Blue Ribbon 4x4 Build Thread

Starting to pre assemble the air line stuff. I bought these last month for myself and all the guys on the jobsite. They kick ass! The jaws stay parallel and are smooth so they don’t mar the fittings. I also do a lot of plumbing it just looks nice when angle stops aren’t all chewed up from channel locks.


IRWIN VISE-GRIP Adjustable Pliers, Plumbing, Tongue & Groove, 8-Inch (IRHT82635)

$27 IRWIN VISE-GRIP Adjustable Pliers, Plumbing, Tongue & Groove, 8" (IRHT82635)

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07QM9L5VR

 

Dang, I deleted my compressor line post to edit it and forgot to do any of that.
I have the

$165 Smittybilt 2781 Smittybilt 5.65 CFM Air Compressor - 2781

Smittybilt 2781 under the hood. My old setup just had a 1/4” line going to the rear bumper with a quick connect. From there I had a four-way hose to fill the tires all at the same time. Fill up from 15psi to 38psi was about 10 minutes, not including wrestling the damn 50-60ft of hose to the tires and roll up.


So in interest of giving the compressor a break and not have to push all that air in a 1/4” line to fill four tires, I upgraded to a 3/8” nylon hose to a splitter next to the windshield washer reservoir. In-line is a 70-100psi pressure switch to shut off the compressor and not blow the line.



In the splitter is an air pressure gauge, a valve for the inlet, two 1/4” outlets, and one 3/8” outlet. The two 1/4” outlets go to the two front fender liners. The 3/8” outlet goes to the rear crossmember in front of the spare tire. There, I installed a second splitter, holding three 1/4” outlets. These go to each rear fender well, and the rear bumper quick connect.



When I originally built the four-way hose, I bought a 100ft air hose. So with the leftover, I made four-five foot hoses with closed air chucks.
Now I can hit the compressor button in the truck, and it fills the line to 100psi. I attach the four hoses from each fender to tire, then open the valve to the first splitter. This starts to fill the tires and activates the compressor to do it’s job. When the pressure gets close to 40 psi on the air pressure gauge, I just close the valve and the gauge gives me an accurate psi measurement on the tires. The pressure switch cuts off the compressor, the air chuck lines get disconnected and I’m on my way.

I’ve tested it twice so far and I can’t believe how much faster the entire procedure is compared to the 4 way line. Actual fill up time is now approximately 7 minutes, and the compressor sounds much smoother and quieter. One day I’ll upgrade to a dual compressor and that time will shorten, but for right now I’m super happy with this new setup.

 

In hindsight, I should have put one 3/8” line from the rear splitter to the rear quick connect, instead of the 1/4”. But that can be remedied.

 

So the wife is out of state for a month, and I have a few things I’ve been procrastinating on. I’ll have time to do them, hopefully. If I post this here, I’ll be holding myself accountable for getting them done.
I have the materials for all these mods, as they’re just sitting on my bench.
1. Paint brake calipers with Por15
2. Raptor line front bumper
3. Suede headliner
4. Black accompanying plastics to headliner.
5. Change headlight color

In the meantime, I’ve been bombing around my whereabouts.

 

The headliner project has me interested…

 

I’ve done a ton of homework, I have the suede, I just gotta commit!

 

I want 1) black and 2) something patches will actually stick to.

 

They sell it in 60” too

 

I see a bunch of people with patches on their headliner, I just assumed they stick. I guess I was incorrect, I wonder what they use.

 

I don’t want the headliner to look like public hair…

they kind of do, but it takes some mashing and then hoping/praying no one touches them or looks at them sideways.

 

Well Geno, can’t believe I’ve never came across your thread, my apologies for the bombardment of “likes.” But geeze, this is awesome! I literally read your whole thread today from the time I got to work…. Hopefully I have a work order to bill my time too for work lol.

Great work man. Love it!

 

Just use work order B@D@$$-B1U3-B!U1D and you'll be fine.

 

I’ll send it in to get that WO added to our tracker! Lol

 

Thanks Kevin!! I really appreciate the compliments!!

 

The beginning…….

 

More pieces removed, adhesion promoter and SEM black going down. Headliner out!!

 

Kinda late night, getting things done before the weekend.
Friday will be sound deadening.
Saturday will be the headliner glue up. Sunday everything will hopefully be reinstalled.
Wondering-anyone ever used fabric spray paint? I’m trying to avoid reupholstering the sun visor.

 

Sound deadening done, I was afraid to cover the crossmembers. I’m unsure the headliner will sit properly if I wrap over them. Looking at the back of the headliner it looks to be ok, but wrestling with this thing by myself, I don’t want any issues when it comes time to reinstall. I thumped on the ceiling and there’s a huge difference. I’m mostly trying to deaden road noise.

 

Almost ready for the glue-up. Everything is painted, I’m not 100% happy with the sun visors. One of the warning stickers wouldn’t come off, so it ended up glossy. I’ll be covering it with a decal. We’ll see what happens.

 

Black. Suede. Headliner.

 

Headliner done. The sun visors got black American flag decals to cover the old decals. Took about three hours to put everything back together. This was a pretty fun project, once I was brave enough to tackle it. It’s hard as hell to get good pictures of black headliner dammit.

 

Update: there’s a huge difference in road noise in the truck. The sound deadening material took a lot of the echo and “snow” noise. Stereo sounds thumpier. I never had rattles, all the doors had sound deadening already, but definitely less resonance in the cab. The roof definitely is a weak point for good sound from your stereo, but my goal was road noise. I was always reminded of it when I drive my wife’s Acura, which is almost silent. As soon as I had everything installed I hit 70mph nearby and the difference was amazing. Very happy with this install.

 

Just a small upgrade. New NVX 12” dual voice coil subwoofer and NVX NDA102 amplifier. Really cleaned up the wiring and upgraded the power lead and ground to actual 4 gauge. The bass is so much cleaner and I can really crank it now. I need to do some tuning but that will be for tomorrow.

 

I mean, you HAVE to with all that sound deadening you upgraded with!! Looking good as always!!

 

Helpers are helping as usual I see.

 

Looks so amazing!! No black headliner in the 2.5 gen has been one of my biggest gripes! Thanks for being the example to show our wives there is someone more dedicated to their truck than the rest of us.

 

Thank you sir!!