Squeak Build

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09 T Alpha Adventure 99k and counting

I call it Squeak. It squeaks, and creaks. When I was younger I probably would have torn the entire truck apart fixing every last one. These days I'm more eh who cares? Plus tearing out the dash isn't a thrilling prospect, I'll wait till the heater core blows.

Dealer Lot

Picked Squeak up in march and went straight home and ordered mirrors and door handles for it. Found the steps on fleabay for dirt cheap. Had to order a couple parts which we wound up negotiating with the dealer into the price. The guy before was a rather large dude and the drivers cushion and trim was pretty much destroyed so I ordered new ones.

Other than that I didn't really do much except drive it until lately while I sorted out what I wanted to do with it and squirrel some fun tickets away for later.

It had an Extang tri fold on it, had a few broken clips that they no longer made according to them and it wasn't usable as it was so I tossed the whole cover and found a slant back for pretty reasonable.

Guess what? After a couple months I hate the slant back, sold it this month and a guy is coming to pick it up. Visibility is none. I like it from certain angles but the way it overlaps the bed and drops the body line down makes it look... funny. Good riddance. Once he picks it up I am ordering a roll type tonneau.

Found a shiny new red grille on fleabay for not so cheap but since they never pop up and you can't get them makes not so cheap is as cheap as it gets. Paint wasn't bad, a hundred bucks. Figured while I was working on the grille I may as well level it, you know since it's completely unrelated. 4 Bilsteins and some bump stops later.

Been stockpiling some stuff.

New seat belt, the drivers was pretty well sprung out from the previous owner and didn't like retracting much. It's reeeeeeeally annoying.

Some wheels showed up along the way. Pro Comp 69 series 16x8. All 5 of them were 405 shipped. Thanks autoanything!

By some miracle I managed to score a nos UCP and Brush Guard at the same time.

Got some plans for this as soon as some other parts arrive for it.

 

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Had to get one of these

So I could have one of these wireless H2O winches

Off with the old

On with the new, threw a flat link on there to see how I like it.

New plugs, wires, air filter and cleaned the throttle body since it was disgusting made a huge improvement in how Squeak runs

This helped a bit too but was pretty freaking annoying getting it lined up to install.

No pics but around this time I also popped in a new head unit and speakers a 5 channel amp and threw a ten behind the drivers seat. I don't have passengers often so no loss there.

Put in the GM performance exhaust, yea that was fun. Both studs on the tail pipe broke, awesome cut it out with a sawzall and ordered a new tail pipe. Had to remove the rear bumper, and half the rear fender to get it in there. 30 minute project that took 3 hours. Probably would have been faster to just unbolt the bed and jack it up.

 

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Current Projects to do:

New radiator being delivered. I know how these guys like to puke on the inside and kill the tranny. I'll just put a new one in every 60k.

Cortex tuner sitting in the box forever.

My truck wasn't a garage queen so I've been fixing a few minor things. Grabbed some of the oem off road mats. Debated quite a while on replacing the rest of the oem leather since I already did the drivers cushion, got a bunch of small nicks, scuffs and general wear on the seats. Finally said screw it and ordered some Katzkins for it since they were pretty much the same price as ordering oem replacement leather. Should be in later this month.

The front mount lamp kit didn't come with the lights, which is great since I didn't want them anyway. Ordered some Piaa's to fill the holes which should actually put out some light.

Haven't gotten around to installing the UCP yet, want to take it in and have the tranny serviced first.

The great tire debate. Spent weeks researching tires. I hate tire shopping, you spend weeks analyzing and agonizing over all the choices. I finally decided to go with the new BFG KO2's in a 33. I borrowed my cousins 35's on XD wheels for a week, hated it. Since I'm mostly 90% on 10% off road and use it as a DD the mpg and performance hit just wasn't worth 35's for me. I'll stick with an aggressive 33 AT this time. They should show up at the end of the month. I really wanted the H3T steelies but they turn to rust buckets too fast. I like a simple wheel, nothing blingy and not much to clean. Had the 69's on the H2 and liked them.

EG flairs just showed up. Waiting on tires.



Future projects to do:

Starr Hid, probably order those this month so I can get the front lamps in at the same time and be done tearing the front apart. My other car has adaptive hid, I swear I feel blind in the T after having them.

Aluminum roll tonneau as soon as the Slant back is gone.

Sliders - not a big fan of Rocky Road but there isn't anything else.

After that it's overhaul mode. Every bushing, control arm, steering rack etc. front to rear is getting replaced. Then I may pull the dash and fix that squeak. Maybe.

 

[Bigunit]

Great looking T and nice write-up.

 

[RazorbackH3]

Nice T. Congrats on finding it and good luck on the modifying/overhauling. :thumbs:

 

[H3slate]

Nice T, do you have any desire to have the oem rubber mats that match your interior?

 

[Ghostbuster]

Awesome. I'm looking forward to the katskinz

 

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Working on some more projects. Picked up the oem light kit sans lights and put some Piaa in there

Big brown truck dropped off this box

Pretty straightforward installation, even if they don't bother including instructions.

Still working on this stuff. Upholstery is a chore to install and get everything lined up correctly. Easy to do a half assed install but I wanted all the stitching and piping lined up correctly. Buy lots of hog rings and bring buckets of patience. The worst part was actually the center console, real bugger getting that thing lined up. Would go a lot faster the next go round, it takes awhile to figure out the magic pattern they must use when installing the hog rings to get everything sitting where it is supposed to. You will want a helper when getting those plastic rails locked back together on the seat backs and headrests.

Came out great, the vanilla color matches the oem cashmere perfectly, paired with the brown really makes it a bit more luxury looking. Everyone who hops in immediately ohhs and ahhs over it. Spendy upgrade, but it is a definite upgrade, the leather is miles apart from oem and your rear no longer slides around. My seats had seen a fair bit of truck use. Replacing it with factory would have cost more, plus I got 450 back for the oem interior on ebay.

Have to find where the rest of the pics went for the Katzkins.


Looks like the 33's are going on the H3, Picked up some 315's from 4wheel parts for an after xmas steal, picking them up today.