Skinny's Frontier Build - Blanche

[Bigfnhammer]

Sweet looking rig!
Funny enough I also blew a big chunk of wood through my CV boot after titan swapping.

 

[plainjaneFJC]

How many miles on this truck now? Reliability, mpg, etc. love the truck btw.

 

[Skinny06]

How many miles on this truck now? Reliability, mpg, etc. love the truck btw.

Almost 50k truck, between 16 and 18k on the titan swap. Zero issues. Depends on loadout for MPG but between 13 and 14.5 in town loaded vs. empty, and highway I've seen big variances depending on where I'm going. If there are mountain passes involved or into headwind or tailwind etc. etc. I've seen 14-20mpg on hwy.

Thanks

 

[Skinny06]

Little catastrophe prevention work done. Both of these T connections come from the factory as plastic parts. While not typically an issue, with the extra shock and vibration the truck gets off pavement, these have become a known weak point in the system especially as the vehicle gets more miles and age on it. If one fails, all your coolant goes bye bye. I've replaced them with metal parts from dorman and now have one less thing to ever really worry about in the back country.

 

[Skinny06]

Doing a partial rear seat delete and making a platform to give the dogs a bit extra room, as well as create some extra room for our gear.

Pulled the entire rear seat, rear pillar trim, and rear wall trim to lay some 80mil sound deadening to offset not having a seat absorbing any sound. Holy moly was it a pain in the ass. Floor and rear wall were 100% covered, pillars were covered where possible. The metallic backing on the sound deadening material will absolutely slice the ******** out of your hands. No photos of the sound deadening installed, sorry.

 

[Skinny06]

The longer of the seats is getting removed, leaving the single seat behind the driver. Put together a simple metal platform, that will get a carpeted wood top. Luckily a buddy recently did the exact same thing and we slapped it together pretty quick. Still need to get a piece of ply, carpet, and install.

Who needs a notebook?

Primed and painted!

 

[Skinny06]

Got around to getting the wood cut, drilled, carpeted, mounted, and the platform installed. Rough estimate is a gain of about 13.5-15 cubic feet gained in storage. Bonus is our little travel dog bed fits perfectly in the space and will ensure the pups are comfortable and as safe as they can be.

Dog bed size vs. platform size

Bottom of platform with everything mounted

Before platform - jump seat down

Before platform - jump seat folded up

 

[Skinny06]

Platform carpeted and ready for install

Platform installed - jump seat down

Platform installed - jump seat up

From drivers side

Dog bed placed

Currently the plan is to bungee bed rolls/sleeping pads, and roll up dog beds to the back wall.

 

[WannabeOverlander]

Great build! Link for that front bumper?

 

[Skinny06]

Great build! Link for that front bumper?

Front and rear bumpers are custom, as well as the roof rack. Eolivas on the club frontier forum builds them with his old man. (one a structural engineer, the other a retired welder)

Email him @ erosti2015@icloud.com

 

[llamalander]

+1 for EOlivas, great guy, good designs and products, really easy to work with.
I'm looking forward to buying him a drink when I'm in his neighborhood next,
I love his gear on my truck--

 

[Skinny06]

Got the RTT mounted up, though I'll revise the mounting utilizing the brackets I got from Heavy Metal Offroad vs. the standard ones that come with the tent. Really happy with its footprint and how it sits. It is just inside the roof and cab line, which should help protect it from brush and trail spray/debris. I may vinyl wrap the side and edges just as an added precaution. I need to install the tunnel awning mount, and fab up brackets for the awning itself, but that'll have to wait a little while. I also picked up the thermal insulation kit for it, and the upgraded comfort mat. The hope is to be able to get out a little earlier in the season, and stay out a little later in the season. Though in the future I may pick up a small diesel/gasoline heater so we can get out year round. I have been against the RTT thing for a long while, but after missing out on a few good camp spots and having to set up our Oztent in the dark and rain a few times this past year, I have since relented and will give this a go.

 

[Skinny06]

With the RTT obscuring the 3rd brake light I figured it might be wise to add some auxiliary brake lights. Luckily I have a friend who is knowledgeable in the world of lightning tubes (@TwinDuro) and tis is what we came up with.

These are great lights, metal housings, sealed, low profile and MEGA bright. Really happy with how they turned out. We'll also be installing a momentary switch to change the flash pattern to emergency lights just in case they are ever needed.

 

[Skinny06]

With the help of @TwinDuro the tunnel entry and awning are now mounted and in place. Fabbed up some brackets to mount the awning and it worked a treat. Still need to modify the ladder with some delrin blocks so it'll readily work with the awning down, but overall happy with how it all turned out. This setup is a game changer moving over from our OZtent.

 

[Skinny06]

I'm not super experienced with the lightning tubes and digicols, but a friend of mine and I finally got around to getting my lights all sorted out and installed. There is still one more sub harness to create for some led strip lighting over the bed, and in the awning but that'll happen in a few weeks.

40 amp 48 volt circuit breaker mounted underhood

8 gauge pure copper wire run along firewall to drivers side, through firewall, up the pillar and along the front of the roofline to a blue sea system 4 circuit fuse block under the overhead panel.

Switch is an upgraded concord aerospace (apollo) custom switch