Build - Frontier with ARE DCU topper

[bryce0lynch]

I put in a 13 gallon fresh water tank.

This is based on the design @Dan Grec used. Basically there's a water pump (with a prefilter before it) attached to a home water filter. In front and behind it are L Valves. This allows me to select my water source (the water tank if I want to drink water or a water bucket on the ground if I want to fill the tank) and then where the water goes (out the end nozzle to put in my bottle or in to the water tank if I'm filling the tank.) Basically, the water is filtered going in to the tank and again coming out of the tank. It's not a perfect design since water can still be in the lines, but, also, it's much better than no filter or a one direction filter. Dan used a bunch of normal vales, four or six I think. I used two L valves which were more expensive but simpler. The piping is 1/2 reinforced flexible line and the filter is a home water filter, so there's a wide variety of cartridges available for a decent price. The pump is a auto-detecting RV pump., but, I put it on a power switch.

The "faucet" hose sticks out about six inches. The "fill" hose can reach the ground with a foot or so to spare. I need to find a fitting to put on the end to hook up a normal hose to it so I hook it up to a normal faucet to fill, as well as said normal hose ... something small and easy to pack. With 13 gallons I shouldn't need it that often, but when I do ... and, speaking of, I'm going to need to find some kind of bucket when the hose won't work. You know the drill: small, collapsible, easy to pack in a truck that is rapidly coming to have zero space available ...

The tank came with one hole on the top. I replaced that with an inspection port so I could clean out the shavings I was about to fill it with. I had to buy a new hole saw for that. Then I drilled a hole near the bottom for the output and one near the top for the fill hose. One more near the top was connected to a tube going outside the truck (through the top of the bedside in one of those gaps that is always letting dust in ...) so air could come in and go out. Marine sealant on all of the gaskets.

It's not pretty. But, it works. And now that it does I can think about how to improve it, shorten lines, minimize fittings, and make it more compact. Also, 90 degree fittings are a lifesaver! I could have used a bajillion of those!



Fifteen more months till March 2025. Here's the project list to get done before then:

Heating elements for battery and water and water level (ordered)
Breather mod (ordered)
Roof Rack (waiting on paint match spray paint to come in)
Starlink
Modern headunit
Get some duplicate keys made
Get that gas tank skid purchased
Suspension upgrade
Inverter ... I want to go 12v only but also I'm not a fool
Roof Rack deflector and maybe solar?
Remote Start?

 

[bryce0lynch]

Diff breather is on with no issues.

Tank heater and batter heater are now installed also. Tank heater is under the water tank and battery heater is on top of the battery. I had to dremel off some of the battery holddown because its very clear about not being contact with anything conductive. "You mean like a lot of battery terminals?!"

Anyway, wired them each to their own switch so I can individually turn them on and off. They turn on at 45 degrees and off at 65. That's not the range I would have selected if I had complete control, hence the manual shut offs. I'm sure it will be fine, but ... also ... they draw 4.5 amps each. (I fused at 7.5 each) that 9 amps an hour on a 100 amp hour battery. I'll watch this and put in some insulation if its a problem and/or switch to something more complex. I'm sure, though, this will be fine.

 

[bryce0lynch]

Gas skid from Z1 is on.

Also, I put on a 500 watt Pure Sine Wave inverter. Which I'm sure is not pure sine wave, but, also, it's close enough for what I want to do. Which is to make a cup of coffee in the morning without getting out the stove, hooking it up, getting out the kettle, etc ... all to make hot water. I didn't want an inverter at all, running all on DC, but those little DC immersion heaters are only rated for about 150 watts ... what you can get off of a car cigarette plug. So, I put in a 500 watt inverter so I could run a 350 watt AC immersion heater to heat 2 cups of water to make coffee in the morning in my AeroPress.

It's hooked up with about 6 feet of AWG10 and fused at 30 amps. I note that 30 amps with AWG is ok ... but 40 isn't. And 500 watts, is going to be about 4.2 amps, which is about 46 amps DC ... which might need AWG8, according to some charts. Good thing my immersion heater is 350 watts and I'm only running it for three minutes a day. And it's fused at 30. Also, the fun runs and is loud. This is what you get when you spend $60 for an inverter to make coffee.

Now, time to go prep that duck for the feast today!

 

[bryce0lynch]

I added some trim boards to the side of the bed. The drivers side is purely decorative, hiding the drawer side. The right side folds down, with leather straps, to make a hatch for my clothing storage

I tried this once before, with a thin board and velcro. The board warped and the velcro was a pain to get in to frequently. This time is (expensive) PVC board, so no warping, and the leather straps and hatch cam lock make it easy to get in and out o

 

[bryce0lynch]

New headunit install

Alpine ILX-F509, with a
Alpine 2-channel Dashcam (dashcam & cabin cam)
Alpine rearview camera
Alpine HDR front camera
Alpine KAC_001 accessory control unti
Maestro RR
Sirius XM tuner

Took a bit, but everything is installed. I think its exactly what I wanted. Everything is integrated in to the headunit, the front camera, maestro gauges, dashcam and external control unit. That kind of integrated look & feel is what I wanted ... and I paid to get it ... This is all pretty straightforward, just plug things in to other things, splice and heat shrink wires, run wires through the firewall boot. Truly, there is nothing weird about this except there are A LOT of connections to make. But they are all straightforward. If you can hook up a components home audio unit then you can do this easily also.

Anyway, the front camera is fun. It has a panorama view, a corners view, and a top down view, all for "how close to the cliff edge am I" tire placement. It integrates in to the headunit seamlessly (Alpine has a proprietary connector for their own branded camera, and an adapter if you are using a standard composite camera)

The dashcam is totally controlled through the unit and I have the second channel pointing at the rivers window, as a copcam. It also has driver assist features ... we'll see about that ...

The rearview I mounted up high next to the third brakelight on my cap. This gets it off the license plate so I no longer almost step on it every time I climb in and out of the backend.

SiriusXM tuner is SiriusXM tuner ... which means their $%^& website is broken and I can't yet register the unit ... for two days now.

The maestro is GREAT! I get my tire psi, digital speedo, and percentages of fuel used, among other things. I missed those.

I'm not using the external accessory unit yet, but its hooked up. I'm hoping to wire up relays to trigger the air compressor and the winch in/out. I know it says "lightbar", but I was just messing around with it.

My only hang up right now is, that in Android Auto, it won't seem to allow me to see a playlist/sort with my "new" music, so all that Snow Wife and Melanie Martinez is hard to mainline.

 

[bryce0lynch]

My work is now complete.

I added a Starlink Mini to the new roof rack. This is in a Striker Fabrication mount.
The thing only draws about 45 watts, but it has a 50 foot power cable with a 30v DC supply wall wart. This is because the cable is fifty feet long/voltage drop. The dish specs say it will work at 12v. (And it has the wifi router built in, so it's only a power cable going to the dish!) I chopped the cable to about eight feet and am running it off my 12v Lithium battery. Seems to work fine. I hooked it up to a Shelly 1plus relay. This is a relay that works via Bluetooth, so I can turn on power to the dish via Bluetooth from the cab/cap/outside. I routed the cable inside the cap with a small hole drilled in the upper left of the bed with a cable grommet in it. No ox on all of the connectors, cable protectors, etc, etc, etc. This was the last major thing I needed to add to the truck.

I also hacked up a buck boost converter to connect my laptop (20v 10a) to my Lithium battery. This converts the 12v from the battery to 20v for the laptop. The converter is all over amazon for about $25. I got a project box and cut it open to mount it in. With the ubiquity on amazon you'd think there would be Etsy boxes, but I couldn't find one. I have a pigtail from my fuse panel ending in an XT-60 connector, and then another XT60 pigtail running in to "power brick/converter", and a chopped up cable with a barrel connector for the laptop. I did NOT enjoy soldering the XT60's. And I bought a second power supply and copped the cable off so I wouldn't have to deal with the barrel connector. The one on the starlink I chopped off, with the ground cable being a mesh on the outside of the positive, convinced me I wanted to do it this way.

Lots of people use a PD/USB adapter cable for the Starlink, or plug it in to their inverter, but I'm trying to keep things DC only, and it helps avoid the conversion loss.

I also switched the water filter from an undersink unit to a 1 micron RV hose unit. I'm still not happy. Also, I'd like a .3 micron. This has not been easy to find in a way I can get it in the truck.

So, I'm done with everything I needed to do.

Other things I MIGHT dink around with:
*) A better mount for the air compressor under the hood.
*) Wiring up the triggers from the Alpine headunit to the compressor and winch in/out.

5 more months.


I guess I'm also deciding about a small pop up bug tent and/or tarp thing to set up over the back of the track for shade/light rain. We'll see. The Starlink needs LOS, so parking under a tree prob won't cut it.

 

[bryce0lynch]

Things I'm NOT doing?

*) A lift. I might, when the current shocks need replacement, upgrade and put on the parabolic springs, which should provide a modest 1" lift or so? But I'm not going out of my way to do this.
*) A snorkel. I think fording depth is like 14" or 17"? I wish it were better, but I'm not willing to stick that thing on the side. I think ...
*) Solar. I don't think I really need this? A rolling stone collects no moss, but it does charge the Lithium

 

[plainjaneFJC]

My work is now complete.

I added a Starlink Mini to the new roof rack. This is in a Striker Fabrication mount.
The thing only draws about 45 watts, but it has a 50 foot power cable with a 30v DC supply wall wart. This is because the cable is fifty feet long/voltage drop. The dish specs say it will work at 12v. (And it has the wifi router built in, so it's only a power cable going to the dish!) I chopped the cable to about eight feet and am running it off my 12v Lithium battery. Seems to work fine. I hooked it up to a Shelly 1plus relay. This is a relay that works via Bluetooth, so I can turn on power to the dish via Bluetooth from the cab/cap/outside. I routed the cable inside the cap with a small hole drilled in the upper left of the bed with a cable grommet in it. No ox on all of the connectors, cable protectors, etc, etc, etc. This was the last major thing I needed to add to the truck.

I also hacked up a buck boost converter to connect my laptop (20v 10a) to my Lithium battery. This converts the 12v from the battery to 20v for the laptop. The converter is all over amazon for about $25. I got a project box and cut it open to mount it in. With the ubiquity on amazon you'd think there would be Etsy boxes, but I couldn't find one. I have a pigtail from my fuse panel ending in an XT-60 connector, and then another XT60 pigtail running in to "power brick/converter", and a chopped up cable with a barrel connector for the laptop. I did NOT enjoy soldering the XT60's. And I bought a second power supply and copped the cable off so I wouldn't have to deal with the barrel connector. The one on the starlink I chopped off, with the ground cable being a mesh on the outside of the positive, convinced me I wanted to do it this way.

Lots of people use a PD/USB adapter cable for the Starlink, or plug it in to their inverter, but I'm trying to keep things DC only, and it helps avoid the conversion loss.

I also switched the water filter from an undersink unit to a 1 micron RV hose unit. I'm still not happy. Also, I'd like a .3 micron. This has not been easy to find in a way I can get it in the truck.

So, I'm done with everything I needed to do.

Other things I MIGHT dink around with:
*) A better mount for the air compressor under the hood.
*) Wiring up the triggers from the Alpine headunit to the compressor and winch in/out.

5 more months.


I guess I'm also deciding about a small pop up bug tent and/or tarp thing to set up over the back of the track for shade/light rain. We'll see. The Starlink needs LOS, so parking under a tree prob won't cut it.

A small awning is going to be so handy definitely figure that out