The Memorial F150 Craptor.

[dbhost]

Got the shipping notification and charging specs from Chins on my battery today. IF Atempower is being honest with their ratings, and Chins is honest on their ratings, then the LION settign on the Atempower charge controller is exactly what I need. So good deal there.

Need to head to Home Depot or similar to get a can of expanding foam for the flares. Those open ends REALLY bother me. Even if that doesn't work I will end up using something like Gorilla tape, something to seal off that open end!

 

[dbhost]

Going to go grab brunch, and then start lugging the table for assembly, and then the bumper boxes out to the driveway. My friend is coming over at 1:00 and we are going to knock this thing out. Running out of time before the engine is ready to install, and I am also running out of time before I start my new job. This needs to finish coming together NOW... I am not sure I have the time to deal with everything I need to, most specifically the electrical cabinet, but I will get as much done as I can. I might have to install the electrical in a temporary tote or something...

 

[dbhost]

So I need to fill the ends of the flares, wire up the lights in the bumper, and install the winch. The poly D ring isolators did NOT come with the bumper, but the silver D rings did. Kind of wish they have been black powder coated but oh well... I also need to figure out how / where to mount the front license plate. I think I am going to mount it to the front bumper under the fairlead but that will require poking 4 holes in the bumper... And contrary to what it seems everyone else wants to do with these trucks, I am going DOWN a tire size to 33x12.50/17s from 35x12.50/17. I could trim the back of the fender some more but I just don't want to. And I am not going to go with more lift than 2.5", I am in my 50s already and I like short women. Need I say more?

 

[dbhost]

And I spent some more quality time on my back under the truck. Wired up the lights, mounted and wired the winch. As I somewhat suspected, the control box does NOT clear the bumper if you leave it mounted on the factory mount points. Move it back 2 screw holes and it is fine, but to access the port for the remote, you will need to pop the hood. May have to rethink where, or how to mount it... The winch was slide as far forward on the mount bolt holes as it could go before I tightened them so that it can not slip anywhere in use...

It is fully wired up to the battery, but the battery terminals are not connected. Going to leave that for the heavy line mechanic to do since he is going to have to disconnect it anyway.

FWIW, the bumper is lined up right, I was standing off to the side, funny optical effect... But I guarantee this will cause Prius drivers to urinate themselves should I be following too closely.

This leaves ONE last minor issue to deal with on the bumper. I am in TX which is a 2 plate state.

I need to check, but I am wondering if it would be legal for me to display the plate on the downside of the front bumper under the fairlead or does it have to be more legible than that position allows? I don't exactly have a lot of unused flat space up front...

 

[dbhost]

One thing I didn't mention. I bought the D ring isolators a LONG time ago, to match my traction boards not knowing my new winch would have a red fairlead and hook... Not happy these D rings are silver either. So I ordered red D rings with black isolators. Cheaper than buying just the D rings so why not?

 

[Mekcanix]

one thing I have done in the past is build a relocation cable port for the winch control. I have used the end that came with the winch controller and cut it off with the appropriate length of cable I needed I then plug it into the winch port then I wire the other end to a 4 pin round trailer plug female, then replace the cut off end on the controller with the matching 4 pin round plug. I have found that most of the remotes are about 3 ft too long so it doesnt hurt to badly. Also the 4 pin trailer plugs have a snap close cover usually and are made of metal, easier to service.

Just a idea

John

 

[dbhost]

Well poop.

I was not aware they made flip up license plate brackets for Hawse Fairleads. I have only ever seen them for roller fairleads.

Being that Texas is a 2 plate state, I have a choice to make.

I can line up, drill and tap for the license plate on the lower portion of the front bumper just below the fairlead. This might run afoul of particularly persnickety small town LEOs, but from what I can tell from reading the vehicle codes relating to license plates in Texas, it just has to be mounted to the front bumper facing forward. Does not say anything about being angled somewhat downward and that is key.

The second option is to unbolt the winch, so that I can get to the fairlead bolts, pull the fairlead, and install a flip up license plate bracket.

There are tons of good looking options but to be completely honest, installing that winch, particularly the 2 front bolts, was a royal pain in the butt. I am not sure I want to remove / reinstall the winch just to meet someones idea of how regulatory compliance should be done. But I am also not sure I want to risk being hassled over something stupid like a front license plate.

 

[dbhost]

one thing I have done in the past is build a relocation cable port for the winch control. I have used the end that came with the winch controller and cut it off with the appropriate length of cable I needed I then plug it into the winch port then I wire the other end to a 4 pin round trailer plug female, then replace the cut off end on the controller with the matching 4 pin round plug. I have found that most of the remotes are about 3 ft too long so it doesnt hurt to badly. Also the 4 pin trailer plugs have a snap close cover usually and are made of metal, easier to service.

Just a idea

John

And not a bad idea at all, however, not needed.

This particular winch came with wireless remotes, and even if, popping the hood to get to the winch remote port is no big deal, just drop the hood again and move on. I believe I have seen superduty drivers have to do this too... It was one of the reasons I wanted wireless remotes.

 

[1000arms]

... Being that Texas is a 2 plate state, I have a choice to make.

I can line up, drill and tap for the license plate on the lower portion of the front bumper just below the fairlead. This might run afoul of particularly persnickety small town LEOs, but from what I can tell from reading the vehicle codes relating to license plates in Texas, it just has to be mounted to the front bumper facing forward. Does not say anything about being angled somewhat downward and that is key. ...

"must display two license plates that are clearly visible, readable, and legible, one at the exterior front and one at the exterior rear of the vehicle that are securely fastened at the exterior front and rear of the vehicle in an upright horizontal position of not less than 12 inches from the ground, measuring from the bottom, except that a vehicle described by Transportation Code, §621.2061 may place the rear plate so that it is clearly visible, readable, and legible; or"

is from:

https://texreg.sos.state.tx.us/public/readtac$ext.TacPage?sl=R&app=9&p_dir=&p_rloc=&p_tloc=&p_ploc=&pg=1&p_tac=&ti=43&pt=10&ch=217&rl=27

 

[dbhost]

"must display two license plates that are clearly visible, readable, and legible, one at the exterior front and one at the exterior rear of the vehicle that are securely fastened at the exterior front and rear of the vehicle in an upright horizontal position of not less than 12 inches from the ground, measuring from the bottom, except that a vehicle described by Transportation Code, §621.2061 may place the rear plate so that it is clearly visible, readable, and legible; or"

is from:

https://texreg.sos.state.tx.us/public/readtac$ext.TacPage?sl=R&app=9&p_dir=&p_rloc=&p_tloc=&p_ploc=&pg=1&p_tac=&ti=43&pt=10&ch=217&rl=27

So pull the winch out so I can unbolt the fairlead and install a flipper... Dang.

I just re-read that. It said HORIZONTAL position, not VERTICAL. That can NOT be right....

I read the code and it contradicts itself. Upright and Horizontal are opposite terms. The intent is clear, but a scheister could worm around that one pretty easily.

Doesn't matter, flip up license plate mount for hawse fairlead is on order from Amazon and will be here by next weekend...

 

[dbhost]

Tested the bed / bench height. Too tall. Need to pull the uprights and bob about 4" off of them. It is literally a stretch to get my feet on the floor and my head is in the roof...

Wondering if there is a better water tank setup I can use...

 

[Dougnuts]

on the front plate, I think ”upright” covers vertical, and “horizontal” covers orientation left to right.

Keep on rocking, the truck is turning out great.

 

[1000arms]

on the front plate, I think ”upright” covers vertical, and “horizontal” covers orientation left to right.

Keep on rocking, the truck is turning out great.

That is also my understanding. No rotating the plate as is done on some motorcycles.

 

[1000arms]

... Wondering if there is a better water tank setup I can use...

Hopefully the common and (relatively) low cost water container(s) work for your setup. If not, you might want to check Ronco Plastics water tanks, ranging from 3 gallon tanks to 380 gallon tanks:

Water / Waste Holding Tank - Ronco Plastics

Marine tanks are suitable for all marine plumbing, waste holding, and water supply needs. The tanks are rotationally molded of a seamless one piece, non-corrosive linear polyethylene and meet FDA regulations. Three female NPT (national pipe thread) fittings are provided free of charge...

ronco-plastics.com

 

[dbhost]

on the front plate, I think ”upright” covers vertical, and “horizontal” covers orientation left to right.

Keep on rocking, the truck is turning out great.

On the left / right thing. Nope, It is common for example for a new Lexus or BMW to have the license plate mount on the drivers side of the front bumper so that it is not in the way of the lower grille. And it would seem to me that upright would be if you look at a 3D grid, let's say Upright is your Y axis, horizontal is your X axis the unnamed left / right would be on the Z axis and would require all 3 coordinates to have an actual specification of orientation and location.

Sorry while not exactly super accurate the word Engineer is actually in my job title...

I've got the uprights for the bed cut to length now. Honestly this would be an easier issue to deal with if I was working with a different water tank. And how much water do I need now?

It occurred to me that I was still designing for 2 people, 1 week between replenisment of supplies. And should all else fail, I have a hitch haul I can strap tanks to, or carry them ON the bed. It is not an absolute requirement the water cans go under the bed. I was just trying to get the weight in front of the axle.

I cut the uprights down to 12" even though I should have gone 11", so I bobbed 3" instead of 4... I might come back and cut them down 1 more inch before reinstalling.

The idea I had behind the water capacity is that I am a big guy, and NEED a daily shower, I can do a navy shower in about 2 gallons. My wife with her long hair took 4+ gallons so we were figuring 7 gal / day for just bathing which I know is a lot. I was working on teaching her how to get wet, turn water off, soap up, turn water back on and rinse off. I never got that far... Anyway, if I could be somewhere with a reasonably clean filterable water source, I could easily do with only one of the AquaTainers and a couple gallons of purified water for cooking. That should get me going, filtering should keep me showering / doing dishes and all should be good.