Diablo Build Update (pics)

[Elwenil]

You going to keep the old style lamps or are you going with the newer style or LEDs? Also, I notice the rims are unpainted. Are you going to run the stock ones or get something else? Nice work, I am extremely jealous of your skills, resources, and most of all, time! Lol.

 

[readyman]

Dman,
Real nice... I especially like the dual fuel tanks.

 

[devilman96]

Im going to use 395's so 20" bead locks are in the future... I am keeping the old style lamps... I like them for some reason!!! I need to get new covers for the ones on the front and powder coat them black.

 

[Deuceswild]

devilman 96,

Is that a vent on top of the winch, if so I dont ever recall seeing any others like that, That is a great idea

Also curious about your head lights and the "landing lights" below,, have you driven in the dark with them yet and what sort of a pattern do they give you compared to the stock set up

By the way, Awesome Work and have been admiring your work from the begining,

 

[devilman96]

Man you guys have some good eyes...

The vent was there when I bought the truck... I am hesitant to suggest installing one as my winch had a lot of water in it... One thing still on the list is forwarding and I am planning on yanking the vent and plumbing air into the casing to pressurize it along with the bellhousing and axles. I don't know if I can pressure ALL of that but I think my mods will allow for it. I have installed my air solenoid for the system which is electric and controlled by one of my toggles on the dash but I have yet to plumb lines and install the psi reg.

The Hella light housings and bulbs are GREAT... I am not "legal" at 90/100W but I have them adjusted properly and will prolly refuse to ever down grade but the likelyhood of that being an issue would be a far stretch...

The ACL lights... well... some idiot accidentally wired them into the black out circuit in the front of the truck rather than the line pulled for them (got the 2 confused)... I can say they were really bright for about 6 second with 24V on them before going poof!!!! So I have to get new bulbs (13$ each) and swap the wires!

I have slacked on some of the detail pics of mods so here is one I did today...

I installed a slave fuel line in my secondary tank to allow for a towable gen set. It will be a rare use item but with the hurricanes I will fell warm and fuzzy knowing I can just "plug and play" into 50 gallons of fuel. I prolly didn't need 5000 psi line on it but hey... redundancy is a nice feature.

 

[BFR]

woah

 

[Recovry4x4]

Note; remote clicker in one photo. Part of remote entry/ start / heated seat option availble on Diablo Deuces.
Before it was the Malibu deuce, now we have the Boca deuce. Any of you familiar with Boca will know exactly what I'm saying.
Just poking fun at ya Bro!

 

[bottleworks]

Once again, kick butt work! You never tolds us your "tag" story.

 

[maddawg308]

Love the air hose connections! I can't get over how cool this truck is, it's got almost everything!

Except...

Are there plans to add an under-hood welding unit? A lot of off-roaders put a small MIG-welding unit under the hood, powered by the alternator, to provide in-the-field repair capability.

 

[pa.rich]

I am envious of your metalwork, You and Buggyman must of attended the same school! Nice work. Hey, dont forget the cupholdersinside that cab! For coffee of course.

 

[gimpyrobb]

MD308, I think those are "hydraulic hose" fittings not air lines. They are to supply fuel to the gen-set he was talking about. The hydraulic lines have a stop valve in them to block "flow" till another fitting is connected. (I am hoping I am not too far off the mark here. If I am I'm sorry)

 

[devilman96]

Yeah its a hyd line... Most you see are 1/2 and that one is 1/4 and looks more like a air fitting in size so good eyes to both of you. I have also added a air coupler in the rear so I will take a pic of that too.

We shall NOT start calling it Boca Deuce bub!!!!

No welders... I am going "Swiss army knife" on this thing however it will be more hurricane driven than off road, mud, or rock crawler... Think more along the lines of army/wrecker/fire/EMT/rescue/bug out/etc...

Cup holders are going in the center console... more to come on that...

The tag story will have to wait until I have a conclusion... It goes a lot further than just my tag.

 

[Recovry4x4]

Sorry Mike! I shall drop that line from my vocabulary. Just wondering, could you use that line for genset fuel to say..draw fuel into the tank from a trailered fuel supply?

 

[devilman96]

Yeah... you could do that also... let me explane the idea(s) so it makes since to the masses...

MEP003 Gen sets use a self contained fuel tank but also have a slave connection. The gen set runs dual fuel pumps one pulls from the tank to IP like most diesels. The other pump is used for transferring from a slave source into the MEP's small self contained tank which has a cut off float switch. As the MEP's small tank runs low the switch kicks the 2nd fuel pump on and pulls fuel from the slave source to refill its tank.

My principle will be the same as many gen sets are set up this way... When my gen set fuel tank gets low its second pump (transfer pump) will be able to pull fuel from my secondary tank on the truck via the hyd line I installed last night.

With a fuel trailer you have a few options on "how to" make that work... Because I deem the line to be a "slave" there is no pump. Technically any support equipment should be self contained so a gen set or transfer tank should have its own pumping sources. You could ignore that fact and install a pump in the line to pull into the tank but it would be kinda odd having the wiring, switch, etc on the truck for nothing 98% of the time, with that said... or explained the trailer should have its own pump, proably operated by a manual switch. To leave this connection running you would really need to install a float switch into your tank... Or accept that you will only use the transfer at idle/when stopped (much easier to configure).

There are two ways to do this... You can simply pull a jumper to your batteries when stopped on the road and fire your pump up... Or your trailer and tank would pull a 24V supply from the trailer connection... Just as a FYI trailer plugs have 4 spare pins in them so you can pull a accessory line through those pins from the battery (which I have done "just in case" I need it later on) and you can also pull a 12V line through there if you have a 12V system (which I have also done). Those accessory line can/will supply a pump... Yes your lines already in existence have 24V on some of them but you REALLY don't want to add the load of a pump to your light switch!!!

Venting is not needed as your main and secondary should both already have vents (if you installed your secondary tank correctly)... In the case of a gen set you do not need a return line as you can return to the gen sets main tank and / or return to the slave line if you have no tank on the set.

One other thing... If you have many diesel pieces floating around the yard like some of us you may consider the idea of making up a 24V pump set up with a coupler to plug into the truck with a jumper wire set to keep near by as you can use the same couplers to transfer between trucks and tractors... As I found out the hard way these little fuel pumps will move a crap load of diesel in a hurry since there is no pressure / restriction on the lines slowing it down.

Sorry to be so technical but I wanted to give a broader picture to everyone in case someone wants to play along or has been seeded with an idea like Kenny was for something else... I tend to think multi fold when building things because I like redundancy and I like beign able to get out of a bind with plenty of back up!!!!

 

[gimpyrobb]

Thats a good point about having a pump and line set up to transfer fuel. I am getting a long list of things to do to my MVs.

 

[devilman96]

Something really simple like this would serve both Rob and Kenny's ideas as you can flip flop the pump to push or pull into or out of the tank... For power you could add a set of jumper wires to go to the battery or buy a trailer plug and wire it so that you could carry the pump in the truck for use on anything.

The fittings make it nice as you can pop on and off quickly and they are sealed so you have no worries of leaking fuel or trash getting inside.

I will be buying a tractor here in a few weeks, when I do I will proably add the same female coupling to the tank so I can go back or fourth with fuel. This makes transporting 20 gallons for the tractor from the store to home a breeze.

Its these stupid little ideas I keep adding that make the truck so invaluable to me.

 

[devilman96]

Here is another one of those mods that I've had the parts for forever but never got around to doing...

I installed a over flow tank on my cooling system. Part of this was due to the simplicity of having it and part of it was due to the dead bug particles I found clogging the original over flow. When I tired to clean it out 120 PSI of air wouldn't dislodge the critters stuck in there so I figured the radiator cap's pressure relief was of zero value.

The tank was bought from Napa PN 730-4514 for around 20$ and you also need about 3 feet of 5/16 hose. The install time was around 15 minutes.

 

[jkelly66]

Very impressive nice mods. Where did you get your windshield wiper arms? And do you think they would work on the stock air powered motors?

 

[devilman96]

The wiper arms are from Napa... I had to buy everything 2 or 3 times before I was happy with what I got in the end... The ones pictured are one size larger than the ones listed in the tech article section, if I remember right you change the last digit of the part number. They will fit on stock motors as the arms have the correct adapters but I am not certain they will fit a stock windshield, I think when fully collapsed they are the same length as the ones used in the tech article but I don't want to tell you "yeah" and send you down a wrong path... If they do fit correctly they are a vast improvement over the other set suggested for use as they are heavier and much better built...

The wipers are 14" and I know to big for the stock fold out glass but I think you can go as small as 10" with these arms.

 

[jkelly66]

thanks for the info. What section is the tech artical in?