Well, I haven't been doing much with this except driving it. A couple notable things have occurred with it lately though. First and foremost, the moment you all have been waiting for (well, I have anyways), I got this super-lightweight, super-aerodynamic machine over 20mpg!! Yessir, we got a 20.55mpg tank out of it. I'm not sure how it happened, but I did the math three times and it worked out the same each time. Of course the next tank was 16.83 (I have no idea whatsoever how THAT happened), but that was followed my a 19.95, so I am counting the 16.83 as an anomaly. All along, I was hoping to get over 20mpg with this 6600lb machine and I finally got it. Hopefully I can repeat it here soon. Ironically, that 20.55 had some stop and go, some extended idle time and some A/C time on it as well (this time of year, the only time the A/C is on is when my wife is in the truck).
I finally got around to regearing the front axle. I picked up a set of like-new, used 3.73 gears. I then managed to match schedules with an old friend of mine to help with the install--thanks Brooce!! Everything to do with the gears went as smooth as could be, but I had some issues with water in the hubs. I am not sure how it got in as all of the seals and the washers under the screws are new, but there was definitely water in there at some time. Upon removal of the locking hub, I was greeted with rust everywhere. The left side was worse than the right as it required replacement of the outer wheel bearing and race due to rust issues. Immediately on the inside of the bearing was perfect--no water got past the bearing. On the right side, no water even got to the bearing. I only had to clean up the mess in the splined area of the hub. I will have to do some more looking to see how the water got in as it could only come from rain and/or driving in rain as the front axle has not been submerged in water.
On a completely different note, some of you may remember when I built the exhaust for this I built one section of it twice--one section with a muffler and the same section without a muffler. Well, Saturday morning I swapped the muffler-less pipe into the truck. Wow, what a difference. There is not too much noise difference idling and driving with a light foot without a muffler vs having a muffler, but when the hammer goes down this thing sounds like a whizzed off semi with and angry exhaust note. I took my boy for a ride to pick something up and when we got in I asked him if it sounded any different. He said no. Cruising out of the neighborhood I asked him again and he said no. Once we got out of the neighborhood, I got on it. I looked over at him and he had this ear-to-ear grin going on that was almost too big for his face. I asked him again and he said it sounded like a semi(truck)-racecar. I'm not sure what a semi(truck)-racecar sounds like, but if it sounds like this thing under heavy throttle, then it sounds pretty damn cool. We had a great time listening to the turbo wail and the exhaust howl and ended our day at a weekly car show.
It was a whole bunch of fun. In the end, I'm not sure who laughed more, me or him.
Great times!!
I did add a little bling to the unit this weekend. I have to thank Kert from
diy4x for the idea and Scott (mrk5) from
Big Horn Graphics for the excellent product.
I will let it speak for itself:
I realize it will not add the twenty hp that a performance parts sticker will, but I like it better anyways.