He bought a champagne coloured SR dual cab last year new, wasnt long before the bug bit. Sourced a tub liner from one of my workmates for $100 and threw that in, chased it down with a canopy and roof racks from ARB to improve secure storage in the tray. An electronic rust prevention doo-dad was 'installed' by the toyota dealer in Darwin (eh-hem... yeah... ), found out later it was tec-screwed through the firewall and the positive lead was jammed in under the battery terminal without so much as a terminal on it. Thanks Bridge Toyota, your service is superseded only by your rediculous prices! A few other bits went in, but then the bug bit.
Hard!
I used to work for an ARB dealer in the Adelaide Hills so got the call from AJ to see if ARB were taking the mickey charging over $650 for a dual battery system. Did the maths and indeed the mickey was being pulled hard! Decided that if we were doing the dual battery, might as well do all the auto electrics and a few other odds and sodds, so went shopping and got the bits n pieces needed, stole the car from him for a week and here are some of the results.
Dual battery tray was sourced from ARB and an exide 100AH battery slotted into the rear left corner of the tray. A Redarc SB112 solenoid was used and wired into an override switch in the cab to link the batteries in the event of the main going flat. Got tested recently when the main battery dropped a cell and worked a treat. Red arrow shows where the circuit breakers are mounted out of the way
Made up a plate to sit in the right rear corner of the engine bay from 4mm marine ally plate sourced from a local boat builder, cost nothing for a bit 60cm x 40cm, so was pretty happy. laid out two fuse boxes (Narva 6 and 10 position ones respectively), six for the feed from the main batt, 10 for the auxillary feed. Circuit breakers mounted near each battery provided the protection for the system and everything was heat shrunk and conduitted to within an inch of its life.
The same plate was used to relocate and correctly install the rust protection unit, the breathers for a Billet RaceCraft diff and transfer case/ Gearbox breather kit, and the relays for the driving lights. The blue air lines are for the diff breather kit and adds a little 'bling'
One of the handiest mods you'll do - at the front of the board (red arrow) is a switch for the under bonnet LED light. This is a 31 LED sealed unit from LED Technologies that throws enough light at night to check fluids, batteries and other bits and pieces without having to fart about with a torch. The LED was mounted centrally and the wire was conduitted, run down the right side of the bonnet and fed out near the windscreen washer water supply.
In this pic, the light is shown with the top arrow, and the switch postion the bottom one.
more to follow
If you ever need some metal offcuts give me a bell. Workshop in Winnellie
