What have you done to your 2.5 gen Tundra today?

I modified and installed an actuator for electric tailgate locking. It wasn't too hard to do with the cheapest actuator on Amazon. I made a bracket to bolt the actuator itself to the righthand side of the handle assembly. To locate the actuator itself: there's a black plastic arm coming off of the tailgate handle assembly, and that arm has a vertical shaft sticking up from it. The key cylinder lever moves that shaft back and forth. You just mount the actuator inline with the movement of that shaft, oriented like in the picture.

Then I made a .090" flat steel traverse arm with a hole in one end just big enough for a #4 screw to join it to the actuator, and on the other end a hole just big enough to slip over the vertical shaft coming off of the black plastic arm. I removed the lever off of the key cylinder, put the flat steel traverse arm down over the black plastic shaft, and then replaced the key cylinder lever. The key cylinder lever now does dual duty as a retainer for my new traverse arm.

There's just enough actuator travel to do the trick, so the location of the actuator has to be just right. In my case I measured carefully to get just the right length of traverse arm. But I could just as well have built the actuator bracket with slots to allow the actuator to be repositioned. But one way or the other, you do have to get the actuator in just the right position. But once properly adjusted it works 100%.

 

love the lego man headrests

 

They just in case I'm short on gas money...

 

I had been planning this installation for months before I finally decided to do it. Mainly due to complexity and time. Especially if it's 4x4 which adds more work. If it is 4x4, you must remove the front differential temporarely and cut one of the crossmember.







I don't have much experience doing this kind of thing but I like to do it and learn as much as I can. There were many things that concerned me. But the things that worried me the most were two things. First, How to do this safely in the garage of my house. I made a wooden base for the jack stands. This way I didn't have to use them at maximum height. Also, added two additional jack stands and placed 4 rear wheel chocks. I bought an adapter for the jack to help lower the front differential. The other thing was time since for me this is a hobby and the time I have is limited. I tried to organize and think of all the possible things I would need to have available before I began.

At this point I cannot recommend one thing or another because I am still in the process. But when I finish I can give you all the details and lessons learned so that you can make a decision with detailed data.

I'm recording everything and my plan is to make a video with all the details, including those that aren't mentioned in the installation guide.

 

Man, cutting the cross member underneath the differential isn't for the faint of heard. Good on your for tackling such a project

 

Installed the Driver Side Grab Handle last Friday and installed some E Track to bed rail adapters so I could install some storage bins. I could have added T Nuts directly to the bins, but with the E Track I have more options and they are easy to remove if needed. I ordered another set of adapters and bins for the front as well.

 

There's a Florida thread somewhere on here (or maybe southeast US thread); maybe post this question in there for a better response and more relevant exposure....

 

Good for you doing it on your own. When you finish you will know that it was done right. I’ve done many lift kits, body lifts , leveling kits but never a lift when I had to cut the crossmember, but I think I’m familiar enough with tools that I can do it… but yes it’s a hobby for me too, but man do I have a lot of nice tools! Thanks for the follow up, I’ll keep tabs on the build

 

I did a similar thing with the universal kit on Amazon. Can't beat 2 actuators for $9. That was about 3 years ago and still works well. Just gotta bend the mounting just right and mount the actuator with the right amount of travel for the piston to get full extension. I had all the wiring already so it saved me just about $200 vs buying the kit from the dealer.

 

More camping. 75 mins from home. <3 AZ

 

Good stuff... Going to have to double that drive to get out of the heat pretty soon.

 

What RTT is that? Looks very slim. I like the profile.

 

You’re spot on, brother.

 

Inspired overland RTT. Only 4” tall & 90lbs. It’s like it’s not even up there. It’s not roomy by any means but large enough for the wife and I up there no problem.

 

I really like the interior on my 2017 CrewMax SR5. Mostly.

What I don't like is the cheap feeling shifter knob.

My truck had 150K when I got it. And the spot where your thumb rests on the shifter was kind of worn down and kind of sticky.

So I dug through my junk box and found a knurled aluminum shift lever. But it was drilled/tapped too large. So I drilled it about an inch deeper and tapped it to 8-1.25. And that was definitely better than stock. But it kind of sticks up too far in the air and was almost hitting my cell phone holder.

So I decided to go low tech: this morning I grabbed a red Snooker ball. Drilled it inch and a half deep with a 17/64ths bit. And then tapped it 8-1.25.

Perfection!

 

Is it comfortable?

 

Baller. Looks like the TRD shift knobs you sometimes see in 6MT Tacomas

 

Running the same on mine...

 

Looks like a red lollipop

 

Painted my wheels with Spraymax 2k Hot Rod Black.

 

Painted? They look powder coated. Good job!

Now...just avoid the curbs!

 

Nice, those look great for an at-home job

 

Thanks. I should have powder coated them. took 2 months of weekends to do them. the wheels came off my 2017 that i had stored in the garage. i had the TRD Pro wheels on the 17 but got in a head on collision with that one and totaled the truck. i would have bought new TRD Pro wheels but the price doubled since i bought them last. im not spending over 3k for wheels. In less than 2 weeks i found a 2021 limited to replace my 17.

 

Nice looking wheels and you did a great job of painting them!

 

Loved that truck. I just paid it off before this guy came in my lane.

 

What hit you?

all ok?

 

Holy shit, glad you're still here to tell the tale!

 

Gotta love a truck that gives it's life to save yours!

 

Glad youre ok. What did the other car look like?