Komodo - My Wife's Daily Driver and High Speed Overland Rig

If you ever get around to it, I'd love to see some more of the progress y'all have made! Not gonna lie... Im about to get a truck (after having to wait for about 5 years) and alot of my build plans are inspired by this truck. Need to go back and re-read the thread so I can find more ways to spend money that I dont have!

 

Welcome to the time machine!

Today we’re going back to the gas can install which I originally did on March 14, 2017. So we’re going back five years and five months.



When we’re off road, I drive like an asshole. Even worse than on the street. So our gas mileage is about 7mpg in the dirt when we’re hammering. With a 26 gallon gas tank, that gives us roughly a 182 mile limit between gas stops. Our style of camping leans toward “stay off road for as long as possible and explore shit far away” so that means we need to bring extra fuel with us so we can get closer to 250 miles range off road.

We didn’t want to install the big Transfer Flow 46 gallon beast of a tank because it hangs down too far and reduces ground clearance quite a bit. And it’s heavy as hell, especially when full, so we really wanted the stock Toyota 38 gallon. Well, in the absence of finding one available, I decided to just add a couple gas cans in order to gain 10 gallons of gas. If you e been following along, you know our space is super limited, and our mantra all along has been weight savings as well as mass centralization. So I found a couple great spots to store five gallon gas cans - in between the wheel well and the front wall of the bed. There is a perfect little niche that is empty because the bed slide has to run between the wheel wells, and that leaves the four corners open. We had already dedicated one of the front corners to the nitrogen bottle, and the other front corner has the water hose, so the two front corners were empty and available.

I did some research on gas cans and found some interesting stuff. The scepter can, or US military can, is a bit different from NATO or Jerry cans. The US scepter can has a screw off lid and the NATO can has a flip up cap. There are a few other differences, but ultimately I decided to go with NATO cans for durability and functional reasons. Later on I found this pretty interesting video about the origins of the Jerry can and the differences between the NATO and scepter cans. Damn, this video came out five months ago, five years after we did our install. Haha!

https://youtu.be/XwUkbGHFAhs


In order to retain the gas cans in their new berthing, I would have to get a little creative. I wanted to use hinged cages like would normally go on top of a roof rack or on the back of a tire gate or similar. Westcott Designs makes a nice one now, but didn’t back then, and it turns out we didn’t have room under the RTT for a hinged mechanism anyway.




We’d just have to strap them in somehow. After a little tinkering and research and laying on my back under the RTT and drinking some beers, I figured out I could ratchet strap them into place using the stock tie down loop in the corner. But to keep them from flopping around off road like a junior high kid on bath salts, I needed a second tie down point. So I took off the tie down loops by the tailgate and found a good spot to bolt them into the bed near the other loops but down low and closer to the wheel well. Drill a few (more) holes into the bed, paint the bare metal for weatherproofing, drink a beer, bolt the loops in and strap the cans in - boom! bang! done! They’re strapped in tight as hell now. Not going anywhere. But how the fuck am I gonna use them when I need to get the gas out of the cans and into the tank? Pull the slide out, unload EVERYTHING on it so I can climb in and unstrap the cans and wriggle out from under the tent like a worm?

Fuck that.

Drunk Engineering Episode 2

https://youtu.be/QFFHFfpOluU


Get a supersiphon

 

The thread lives!!!!

The only question I have after this most eloquent second installment of drunk engineering is.... how do you get aforementioned fuel from gas can numero dos into the tank? Any issues with the siphon method there?

 

Oh shit, totally forgot about that - great question!

I use a second super siphon with a bit longer hose to empty the farther one.

 

Hey Kevin, sweet build. I like what you've done! Been looking a lot at the forum as I plan changes for my truck and others experiences have helped me make decisions.

In prep for doing a BMC I was reading about what you did to clear your 37s. I didnt see anywhere in your posts that you actually welded in a BMC plate after trimming the metal. Did you eventually do that or did you just leave the cut as in your photos?

Thanks!

 

Thanks man!

yeah we eventually had @sdhq weld in plates when we knew we had trimmed enough. They made custom bent ones that offered a better clearance angle than the flat plates you usually see.


Ignore the CV grease everywhere. LoL
And you can still remove the body mounts. We replaced ours sometime after the plates were put in.

 

That looks nice, looks like they did a good job. I think I may end up just fabricating some plates instead of buying them. It seems that is the best way to get maximum clearance and to accommodate all the trimming that might happen. With the premade options it seems like the shape and depth of the cut is somewhat determined by the plate you plan to weld on. I think the next set of tires wil be 35's but I'd rather do the BMC such that 37's could be accommodated down the road if I choose to go that route.

Thanks for your input!

 

This is such a great build!

I have also taken my back seat out. Got excited and started to ask what fancy material you used for the back of the cab wall. Then decided to calm down and read the whole thread. Painted plywood. . Exactly what I'm planning to use. Did you cut out the jack mount? You probably don't use the stock jack anymore?

 

Correct on both accounts. Plywood, and yeah I cut the stock jack mount out.

 

Wow. Guess it’s time for my annual thread update.

This wasn’t really planned to pretty much always happen in August, but whatever. Serendipity. Looks like I nailed this one down to the fuckin day.

I was reading a Facebook post where some people were talking about 37s and my buddy Scott linked back to my write up here from like 2017 about how to fit 37s on a Tundra.

Anyway, where was I?



Fuck me. We’re only up to the fender liner delete?!? Dear god. That was St. Patrick’s Day 2017 - six and a half years ago. OK, here goes…

I fucked the fender liner when I was tuning the new rear bypasses. We still had the Toytec BOSS coilovers up front and maybe shouldn’t have been jumping the truck with those on.



actual footage of “self clearancing” in action.






Whatever. I still pulled like six vehicles out of sycamore creek later that day with my buddy the fuckin paraplegic in a wheelchair taking crap photos.







Funny story, Eric the paraplegic was bombing his first gen down there and slammed a big ass river rock, bending his steel wheel and getting a flat. I used that same goddamm rock to hammer his rim back into shape and reseated the tire on the bead. No pics cuz he was too busy wheeling around the sand in his wheelchair like R2-D2 on Tatooine. Later we got lost at night trying to find our way out through upper sycamore through the bushes and trees. Almost zero alcohol was involved.


Ah, “TREDs on RTT”

That was a great idea until it wasn’t.

Pro Tip: Don’t bother with traction boards. Just wheel with friends. Not only can they help get you unstuck, but hopefully they bring enough beer for when you run out. Two birds one Stone IPA or something.

We got these dope new TRED Pros about six years ago and wanted to mount someplace we could get to them easily whenever we’re in a shit situation and need access to them. Inside the bed was not an option because that whole area under the RTT was already full. So I got the brilliant idea of mounting them on top of the RTT.

Did that.






It was cool.

I even got the special mounts for them, but because I’m afraid of fiberglass modifications that might lead to me sleeping in wetness that is not my own piss (potential rain leaks in the RTT roof) and I’m a fan of Velcro, I basically just velcroed the mounts to the top of the RTT.

Worked pretty dope for several thousand miles and some off road trips until I hit a decent whoop section at speed and blasted them into low earth orbit like SpaceX. Thanks Scott for spotting the green UFOs and picking the pieces up off the side of the trail.

They haven’t been back on the truck since. I think that was 2017 or 2018. Anyone wanna by a set of unused traction boards with low space flight miles? They’re in my garage.

Glass Fenders is next on the list, but probably deserve their own post. Maybe next year.

 

Updated my To Do list. We got a long way to go, kids.

 

I'm curious about this Blown Motor item you have on your list. I'll set a reminder for your 2026 update to check it out

 

How are you upgrading the icon front suspension now?!?!?

 

Those are just items he hasn’t detailed in the build thread.. pretty sure he has all those items already completed on the truck, at least last time I saw it

 

Yep, this.
We already did all that shit, I’ve just been too lazy/drunk to write any of it up in a meaningful way.

But also, I may or may not be scheduling time with ICON to participate in some tuning and research for an updated front and rear suspension.

When it all comes together it’ll be pretty much full retard.

 

officially full retard

 

Nothing better than full retard

 

I am pretty happy with my icon 2.5 upfront. I suspect in the future when I add bumper/ winch and other “stuff” I may want to upgrade. Looking forward to see what you and Icon work out.

 

Did you regear on 37's? Im currently on 35's and have been wanting to get 37's next on stock 4:30 gears