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My '04 Build/Messin' with it Thread

45K views 195 replies 29 participants last post by  x_mods 
#1 ·
Not much of a build thread as I commute with the truck, but I do **** with stuff on it constantly so I will this thread to document it. Oh. I don't pay other people to work on my truck for me.

What I've done on it:

- Secondary kitty delete, mandrel bent 2.25" into a single 3" outlet from an Edelbrock SDT muffler and a Summit glasspack.
- Deleted the airbox resonators
- Misc. BS in the interior
- BO'd the headlights
- Swapped to a '00 rear end - necessity mod, not performance

That's about. Her name is Super Bunny.

Bunny hasn't been getting much love lately, but that's the way its supposed to be. Finally swapped out the rear end for a fresh one from a 2000 Frontier. While it physically bolts up, there are a couple amenities that don't translate very well - namely emergency brake and ABS.

I don't really care about ABS so I took the cluster apart, taped over the ABS light and pulled the ABS fuse to disable the system. Done and done. E-brake is another issue. The cable that came with the 2000 rear end came with does not even come close to fitting my '04 so I need to look at some things. I may be able to simply swap axles and then I'll have the right hubs to run my '04 ebrake setup since I no longer care about ABS ('00 exciter rings are on each axle, '04 has a single one on the pinion). While I did give up the locker in the '04, the '00 doesn't howl or cost $350 in parts to fix. Good enough for me.

I added my buddy's present, a nice little red top Optima. I fabricated a downpipe and new tubing before his kitty on his turbo'd Civic and this was my payment.




And then I started addressing the tiny sump issue that I'm not happy with.

Stock oil pan with some Sharpie marks on it.




After the Sharpie marks were removed.




Arts and crafts time.




The same in metal.



I just need to connect the front, a skinny section on the rear, make a drain plug section and also make and weld in a windage tray. Stock dipstick guide is still in place and this should have increased the capacity by around 2 quarts. I'll find out for sure once its all welded and painted up.
 
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#3 ·
I ran it dry and I think it ate one or more of the pinion shims. I need to tear it down - in my copious spare time - and figure out where the howl is coming instead of throwing $150 Nissan bearings at it and finding the noise doesn't go away. The '00 rear end was $200 complete and is doing the trick.

I need to rebuild the motor because the truck about died on me because the previous owner never changed the oil. Top end looks just as bad, at least I was able to clean all this mess up.








Motor is coming out in Feb/March and I'll rebuild it because I will have a couple continuous weeks of decent weather to ride the bike as a daily while my truck is deadlined.
 
#4 ·
Oh man that sucks to hear the previous owner did not care for bunny as much as you do.

Im curious as to why you enlarged the oil pan?

With the extra oil its going to take the truck longer to warm up, and the sump you built looks like it would hang quite low catching on things?

I know more oil will help keep u lubed in high G situations and absorb more heat and the larger pan will help with the oil contamination/grime that you have leftover from the previous owner...

I am just curious as to your reasoning behind this?
 
#6 · (Edited)
Doesn't hang any lower than normal as I left the lowermost part of the pan as a guide. My rationale is that 3.7 quarts on a 3.3L OHC V6 is nowhere near enough oil. Its not about high Gs because these trucks are too slow to pull any.

I look at other motors as a guide. A standard 1.6L 4-banger honda civic runs just as much - and in some cases more - oil as the 3.3L Nissan. My 2.5L V6 Lexus ran just over 8 quarts. My 3.5L Ford Edge also runs about 8 quarts. Looking at my oil at every change compared to my other vehicles, I cringe when it comes out of the pan.

I'm not sure where you're getting the longer to warm up thing. That's pretty much based on engine coolant and not oil.

Yikes! This is the second time I've see those pics and it still makes me cringe(sludge).
Nice work. It doesn't hang any lower than stock, right? Or am I wrong?
Nope you're correct. Stock depth. Since I don't have all the 4x4 crap, there is gobs and gobs of room by the cross member to accommodate the larger sump.

Plus that stupid kickout section where the drain plug is makes it really difficult to get those four pan bolts out when you remove the pan. So I cut that section out of my re-designed pan.
 
#7 ·
Ah, I guess I have not had a vehicle that had high amounts of oil. I did not know there was a difference, I am going to have to test some to see the difference, thanks.

I just figured if you had more engine oil, that means there is more substance to absorb heat. Causing the engine to take longer to reach operating temperature, was I confused?

It just came to mind because you mentioned it was cold outside…
 
#9 ·
I see your line of thinking, but the water jackets and coolant plays the biggest role in engine operating temperature, oil temp is a very minor player in it. This might be a concern if I was expanding the sump by an awful lot outside of its normal footprint or if we didn't have the skid plate (wind protection), but not really even then. Look at small block chevy motors. Milodon makes 10-quart pans for those bad boys. This pan will hold right around 5.5 - 6 quarts when I'm done.

Sorry to see those pics Foos, congrats on the bike tho, when did you pick that up? And do I dare ask how the volvo is?
I physically pick it up on Monday.

The volvo.....yeah that one broke me. I've parted out pretty much all the aftermarket bits and now I just need to get rid of/sell the carcass. I will probably have to get creative with it though as there is not much demand for the parts.
 
#10 ·
I guess I don't follow the reason for the extra oil in the truck. I've seen a couple guys build a larger pan and longer pickup so when they are wheeling the can still be pulled out of the pan when their truck is at a 45. However, I am not sure what would be the benefit of adding more oil to an engine. Now if the engine was not getting enough oil I could understand.

Just thinking, I am not trying to pick.
 
#13 ·
Read this post below.

Adding more oil to the engine means more oil for lubricating. Cycling 8 quarts through an engine vs 4 quarts over a 3 month period means that the oil will break down less and stay cleaner over that period of time. That is why some engines like the jeep cherokee straight 6's from the 90's & 80's were considered "bulletproof". They cycled 7 or 8 quarts through a small 4.2 l engine.

You can even see it in newer vehicles now. In the late 90's F150s would take like 4 1/2 quarts and now all the new trucks (chevys,ford, dodge) have added an oil cooler and larger oil pans so 7 or 8 quarts can be put in on most models.
Bingo.

I agree. I like the larger pan idea.. its scary that my truck uses the same amount of oil as my ladies lil 4 banger civic
Exactly my point.

Snap a pic of the oil pan and assorted garbage on the underside of your 4x4 when you get a moment. I'm curious.
 
#11 ·
Adding more oil to the engine means more oil for lubricating. Cycling 8 quarts through an engine vs 4 quarts over a 3 month period means that the oil will break down less and stay cleaner over that period of time. That is why some engines like the jeep cherokee straight 6's from the 90's & 80's were considered "bulletproof". They cycled 7 or 8 quarts through a small 4.2 l engine.

You can even see it in newer vehicles now. In the late 90's F150s would take like 4 1/2 quarts and now all the new trucks (chevys,ford, dodge) have added an oil cooler and larger oil pans so 7 or 8 quarts can be put in on most models.
 
#14 ·
An oil cooler cools the engine oil before being transferred back to the engine. Adding a cooler would up your capacity of oil needed to run the engine.

Just adding a larger pan to hold oil would not allow the oil to be cooler.

Your oil pickup oil allows X amount of oil to cycle through the engine. So extra oil will not allow the engine to cycle any more extra oil at any given time.

Now if you are concerned about cleaning the oil the oil then wouldn't replacing the oil sooner do the same thing?

I'm sorry I am just not seeing the logic. Though I could be missing something.
 
#16 ·
Yes, I could follow a forced induction oil change schedule and change it every 2000 miles but that's stupid. This was never a matter of allowing the oil to be cooler, I'm not sure where you're getting that. I would have installed an oil cooler if that was my goal. I also understand that there is a finite about of oil that the pickup can - well, pick up - and that's already met by the stock pan.

My concern is premature wear of the oil that resides in the vehicle. More oil means the load/wear is spread across a larger volume thereby increasing the oil's life expectancy during a normal change interval. There is also a safety margin thing here. 1/2 to 1 quart low on a 3.7 quart system is disastrous. Not that I let that happen to my truck, but there's nothing wrong with having a net below you when you're on the tight rope.

And one more important factor:

I have a garage full of tools, the ability to weld and fabricate, and I felt like doing this.

Pics of not a lot of room.
Ah. Oh well, looks like you 4x4 folks are arse out if you wanted a larger (and apparently superfluous) oil pan.

But FrankenPan is done.

A little windage tray action.




Then some paint and more paint. I cut the drain plug section out of an old D16 (96-00 Honda Civic motor) pan sitting in my scrap pile.






Now to just find some time to install it!
 
#17 ·
The other gentleman note that newer trucks are coming out with oil coolers and require more oil. I was pointing out that if you have an oil cooler you will need to add more oil.

You are good at welding for sue and you are doing it because you can (sort of like my efan mod). I was just trying to understand the reasoning.
 
#18 · (Edited)
Damn foos! let us know how much more capacity you get!!

And JoeFrontier: When you add an oil cooler, you can add to your capacity because extra oil will hang out in their. Granted an oil cooler is great for cooling oil, but on some vehicles, their is no space for a bigger pan so you can add an oil cooler as another way to up your capacity.

Haha, looks like we posted at about the same time so you already get it..... I like your write ups joe.
 
#20 ·
Wicked looking oil pan my good man! Excellent idea for adding more oil. There's no reason our motor should have such a small oil capacity. It's a truck for crying out loud. I'm adding an oil cooler and remote filter to get more capacity in my 4x4. Should get me between 1 1/2 to 2 quarts more oil capacity. I off-road this thing and would like to go more than 3000 miles between oil changes.

My 2006 4.0L jeep wrangler I-6 takes 6 quarts every oil change. That motor is known to last 200-300k miles if properly maintained. I used to have a Chevy trailblazer. 7 quarts of oil. I used to get between 9-10,000 miles before the computer told me it was time for a change.
 
#21 ·
I'm adding an oil cooler and remote filter to get more capacity in my 4x4. Should get me between 1 1/2 to 2 quarts more oil capacity.
well I guess I can add these to my list of to-do's haha
 
#22 ·
LOL - all it takes is money.

Pan is in! I had to remove my windage tray but I'm not to worried about windage as the pickup tube and mains casting will accomplish that. Once that was removed, it fit like a glove.

First a couple comparison shots.








And now installed. Its a little hard to see, but she tucks up in there quite nicely with plenty of clearance all the way around.







And the best thing is that she now takes an even six quarts of oil!!
 
#24 ·
Hey Speedfoos, Hows the new pan working out with driving around ? Flawless ? It came out nice.

I'm always a fan of custom stuff. I have a Lincoln MIG and don't know how I got by without it.
 
#28 ·
Nice ride ! Be careful out there. There's ALOT of idiots driving around.

I'm still currently out of work for a bike accident I was in (high side) back in the beginning of Oct. Broke my Tibea and Fibula and a separated shoulder. Had a titanium rod installed inside the tib. Bad spiral fracture. Dr said I probably would have died if I wasn't wearing my helmet. My head hit the ground hard and drug.
I was only doing 30mph when the guy popped out right in front of me from between two cars and completely cut out my lane (my only lane with no shoulder). He didn't look and neither did the guy who flagged him out. Merry xmas to him.
 
#30 ·
Thanks. I just got new x-rays yesterday. Bone is healing nicely. Should be back to work sometime in Febuary.

Couldn't see the guy till he was there. No way he could have seen me because he didn't come out slowly while looking. I was the first one waiting at a red light during rush hour on a 2 lane undivided road. There was at least 10+ cars in the opposite direction waiting to go. Light turns green, I go. Passed a few of the opposing cars while accelerating and BAM. There he was from the left. Seemingly out of nowhere. I steered to the right while braking hard to try to minimize the damage. Locked the front wheel and caught his corner panel. Did a somersault, landed high side and skidded to a stop with my bike pushing me. I would have walked away from it if my foot wasn't pionted the wrong way when the bike came down on it. I was never a fan of helmets till this. If it had been warmer that morning, I wouldn't have been wearing it.

Even after all this, i'll probably ride again. Like you said . ."Keep your eye on the monkey in the cage." They are liable to throw feces at you from time to time.

Keep up the great mods !
 
#31 ·
Sorry to hear about the accident airbag. I had my first accident in 04. Lifted truck no less.. ran a stop sign, clipped my front wheel and took off. Slid into the curb head first, and still managed to try to chase him down.. bike was a no go tho.

Ride safe FOOS!
 
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