When to Buy Winter Tires?

Now that I have nice summer tires for my truck it's made me think about purchasing good winter tires for next years season. I could just keep using one set of tires all year long, the ones I have are "all terrain" and would do okay in the snow, but a pair of proper winter tires will be the best. Since I have a spare set of wheels to mount tires on, I figure I might as well use them.
But now the question is when do I want to buy them? In the Fall / Winter prices rise because they're in demand, so I figure the best time to purchase will be once all the snow is melted in April or May and tire dealers are having blow out sales to try and get rid of their out of season products.
I'm looking for tires that are narrow and studded so that they'll handle as good as a winter tire. The main decision maker will be what I can get a good deal on though, if the dealerships don't have that good of deals and are priced higher than I'd like to go I might just wait until I find a used pair locally online or at a yard sale.
Luckily, I've got a few months to find a set of winter tires for the truck, but the sooner I find some, the better.

New Tires, New Look

Before

 Over February break we finally got my car running in tip top shape again, so I finally had a chance to work on the pickup again. The first thing I wanted to do was put on the new tires I had bought last month because I was just sick of having to blow up the ones on the truck every single time I worked on it. 

One of the new tires next to an old one

 These new tires are 31/10.50 tires so they're about an inch or so bigger than the old ones and they're a mud terrain tire so the tread is a lot thicker and widely spaced. They are gonna be the perfect size for me because they aren't insanely big so that I'd need to lift the suspension. At the same time they make the truck sit higher off the ground, give it plenty of traction on and off the road, and look bad ass.

After

It only took me about an hour or so to get the old wheels off and the new on, the I didn't push it into the garage or anything I just brought a jack out to the back and took one wheel off at a time. For the most part they all came off pretty easily but the lug nuts on the front were frozen since the tires were fully flat and buried in the snow.

I love how the wheels turned out, it makes the pickup look so much better already. It's crazy how much new pairs of shoes can completely change how a vehicle looks.

No Car = More Delays

For nearly the past month I've been having trouble with my Subaru. Its been randomly misfiring and we thought we had fixed it but the other day it started doing it again and left me stranded. For a while my sister and I borrowed our mom's car or got rides from friends.
This has lead to me not being able to make it up to my Uncle's house because its hard to get a ride there and back home. If the pickup was at my house I would've been able to make a good amount of progress, but we gotta get it running before we do that.
Once the Subaru's up and running again I plan on working on the truck as much as I can, I'm aiming for twice a week.

My Subaru next to my friend's 95 Toyota Pickup

Off by One Year

After the work I did on Wednesday I was kind of surprised by all the sensors and wires that seemed different on the new engine so I went online and made a post on https://www.facebook.com/groups/PICKUPMAFIA/. I asked if anyone else had done the same engine swap as me and what to expect with getting it to hook up right. 

When I woke up in the morning I had a load of replies, I think it was around 29 comments or so. All of the responses were helpful but not exactly what I wanted to read... Most of them were telling me how it'll work but the cabs harness wont hook up to the engine's computer. They also told me which parts / sensors I might need to swap out in order for it to work.
Luckily, the engine will still work I'm just gonna have to do a bit more work than I hoped. I'm going to look into it some more next time I'm up and see if there's some adapter or re-wire that I can do. If not, I'll take apart the dash and put in a whole new wiring harness to adapt to the new engine.

Wednesday Work (Vlog)

Here is a video I took while working on my truck yesterday. It highlights what I got done yesterday and the current shape of the project. I’m hoping to be able to work on it twice a week or so from now on.

Weekend Bargain

For the past month or so I've been trying to buy a set of tires for my truck from a friend of a friend; This weekend I was finally able to see them in person and purchase them.

They looked WAY better in person than they did in the photos, the guy had bought them for his pickup a few years back then when he sold it he kept the wheels and they've been sitting in the basement since. I was lucky enough to get all four of the rims and tires for $150, nearly a third of what they're worth. They are pretty large tires, but they aren't too big. I don't want to lift my truck, and the biggest tires that it can fit on its stock suspension are 31/10/50r, That's exactly what these new ones are, so I shouldn't have any issues with them fitting. They're definitely a lot better than my current dry rotted tires that lose air every two weeks, plus they'll give the truck two more inches of ground clearance and a bad ass look.

How Should the Bed Look?

Since I haven't been able to physically go work on the Pickup recently I've done some research on what would go into building a bed since the current one isn't the most stable. The main thing I need for a bed is it to have more structural integrity than wood. Steel is what I plan on using for the framing because its both super strong and cheap. I priced out the steel and for a 5 1/2 foot bed should be around $150 more or less, wayyyy more affordable than buying an original bed.

I've been searching on Google Images and forums to find ideas for how other people have designed theirs. I found a lot of helpful pictures, some of the truck even look exactly like mine.

 These four pictures are my biggest references and luckily the last one is one of my friends, and that means I can go look at it anytime and take measurements to help me out. I plan on doing a mix between his bed with the square steel framing and wooden planks on the floor then adding one of the back racks from the second or first photos.
The hardest part of creating this new bed should be the welding and measurements, but I have a few friends who like to keep busy and will gladly help me out. I plan on taking the bed off in the spring when I do some rust repair on the actual cab of the truck. I figure while I have it off, it'll be a perfect time to refurbish a new one.

Behind Schedule, but Excited to Bounce Back

December was an extremely busy month for me between a new job at Burdicks Chocolate taking up my after school life and homework taking up the rest of my time. That means that the trucks been put aside until mid January when I complete my College Applications. Luckily with the new year comes more school time to work on senior projects so every Wednesday I'll be working on the truck in the afternoons. I've got a plan for all the things I want to complete next, I'll keep posting updates on any progress I make!

The Engine is IN

On December 13th, a few days before I got my manual in the mail my Dad and I went up to my Uncle's garage and we all finally got to work on installing the engine.
The first thing we did was blow up the trucks tires since they're junk and seem to lose air in two weeks or so (no big deal though, I plan on buying newer ones in the spring.) then we pushed it into the heated garage with a tractor and got right to work. Before even touching the engine we had to prepare the transmission with a new release bearing. The old one didn't look that warn but its just one of the things where its such a cheap part, might as well replace it while you have it apart.

After that we hooked the engine up to a pulley and slowly slid it into the engine bay of the truck, it went in a whole lot easier than our previous attempt which was a release. it took a few minutes to align everything up how it was supposed to but once we did the Toyota went up on the lift and we quickly screwed in all the bell housing bolts which attach the transmission to the engine. After that we were kind of tired but we wanted to finish the motor mounts before we left. It took another half an hour or so to line those two up correctly but we eventually did it, the motor was installed in its new home.

Now all we have to do is hook all the cables, hoses, and sensors up... luckily that job isn't the most challenging and I can do most of it by myself!

Another Delivery!

On Giving Day, the day before break, my second book finally arrived! So far I haven't had to use it yet but I skimmed through all the chapters and WOW it has useful information. Step by step procedures on how to do nearly everything on the pickup. This will definitely be one of my most used resources throughout the project right alongside Google.

Busy Busy, but not With the Project...

My Dad and I have basically been working on the truck every Friday as long as the weathers good and neither of us have plans. Over vacation we worked at the beginning but towards the end was Thanksgiving so I was away in Rhode Island. Then this week the clutch Finally came in but Friday's weather didn't cooperate. Hopefully next week everything will be on our side and we can install our new clutch kit and maybe even drop the engine into the pickup and start hooking everything up. It's hard because December is such a hectic month for me with a new after school job, college applications to write, COMPS to work on, a giving day gift to create, AND a senior project. I'll get through it though and once all the other stuff is out of the way I'll have lots of free time to fix my truck.

I guess its time to start fixing the plow too, then once its running I can test how well it does, especially since the snow finally seems like its ready to stay for a while.