The Grey Mouser: Reboot

Parts are piling up while I wait on warmer and drier concrete to work on. Damn you Winter! Leave already!

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Bolts, zip ties, duct tape, Velcro and Elmers Glue. Sounds like a solid plan. What could possibly go wrong?
 
There seems to have been an issue with my plan to use zip ties to mount a winch...and since one of those naysayers is an actual rocket scientist I thought I best check out other options. So I went this route...


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Aluminum Slimline from SOS Offroad Concepts. 28 lbs.

I originally planned on a full bumper but two things changed my mind. First is aesthetics. I really like the looks of the front end of this variant of Tacoma and the crop of front bumpers for them aren’t all that good looking In my eyes. With the slimline I can keep the country gentleman look without the Bro-Yoda bumper. Second is weight. It’s way to easy to over burden these little trucks and I can already feel the weight building up. Instead of a 150 lbs bumper and a 60 lbs winch, I’ll be at 98 lbs total for this slimline/winch combo. I’m giving up some protection so I’m gambling that weight savings will outplay deer strike. Time will tell.
 
Took this day to do some truck stuff that needed done. Did a complete fluid change since it was neither raining nor snowing today (it’s snowed the last three days here) and the cement was dry.

Afterwards I got mucking around putting some LED lights in the cap adventure boxes. Awhile back I found some aluminum “rock lights” sitting on a shelf at WallyWorld. 5 whole bucks out of my pocket and I had some lights.
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Power was routed back from the engine compartment to a dedicated Blue Seas fuse block for cap accessories.
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Light housings were mounted to the tops of the box enclosures, switches were installed in the interior and wired in and magically light happened.
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Get rid of that metal thimble as well. If you pull in too much line, the thimble can/will damage the fairlead.
 
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