Posts of the Week

Fuel 18x9 20 offset
Cooper at3 xlt 275/70/18
No trimming no rubbing

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Went back to Phoenix to finish my build. Went with the lift, new method wheels and Toyo Open Country A/T III LT285/75 R17. Drove it back to San Diego and loved the ride. It seems better than before. Here' a couple of pics

Hi all, we swapped the LC 250 20" rims and tires with a set of the 23' Sequoia TRD pro rims and tires noted above. Couldn't stop grinning once they were on. TRD pro tires are Wildpeak AT3 with the same diameter as stock 265 60 20 tires. Saved a total 6 lbs per wheel over the 20" setup. I had given up on the BBS TRD pro option due to price but FB marketplace saved the day at $1800 with like new rims and very lightly used tires. Paid another $250 for a matching spare with a bit more tire wear. Will see about sizing up on tires once we get some trail miles in.

I finally got around to finishing the mounting points for my Ironman 4x4 shade canopy.

I'm not the kind of guy who needs to drive around town looking like I'm ready for the zombie apocalypse to start any minute, with all sorts of shit strapped to my truck, so there was no way I'm leaving the shade canopy on my truck full-time.

So I bought a pair of these quick-release mounting brackets:
Awning Quick Release Mounting Brackets

They advertise them as mounting the male hook piece on your rack and the female piece on the back of the shade canopy but I didn't want those dorky hooks living full time on my rack. The hooks would also stick up a few inches over the top of my rack which wouldn't let me get in my own garage not to mention parking garages around town. So I simply reversed the male & female parts and mounted the hooks on the canopy and the female part on the side of my roof rack.

The two pieces of the brackets are secured with some large swivel hitch pin clips that go through pre-drilled holes in the male & female parts that line up when mounted, but the Iron-man supplied clips touched the white paint on the truck when inserted so I bought some stainless steel straight-pins and separate cotter pins. The rack is very secure and it doesn't rattle. Surprisingly, I couldn't hear any wind noise even on the highway. I'll have to get some pictures of the shade canopy opened up (or "deployed" as the zombie apocalypse overlanders like to say) on my next camping trip. It's still too damn hot here to open it up just for a picture.

Another problem was where to store this long shade canopy when it's not on the truck? I'd typically just lean it up in a corner of my garage but all the corners are already taken up with useless shit. While looking at it on the truck I thought what would be the easiest way to get it on & off and store it and I realized that the perfect solution was to hang it on the ceiling. So a few big hooks went in and now it's easy to just lower it onto the truck and then lift it back up onto the hooks and the canopy is out of everyone's way. Luckily it clears the garage by about a quarter inch. The zippers actually brush the garage door when it's opening and closing.

Eminent White Pearl with fresh ceramic coat (Adam's 9-year Graphene Ceramic)

nartmot said:

Pretty disappointing towing performance. Looks like Toyota overstated their towing capacity by a couple thousand pounds. 9000lbs would be under ideal (flat) conditions. Is that pretty common for car manufacturers?

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They are towing almost 9,000lbs in a mid-sized SUV on a 7% grade at over 9,000ft. Seems more than respectable to me.

Rays Engineering wheels
18x9 6x139.7
+20 offset
35x11.50R18 Falken RT01
readylift 2.5" lift kit

I nearly have this licked. Stay tuned. Film at 11:00.

I posted some info about this in another thread focused on warranty issues, but I wanted to share here to hopefully help some of you avoid the issue altogether. It has been reported here and in some other videos, that the rear seat flip levers in the GX and LC break easily. Since mine have not broken I wanted to see if we could address the issue proactively to prevent the problem. I took the levers off my seats and found the plastic was already slightly cracked and it appears to be just from the install of the bolts. I first planned to add some epoxy to bolster the connection, but I could not figure out a good way to do that. I ended up printing some inserts that fit into the lever and allow the bolt to spread the contact to a much larger surface area for additional support. I also added a washer just a little bigger than the bolt head, to also help spread the contact. Here's what I did:

1. Flip the seats forward and use a flat screwdriver to pop off the seat lever bolt access cover.
2. Use 8mm socket to remove the seat lever bolt and the slide the lever off.
3. Print insert in PETG that is 3mm x 15mm x 22mm with a hole aligned for the bolt to pass through.
4. Reinstall levers with insert and washer to add surface area and thickness for the lever contact.

I tried to get photos to help show what I did and I printed them in blue to make them easier to see. This does not require any permanent changes, and if a better solution comes up this could easily just be removed. You could also accomplish the same thing with a small piece of thin metal cut to 15 x 22mm with an appropriately located bolt hole, I just did it with the 3d printer because that was convenient for me.

Gunner said:

The invoice noted that the mechanic noticed the hood vibrating with the wind, but also stated: No adjustment to try and secure hood that can help issue. Would really like to know what the fix is for the hood vibration and if it went away for Sroberts?

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The hood vibration is gone. The vibrations felt throughout the car are gone. The brakes no longer squeal. All of those issues were because of the shims-the ones they had to wait for legal to clear and shipped a couple of weeks ago from Japan. I’m relaying what I was told today verbally by the head of the service department. I know this is vague, and it wasn’t on the ticket. Maybe there’s a reason for that..I’m not sure. I do think time will tell. I can say my car is fixed, and I’m happy!