Tires came in so had them mounted up today (well, actually mounted twice since the guy originally put the white letters out, which isn't what I wanted). Also finished wet-sanding the first 2 coats of paint. So, making some progress.....
Tires came in so had them mounted up today (well, actually mounted twice since the guy originally put the white letters out, which isn't what I wanted). Also finished wet-sanding the first 2 coats of paint. So, making some progress.....
That's going to look great behind the Raider.
This is awesome. I painted a spare set of Poms I have for my Delica in a similar bronze color. This is going to be bad ass behind the Montero/Raider!!
Mazdax605 said:This is awesome. I painted a spare set of Poms I have for my Delica in a similar bronze color. This is going to be bad ass behind the Montero/Raider!!
I honestly thing the Poms are some of the best-looking truck/SUV wheels ever made. I was happy to find a second set! I bet they look awesome on a Delica.
It was in the 60s today so decided to do the topcoats of paint using a smooth roller.
So all done, two coats. Tured out pretty decent (certainly shows up all the dents and dings I didn't bother to fill), and honestly, I doubt I'll wetsand it. This is for utility, it'll get banged up and dirty and scratched. So likely gonne leave it right here as "good enough" with regard to the paint.
It’s kind of the old story nothing looks better than a black car with some chrome for bling and it’s all freshly washed and shiny. Nothing looks worse than a black car that needs a wash.
Rons said:It’s kind of the old story nothing looks better than a black car with some chrome for bling and it’s all freshly washed and shiny. Nothing looks worse than a black car that needs a wash.
Considering I own or have owned predominantly black or very dark blue vehicles for the last 20 years, I"m very aware of that lol. WIth this thing being towed by my black/scratched up Raider or black/scratched up Sequoia, trying to make things look actually "nice" is a bridge too far for me, a person who hates detailing and never does it :D
It looks really cool, nice work. I am, however, wondering why if black was the end goal you didn't just keep the seemingly rust-free black bed from the black truck?
AxeHealey said:It looks really cool, nice work. I am, however, wondering why if black was the end goal you didn't just keep the seemingly rust-free black bed from the black truck?
I considered it, but that bed was rustier than it looked. Certainly could have been saved (not terminal like an old Toyota bed!) but would have needed a good amount of repair work in tough areas. And i still would have had to paint it after the rust repair. This bed is much, much nicer structurally
In reply to irish44j (Forum Supporter) :
So "seemingly" is the operative word here. Makes sense.
Quick little after-work project using nothing but leftover scraps of rollbar tubing from the rally car and a random round steel plate....
Since this trailer is pretty well balanced with only around 30lbs of tongue weight when empty (in order to be able to move it around easily by hand), I usually have kept a big jackstand under the rear frame rail so it doesn't tip back if I climb in it, etc. This won't do "in the field" of course. Lots of guys just mount a couple tongue jacks on the corners, but I don't really want to have stuff sticking out, and really don't need something that extensive as I don't plan to have a RTT on a rack or anything that requires high stability. That said, I wanted to put together a "kickstand" of sorts for the rear.
So got out a couple scrap roll cage tubing in two diameters and drilled them out so the smaller one can be at different lengths inside the larger one. Then welded on a foot from a big beefy piece of round steel leftover from building spring perches on the rally car.
I considered making some actual brackets for this, but really, there's no real point to getting fancy so I just drilled a hole at the center of the rear frame crossbar and one at the top of the kickstand tube, and put a big bolt through it. This should be plenty strong enough for whatever weight I would need to put on it. The length here is set for the trailer level on flat ground, but it can go up or down 3-4" either way by pulling the bolt and moving it to other holes.
To stow it away, it just rotates upward to one side and there's another set of matching holes on the frame and the tube where another bolt goes. I'll put a big wing-nut on this one so it can be removed by hand (and tack a tab on the head of the bolt so it can be held by hand too. just pop the bolt in and it's stowed, easy peazy. This is just mocked up, need to get some appropriate hardware for it tomorrow. But, not bad for a 30-minute project.
For some strange reason I think trailer builds are fun. This one too!
Isn't there a risk that the "kick stand" can swing sideways and make the trailer drop if it's not connected to the tow vehicle? Wheel chocks would probably stop that though.
I'm used to our European trailers with jockey wheels and they tend to swing around a bit as they like unless the parking brake is good (better than normal) working order.
Gustaf
In reply to therealpinto :
Yes. I may add a small plate and a lock pin so it will stay vertical. But chocks are key as well, for sure. If i ever add trailer brakes, ill put a breakaway box on it thst i can use to lock the barkes when parked.
Not doing much today, but here's a 10-minute project. Bent up a couple pieces of steel bar and made some chain hooks for the trailer. Only posting it in the spirit of documenting even the little stuff. Try to contain your excitement ;)
Took the trailer down the street for its maiden voyage. Happy to report nothing fell off, and no issues noted. The Raider doesn't really notice it there when it's empty, which is nice.
I did, however, notice one small issue. In order to make the trailer sit level, I got a straight hitch shank with the ball on top. Unfortunately now the top of the trailer hitch lock is now too high and is in the way of the tailgate opening
So, I could probably live with that, but might as well do it right, so I'll do some modification to the front to drop the hitch down so I can use a lower ball height on the Raider.
You might try a coupler style
Or, look tough with Pintle and ring style. Though, these can be noisy as the "slop around" a bit.
John Welsh said:You might try a coupler style
Or, look tough with Pintle and ring style. Though, these can be noisy as the "slop around" a bit.
I had considered both of those but I think I have a much easier solution that will only involve a leftover piece of the steel I built the frame from :)
I really have no need for a pintle since I'm not doing hardcore off-roading with the trailer and I think it's standard ball is more than sufficient. Plus I want the trailer to be easy to use with other vehicles I have that have regular hitches
So I know I said earlier that I was just going to leave the paint as-is brushed on. But......today was really, really nice out, and I had nothing to do unless I wanted to do yard work (hard pass). And also, I always want to learn/get better at things I'm not good or experienced at, and "finishing" painting is one of those things.
So, busted out my big bin of foam pads and Meguire's cutting compounds left from the Porsche paint job, plus some 1000-grit and 1200-grit wet and dry sandpaper. Ugh, I hate this stuff. So took a few hours and sanded down the whole bed. Now....I didn't do a "full" job down to glass-smooth. I'm not confident the paint is on thick enough to do that well. But I got it about 75% smoothed down from the texture left by the roller.
Then got out the 105 (or is it 205?) cutting compund and the random orbital buffer and got to work:
After doing each side of the bed I got out the "Mirror Finish" stuff with a different pad and got it all shined up. So anyhow, it's smooth to the touch, though not smooth to the eye. In any case, now at least I can see reflections in it. This truly, now, is at the "good enough" point where it looks about as good (or bad) as the Raider's paint, which was the goal. Still have one area to finish up, but more or less done with messing with the paint.
That's a huge transformation of the roller paint job. Nicely done.
It's so weird that I now want one, yet have no use for a trailer like that lol. Or a place to put it.
Looks great!
russ_mill said:It's so weird that I now want one, yet have no use for a trailer like that lol. Or a place to put it.
Looks great!
I would say that there are very few things that this trailer can do that the vehicles are already own can't do for the most part. That said I wanted a winter project, And this cost a lot less than rebuilding another car And then having to insure it :)
After debating on some solutions to the hitch interference, I bought a bulldog hitch, since it doesn't have a top latch and will save me from making changes to suspension or the neck itself. So that came in today and man, it's beefy. I know these aer generally for heavy-duty trailers but it probably weighs twice what the other hitch weighs. If you don't know, the bulldog basically has the side of the "cup" open to let the ball in when you slide back a spring-loaded collar. Then once the ball is in, you close the cup and the collar pops back over it (with a bin behind to keep it from opening). Maybe this just needs some break-in (or lubrication) but it took a good amount of strength to get the collar all the way back to clear the cup's lip. Not a big deal since not like the trailer is going on and off frequently, but definitely a bit cumbersome.
Also, bulldogs are generally weld-on (for HD applications) but in order to leave my options open in the future I decided to drill it to be bolt-on. Took a lot of measuring to try to make the holes in the same place as the frame
Holes lined up and bolted on
And painted it black, since the gray is ugly. I found it amusing that Bulldog puts some contact paper over their big sticker that says "remove after painting" - like they want to make damn sure their sticker is still visible after your dumb-ass paints over it, lol.
I had to cut some stickers for Nonack's rally car yesterday, so while I was at it, cut a MITSUBISHI one for the tailgate. I was thinking about doing it in white, but in the end decided to go with something a bit more subtle.
The dog decided to show off how well the vehicles match with him.
Saw a pair of tow eyes from my Sequoia sitting around the garage (removed to fit the front hitch), so figured, might as well do something with them, and give myself rear recovery points on the trailer, if for some reason I'd ever need them
While I was there put an angle iron bracket behind the "tripod" leg so I can lock it in place vertically if needed (hardware is temporary)
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