This weekend I’ll be heading out on a 4000 mile road trip to tow back the Rx-7. The truck has been running well, but it’s as good an excuse as any to finish up some of the projects I’ve been putting off. The first has been sorting out the electrical system in the bed. I had a spare battery in back when I had the camper in place, but with the topper installed the battery is now in the “living” area. Instead of trying to rig up a sealed box and external vent, I’m planning on moving the second battery under the hood instead. That will require building a new battery tray, so in the mean time I just ran power back from the main battery to a fuse panel and removed the second battery entirely. I’ll have to be careful not to kill it, so for the moment it’s only powering a light and cigarette lighter socket, a fan and inverter will have to wait.

While I was messing with the wiring, I installed the backup camera I bought a while back to replace the one that left with the Four Wheel Camper. It was another cheap ebay camera, however this one must have been meant to mount under a bumper or other lip. I made a mount out of a spare piece of aluminum, but the angle still isn’t great. I’ll see how it works on the trip, but I may end up replacing it.

Good enough?

Next on the list was to build a shelf over the front part of the bed. The idea is to have a place to store camping gear while leaving space for a mattress underneath. I considered a platform with drawers instead, but decided to go for something simple this time. I made it out of 5/8″ plywood with an aluminum L channel to brace the front. I think it came out pretty nice.

Storage for the topper

With the slope of the cap, it’s a tight fit between the bed rails and won’t be coming out any time soon. But so far it looks like it’ll work to keep everything out of the way.

Comfy.

The T100 has always it’s share of squeaks and rattles, but lately it’s crossed the line for even a 25 year old truck. Two problems in particular were getting worse. The first was a noise from under the hood that sounded similar to the ticking noise from an exhaust leak. The problem was it was coming from the left side of the engine, opposite the exhaust. When I had the manifolds off for the head gasket repair I checked them for cracks, so I was fairly certain it wasn’t leaking from there. I could only hear it under load so I could never identify where it was coming from by sticking my head under the hood. Finally I gave up last week and went to a local Toyota shop to see if they could figure it out. A half hour of labor later they came back with the diagnoses of a cracked heat shield. No exhaust leak after all, just a rattle that was in time with the exhaust pulse. I took it back home and added a hose clamp to keep the heat shield in place.

Problem Solved.

The next noise was a constant squeaking from the rear of the truck whenever I went over a bump…or when I slowed down…or accelerated. This was easier to identify. The rear leaf spring bushings were shot. They were in bad shape last year when I installed the add-a-leaf, and half a year of carrying a camper only made them worse. Below is a 360 video of the bushing replacement.

It’s been a slow winter for the T100. With the camper gone it’s been serving as my daily driver, but with Spring just about here I’ve been thinking about setting it up for longer trips again. Since I won’t be spending as much time in it as last year, a full camper would be overkill and instead I’ve been keeping an eye out for a cheap shell for the bed. I finally lucked out and found this ARE topper on craigslist:

ARE Cap on the T100

It came off of a 270k mile T100 and needs some maintenance, but it has some great features for a camper shell. Came with a carpeted interior, compression boot where it meets the cab, hinged window on the left, and a slider on the right. The downside to it is the height. I had hoped for a flush shell, but for $200 I can’t complain. I also need to do something about the paint. At a minimum the white paint needs to be touched up, but I’m considering a full repaint to match the truck. Would look better, but I might regret it in the heat.