I'd have to recess them quite a bit.
I'm also considering an internal vault using a combo lock, where the drawer will only open so far (say 80%) until you enter the combo and turn a knob. I put this combo lock on the SDSO SRT Sniper lockers, and it works great!
I was looking at these
http://www.mcmaster.com/#standard-push-to-close-latches/=le5j8j (Fuggin McMaster doesn't allow direct link, so look for "Recessed-Handle Pull-to-Open Latches")
But I'd have to recess them quite a bit.
I'm also considering an internal vault using a combo lock, where the drawer will only open so far (say 80%) until you enter the combo and turn a knob. I put this combo lock on the SDSO SRT Sniper lockers, and it works great!
4RunAmok
Explorer
Meanwhile, in other news...
The drawers are nearing completion.. I have the latches, and some other cool progress completed...And a keen eye might even catch a glimpse...
But this happened last weekend while on the trail...
This could be why...
So I ordered these...
The folks at Icon are awesome, they got these to me before this weekend's trip even though Jeremy had to get these made yesterday so that I could have them and install them today.
It didn't take too long to install, and thankfully, I was able to use a bay at work to do the job. Thanks Boss!
Installed and awaiting abuse!
The drawers are nearing completion.. I have the latches, and some other cool progress completed...And a keen eye might even catch a glimpse...
But this happened last weekend while on the trail...
This could be why...
So I ordered these...
The folks at Icon are awesome, they got these to me before this weekend's trip even though Jeremy had to get these made yesterday so that I could have them and install them today.
It didn't take too long to install, and thankfully, I was able to use a bay at work to do the job. Thanks Boss!
Installed and awaiting abuse!
Dave Bennett
Adventurist
Nice. Make sure you add the boots to protect that shaft...