Hello all,
I have been waiting till I started the build of my truck to post anything, wanted to have something for you all to read.
Little background on myself and what the truck will turn out to be in the next year or so.
I'm a CNC Machinist for a medical device company, and yes they let me use the machines after hours. Its nice that I'm in this profession as I have access to Solid works(a program to draw and design in 3D) and a CNC mill and CNC lathe at my finger tips. I'm super hands on so I personally do all the design work and work on my truck, big or small.
As for the truck, I looking at having a capable rig that can go most places. End goal is to have a rig that can get me off the beaten path and do it efficiently. Thats the sole reason why a 12 valve Cummins was the best idea for a rig in my mind. The Cummins can still get good mileage while having tons of room for gear and sleeping space. Since my truck is a long bed Sam(my girlfriend) and I sleep in the back. This makes it super stealthy so we can sleep in a random parking lot without and problems. That way on long road trips we dont have to find a campground every night. An added plus to this is we can pull up anywhere and camp is already made. No tents to setup, just open the back and sleep.
Name of the truck, "Diry Deb", came from this build "trying" to be done dirt cheap. That being said this will be no basic truck when I'm done.
Enough of that, onto the build!
I got the truck from a friend that flips dodges for a living. Specs: 95 dodge 12 valve, auto trans, 4x4, 4.10 gears, extended cab, long bed. I got a killer price as it needed some little work and a guarantee that if a part on the engine breaks to call him and he would send one no charge. AWESOME!!!This is the first photo I got of her.
I flew up to medford OR, where he lives and we started to look a little close at her. Main thing I wanted to fix asap was the killer dowel pin. Never having own a diesel I did lots of research to find out the problems of the 12 valve and this was the main one. Unfortunately we opened her up to this....
So for the time being we put some jb weld on it(I know, I know... Its ganky as ********). Plus I had to drive home and get back to work and college classes. This want the only thing I was slightly worried about, but that will be for a latter photo(trust me, you'll know when you see it).
One the way home I had my girlfriend look on criagslist for me to see if there was any campershells for sell in the path of home. There was one so I stopped and got it. It wasnt meant for my truck and it looked beat, but for $80 I couldnt pass on it.
Once I got it home it was time to do maintenance stuff. The driver front break was squeaking a little and I was told I need to do a break job soon. I took the wheel off to find this...
Yep, that scared the crap out of me. So While I was replacing the pads and rotors I decided it would be best to do wheel bearings, axle u-joints and axle seals. It was a good weekend worth of work but did it all.
Once I got the truck registered it was on to the exhaust. Thankfully I got a truck that is pre-diesel smog here in California. So out came the saws-all.
Now remember when I said "that will be for a latter photo(trust me, you'll know when you see it)", well here is where it gets interesting. When my friend bought the truck originally it needed a water pump and a the turbo was done. He showed me the bad turbo. The compressor wheel hit the housing and was chewed up. I then flipped it over to see the exhaust turbine.... and it was missing... I asked "here is it?" My friend said "probably in front of the cat." Well guess what... he wasnt lying.
That came out along with a good bit of oil. I called my buddy to tell him and he starts laughing hysterically. "I've never seen that before! Oh and I have already drained 4 quarts of oil from that exhaust." I instantly fell in love with this truck as on the drive home with oil and an exhaust turbine in front of the cat, tires too small for the 4.10 gears, I got 18mpg. I was happy about that as all my friends that have toyota's say they get under 15mpg in adventure mode. That sucks! So now its straight piped and also put the huge air filter that all the cummins guys do. I have been getting 17mpg going to and from work which I'm happy about.
Now that the truck was safe and running good it was on to making the camper sheel look nice. sanded and ready for paint.
After paint and back on the truck. So much better!
After the outside the inside needed some attention. The carpet was looking funky so we took it out and painted over the fiberglass. 2 coats later it was nice looking. Then to top it off we put a Mexican blanket on the roof of the camper to give it some character.
To just start and get us out and camping we put a full queen size air mattress in the back with sheets and all. This is just for the time being while I design can build the drawer system for the back. More on that later.
More to come over the next few days as I post more. I'm going to try to make this a regular thing. Thanks all for reading!
I have been waiting till I started the build of my truck to post anything, wanted to have something for you all to read.
Little background on myself and what the truck will turn out to be in the next year or so.
I'm a CNC Machinist for a medical device company, and yes they let me use the machines after hours. Its nice that I'm in this profession as I have access to Solid works(a program to draw and design in 3D) and a CNC mill and CNC lathe at my finger tips. I'm super hands on so I personally do all the design work and work on my truck, big or small.
As for the truck, I looking at having a capable rig that can go most places. End goal is to have a rig that can get me off the beaten path and do it efficiently. Thats the sole reason why a 12 valve Cummins was the best idea for a rig in my mind. The Cummins can still get good mileage while having tons of room for gear and sleeping space. Since my truck is a long bed Sam(my girlfriend) and I sleep in the back. This makes it super stealthy so we can sleep in a random parking lot without and problems. That way on long road trips we dont have to find a campground every night. An added plus to this is we can pull up anywhere and camp is already made. No tents to setup, just open the back and sleep.
Name of the truck, "Diry Deb", came from this build "trying" to be done dirt cheap. That being said this will be no basic truck when I'm done.
Enough of that, onto the build!
I got the truck from a friend that flips dodges for a living. Specs: 95 dodge 12 valve, auto trans, 4x4, 4.10 gears, extended cab, long bed. I got a killer price as it needed some little work and a guarantee that if a part on the engine breaks to call him and he would send one no charge. AWESOME!!!This is the first photo I got of her.
I flew up to medford OR, where he lives and we started to look a little close at her. Main thing I wanted to fix asap was the killer dowel pin. Never having own a diesel I did lots of research to find out the problems of the 12 valve and this was the main one. Unfortunately we opened her up to this....
So for the time being we put some jb weld on it(I know, I know... Its ganky as ********). Plus I had to drive home and get back to work and college classes. This want the only thing I was slightly worried about, but that will be for a latter photo(trust me, you'll know when you see it).
One the way home I had my girlfriend look on criagslist for me to see if there was any campershells for sell in the path of home. There was one so I stopped and got it. It wasnt meant for my truck and it looked beat, but for $80 I couldnt pass on it.
Once I got it home it was time to do maintenance stuff. The driver front break was squeaking a little and I was told I need to do a break job soon. I took the wheel off to find this...
Yep, that scared the crap out of me. So While I was replacing the pads and rotors I decided it would be best to do wheel bearings, axle u-joints and axle seals. It was a good weekend worth of work but did it all.
Once I got the truck registered it was on to the exhaust. Thankfully I got a truck that is pre-diesel smog here in California. So out came the saws-all.
Now remember when I said "that will be for a latter photo(trust me, you'll know when you see it)", well here is where it gets interesting. When my friend bought the truck originally it needed a water pump and a the turbo was done. He showed me the bad turbo. The compressor wheel hit the housing and was chewed up. I then flipped it over to see the exhaust turbine.... and it was missing... I asked "here is it?" My friend said "probably in front of the cat." Well guess what... he wasnt lying.
That came out along with a good bit of oil. I called my buddy to tell him and he starts laughing hysterically. "I've never seen that before! Oh and I have already drained 4 quarts of oil from that exhaust." I instantly fell in love with this truck as on the drive home with oil and an exhaust turbine in front of the cat, tires too small for the 4.10 gears, I got 18mpg. I was happy about that as all my friends that have toyota's say they get under 15mpg in adventure mode. That sucks! So now its straight piped and also put the huge air filter that all the cummins guys do. I have been getting 17mpg going to and from work which I'm happy about.
Now that the truck was safe and running good it was on to making the camper sheel look nice. sanded and ready for paint.
After paint and back on the truck. So much better!
After the outside the inside needed some attention. The carpet was looking funky so we took it out and painted over the fiberglass. 2 coats later it was nice looking. Then to top it off we put a Mexican blanket on the roof of the camper to give it some character.
To just start and get us out and camping we put a full queen size air mattress in the back with sheets and all. This is just for the time being while I design can build the drawer system for the back. More on that later.
More to come over the next few days as I post more. I'm going to try to make this a regular thing. Thanks all for reading!
Last edited:
