Unfortunately, I got tricked into browsing cars at the local Auotmall a couple weekends ago and somehow ended up spending the entire afternoon bargaining on a 2017 Chevrolet Volt. I was able to get into a great 3-year lease deal and the fact that my work offers free EV charging made it too economically sound to pass. If I am diligent with my EV charging habits, my running costs will be completely offset by only the monthly lease.

Now, I must offer the truck up for sale. I would honestly love to keep it because it’s always convenient to have a pickup around, and I’ve done so much work on it already… but space is limited and keeping multiple cars insured and registered is an issue.

• 33×12.50 BFGoodrich All-Terain T/A KO2 tires with Procomp Wheels
• Split Bench 60/40 Reupholstered Seats
• Windows Tinted on side and back
• A/C System Completely Overhauled and Recharged
• Bilstein Sport Shocks All Around
• Trailgear Front Bumper w/ Welded Light Bar Hoop, Powdercoated Black
• Old Man Emu Front Springs with 1″ Lift
• Stock Replacement Complete Rear Leafpacks
• Toytec U-Bolts
• Toytec Brake Proportioning Valve Bracket
• Toytec Exhaust Hanger
• Toytec 1″ Lift Shackles
• Polyurethane Leafpack Bushings
• Aisin Locking Hubs
• New OEM Weatherstripping and Trim
• New OEM Wiper Arms
• New OEM Spark Plugs
• New OEM Spark Plug Wires
• New OEM Rear Tow Package
• New OEM EGR Solenoid
• Bosch Icon Window Wipers
• Bosch Premium O2 Sensor
• Replacement Starter Motor
• Optima Redtop Battery
• K&N Air Intake System (carb legal)
• Weathertech Floor Mats
• Alpine CDE-153BT Headunit
• Hybrid Audio Clarus 6.5″ Component Speakers
• Hybrid Audio Clarus 10″ Subwoofer
• MTX Thunderform Subwoofer Enclosure
• Stinger 4-AWG Wiring Kit
• ARC Audio 5-Channel Amplifier
• Gorilla Spline lugnuts

All these years, I’ve held on tightly and dearly to the romanticized ideology that all cars you drive need to be fun and engaging. I never thought this day would come, but alas, I’ve finally accepted that a daily driver can be average and plain, where qualities like comfort and economy take precedence. When you break down mundane events like commuting to work and going to the grocery store for errands, it really is “point A to point B” driving.

Driving a race car or a fancy sports car with perfect paint every day, just for the sake of being different, creates overhead and can become more burdensome than fun. I sold the M3 because I felt it was slightly too clean and the act of only sitting in stop and go traffic every day seemed wasteful. I then tried the opposite end of the spectrum and got the Tacoma, so I could feel more freedom and still have a unique drive.

To be honest, the Tacoma was great and it did adhere to the purpose I initially postulated. Regardless, here I am today, with another step deeper into the black and white world of Adulthood. Is it finally time to grow up? Have I lost my last bastion of youth and expressionism?

Update:

Aaaaaand just like that, the Tacoma has sold and is off to its new home. Farewell truck, thanks for the brief but interesting experience.

Let’s get to it. Follow these steps and you will be successful in your poke endeavors.

First, acquire a suitably Hawaiian vehicle for transportation. This ’96 2.7L Taco on 33’s shall do nicely. Mud is optional, but preferable.

If you’re in the San Jose area, go to Santo Market in Japantown.

Head to the back of the grocer and ask the people at the deli stand for as much poke as you can handle in one sitting. I personally ordered about 0.4lbs of both Shoyu and Spicy poke. I also grabbed a bit of ocean salad on the side, because it’s important to keep a meal balanced – folks.

Once back home, cook up some rice. I chose brown rice, but you may want to use short-grain white rice to better match the texture of the meal. My cooking instrument of choice is the Zojirushi NS-TSC10, which has consistently delivered great rice.

Throw everything on a plate and stay blessed.

Afterwards, be sure to hit the gym to reap those GAINS. Remember to throw up that Shaka. I’m out.

With the rear bumper removed, it exposed the aftermarket rear tow hitch that the previous owner installed. Like the bumper, this tow hitch also had one foot in the grave due to rust. I’m all for wearing the jank life like a badge of honor and trumpeting its ideologies wherever I go, but there’s a line… and at the end of the day, I’m still a man with standards. I purchased a brand new Toyota tow hitch to revitalize the rear end.

The hardest part of the install was removing the old tow hitch, since all of its bolts were stubborn and required coercive persuasion with an elongated breaker bar. Actually, I take that back. The hardest part of the install was not being able to actually finish the install because the brand new tow hitch from TOYOTA included the WRONG mounting bracket. There’s supposed to be a Left and Right bracket, but instead I received 2 Left side brackets…

Going to have to chase down the right bracket and finish this up another time.

I’ve been investing continuous effort to get this truck up to par and truly road-worthy and eventually trail-worthy. Including having to replace nearly the entire A/C system and recharging it on 2 separate occasions. It’s almost there.

I also wanted to lift the truck as minimally as possible, just enough to give enough clearance for the new 33×12.50″ tires. After all the new parts came in and were installed, the truck was lifted about 2″ in the front but over 3.5″ in the rear… stock, the rear is already 1″ higher than the front as is. I initially requested to have the rear leaf packs replaced in their entirety to be thorough with the overhaul. The problem is, there are not many leaf pack choices to pick from for my truck’s year. You either stay with factory replacements or go with heavy-duty ones, I ended up with the latter and with one of the best brands, Old Man Emu.

Righteous were my ways, but the results ended up ruining the truck. The rear lift gave a severe rake and made the truck tall overall, far too tall for my liking. Excessively lifted trucks are as bad as “slammed” stanced cars, in my opinion. Worst of all, given that the leaf packs are designed for heavy-duty use (i.e., hauling), the ride quality was rendered stiff and bouncy. If only I knew beforehand.

I drove around in this state for a few weeks before I finally decided to redo the rear suspension again. I almost didn’t do it, but I’m glad I did. I bought and installed another set of leaf packs, this time of the factory spec variety. Immediately afterwards, the ride quality was improved tenfold and made the truck so much more bearable. Unfortunately, with the front end still lifted 2″, the factory spec leaf packs made the rear end sit about 1″ lower now.

Fix one problem and then another one appears. I then purchased a set of 1″ lift shackles from Toytec for the rear. I opted to stay away from lift blocks because I wanted to maintain the full range of articulation, and I definitely didn’t want to do the “add-a-leaf” option to gain the height back, for fear of compromising the ride quality again.

New shackles installed:

Ride height finally level front and rear and ride quality regained:

I mentioned in a previous post that I had installed a trail gear bumper with a welded on light hoop, but never posted a picture. Here it is.

Secondly, aside from satiating a craving, I wanted a truck so it can take me to new sceneries and open doors for new activities. Maybe I’ll start getting into fishing. Maybe I’ll go to Tahoe and snowboard more often. Maybe I’ll get bitten by the off-roading bug and find myself on an expedition to Chile. Or maybe I’ll end up being lazy and do none of those things. Whatever the case, it’s nice to have options available.

Best of all, however, is I can now transport good ole Blue around more easily. He may be a Border Collie dog, but he doubles as the world’s most efficient hair producing factory. Having him inside cars with cloth seats always became a mess. Now the pickup bed is much easier.

Just look at that face. Witness the sheer majesty of Blue reveling in the wind. This, my friends, is the unfiltered definition of freedom. God bless.

What do you do when you have an extremely slow vehicle? You make it sound better, of course. If I’m going to be spending the majority of my commuting in this truck, I wanted to at least spoil myself with the luxury of a nice sound system. Good music is the key to distract myself from the knowledge that I willingly downgraded my lifestyle from a mint E46 M3 daily to an old truck. It’s all good though. My ultimate goal is to practice more modesty in my life. And to slap more 2Pac.

For my stereo needs, I turned back to Toby, the interior customizing wizard. His day job is actually running a stereo shop in Illinois. I told him my expectations and the level I wanted to achieve, and he did the rest by hooking me up with a well sorted package. I received Hybrid Audio component speakers and a 10″ subwoofer. The amplifier is an Arc 4-channel and the headunit is an Alpine.

I wanted to knock out the install in 1 day, but as always with car work, your ambitions tend to exceed the pace of reality. It ended up taking me 2 days just to rip apart the interior and finish the wiring work.

I bought a MTX Thunderform enclosure to cleanly house the subwoofer behind the seats.

Second Skin sound deadening material was applied all over the doors and the wall (or whatever it’s called) behind the seats.

Because I ran out of time during the day, I brought my soldering supplies back to my condo in San Jose to finish the headunit’s wiring adapter.

The hardest part of the install was fitting the component speakers. The mounting depth of the door speakers required custom adapters with spacers to be made to clear. The inside bore of the door panel around the speaker hole had to be excavated and only yielded about a 1/8″ gap.

The tweeters were installed on the triangular trim pieces that go behind the side mirrors. Forgot to take pictures of these.

I also installed a powder coated black Trail Gear tubular front bumper with a light hoop that I had welded on. Forgot to take a picture of the bumper too. Maybe if I take the truck somewhere interesting in the near future, I’ll stop being lazy and grab more pictures.

So the time has come for me to foray into the world of trucks, and possibly off-roading, with this 1996 Toyota Tacoma.

It’s one of the first years of the first generation of Tacomas and blends classic truck details, which I like. 4-cylinder and 5-speed but with almost 200k on the clock – I will certainly be putting the theory of bulletproof Toyota pickups to the test.

Trucks live a hard life and this one was actually the cleanest example I could find. Overall it is in good shape with a clean interior. Now I can truly daily drive this vehicle because I’m no longer burdened with paranoia. I can throw this thing into the tightest of parking spots without care of door dings or wear and tears of that nature. I’ve learned by now that having full freedom from worry is the most important gateway to actually driving.

I wasted no time in getting to work. First thing I did was rip off the rear bumper to accentuate the jankness. Don’t fight the ghetto, embrace the ghetto.

Next, the real party started. I ordered up a set of ProComp 15″ Rock Crawler steelies with 33×12.50″ BFGoodrich KO2s. In order to fit these larger wheels, the truck needed to go up, so I had the suspension overhauled with Bilstein shocks and Old Man Emu springs, leaf packs, and shackles. The lift obtained is supposed to be 3″, but the rear is higher with the heavy duty leaf springs. I may go back to new OEM rated leaf packs for the rear.

The side window moulding trims were in rough shape and I tried plastidipping over them to refurbish. That failed because it came out looking even worse.

So I just bought new OEM replacements.

More in the next post.