Introducing Wilson, the 1st Gen Tacoma with 60k original miles.
2004 Toyota Tacoma TRD
Icon Stage 5 Suspension
17" Raceline 949B 7X
33" BFG K02
Prinsu Roof Rack
Xtrusion Overland Bedrack
Softopper Bed Cover
Trailgear Front Bumper
Roam Rooftop Tent
Baja Designs Squadron Pro Ditch Lights
Baja Designs Ambers
Crazy story about this truck. It was my Grandpa Wilson's truck that he bought brand new in 2004 straight off the showroom floor. Over the course of his 15 years of ownership, he put 60k miles on it. Never drove it in the rain, always kept it in the garage, and followed the Toyota Maintenance program to a "T" recommended by the owners manual. Every service record, oil change, tire-rotation, warranty paper is in a neatly organized binder in the console. He passed in 2019 and it sat in my grandmothers garage for the occasional trip to Home Depot until January of 2022. It wasn't until my 2015 Jeep Wrangler got the tick of death that my fixation on my grandfathers truck became an obsession. My grandmother offered the truck to me at an INSANE deal and I bought it off her. Here's the day I brought it home.
I own a video production company in North Carolina and most of our work up until 2020 was a lot of commercial and documentary work. I've camped my entire life, but our company stumbled into the overland/off-road industry through some mutual connections back when the pandemic started up and people were getting out more. We have a big ford transit production van we use, but it became pretty apparent that we needed a vehicle that was more capable for the shoots we were doing off-road. I offered to build this out into a production truck of sorts to make our shoots more enjoyable, especially when they last multiple days. Plus, it's a good write off :D.
First thing I did was Raptor Line the bed. Lucky for me, my father in law runs a body repair shop with a full paint booth, so he's assisted a lot with this build.
Instead of powder-coating the trailgear bumper, my father in law had recently finished painting his 69 Mustang he's been rebuilding an had some extra paint left over, so we painted it the same color. He spent about a week coating and polishing it, only for me to go smash it down on a rock on my first trip out with it.
Had to wait 5 months for my Icon suspension to come in, but it finally did. My Raceline wheels and BFG's went on at the same time.
Here's a pic from the the most recent trip up in the mountains of NC.
Next plans?
The real purpose of the truck build out begins. I plan on doing a custom drawer slide system for the bed of the truck using 80/20. Basically GooseGear clone since they do not make a system for these trucks. The bed system will be dedicated to all of my overlanding/camping essentials. One drawer will be a full slide out kitchen. Other side will be more campsite gear related. Backseats will be coming out soon and replaced with a seat delete platform also made from 80/20 that will included drawer slides as well. This will be dedicated to camera equipment only. A full renogy dual battery system is ready to be installed with connections to a high-output alternator and 100watts of solar. Will run 200Ah of Lithium since our drone and cinema camera batteries like to suck a lot of juice.
Tundra brakes are ready to be installed whenever I find the time. The stock breaks do not like all of this extra weight.
Lots more to come, but the build has come a long way since January!
2004 Toyota Tacoma TRD
Icon Stage 5 Suspension
17" Raceline 949B 7X
33" BFG K02
Prinsu Roof Rack
Xtrusion Overland Bedrack
Softopper Bed Cover
Trailgear Front Bumper
Roam Rooftop Tent
Baja Designs Squadron Pro Ditch Lights
Baja Designs Ambers
Crazy story about this truck. It was my Grandpa Wilson's truck that he bought brand new in 2004 straight off the showroom floor. Over the course of his 15 years of ownership, he put 60k miles on it. Never drove it in the rain, always kept it in the garage, and followed the Toyota Maintenance program to a "T" recommended by the owners manual. Every service record, oil change, tire-rotation, warranty paper is in a neatly organized binder in the console. He passed in 2019 and it sat in my grandmothers garage for the occasional trip to Home Depot until January of 2022. It wasn't until my 2015 Jeep Wrangler got the tick of death that my fixation on my grandfathers truck became an obsession. My grandmother offered the truck to me at an INSANE deal and I bought it off her. Here's the day I brought it home.
I own a video production company in North Carolina and most of our work up until 2020 was a lot of commercial and documentary work. I've camped my entire life, but our company stumbled into the overland/off-road industry through some mutual connections back when the pandemic started up and people were getting out more. We have a big ford transit production van we use, but it became pretty apparent that we needed a vehicle that was more capable for the shoots we were doing off-road. I offered to build this out into a production truck of sorts to make our shoots more enjoyable, especially when they last multiple days. Plus, it's a good write off :D.
First thing I did was Raptor Line the bed. Lucky for me, my father in law runs a body repair shop with a full paint booth, so he's assisted a lot with this build.
Instead of powder-coating the trailgear bumper, my father in law had recently finished painting his 69 Mustang he's been rebuilding an had some extra paint left over, so we painted it the same color. He spent about a week coating and polishing it, only for me to go smash it down on a rock on my first trip out with it.
Had to wait 5 months for my Icon suspension to come in, but it finally did. My Raceline wheels and BFG's went on at the same time.
Here's a pic from the the most recent trip up in the mountains of NC.
Next plans?
The real purpose of the truck build out begins. I plan on doing a custom drawer slide system for the bed of the truck using 80/20. Basically GooseGear clone since they do not make a system for these trucks. The bed system will be dedicated to all of my overlanding/camping essentials. One drawer will be a full slide out kitchen. Other side will be more campsite gear related. Backseats will be coming out soon and replaced with a seat delete platform also made from 80/20 that will included drawer slides as well. This will be dedicated to camera equipment only. A full renogy dual battery system is ready to be installed with connections to a high-output alternator and 100watts of solar. Will run 200Ah of Lithium since our drone and cinema camera batteries like to suck a lot of juice.
Tundra brakes are ready to be installed whenever I find the time. The stock breaks do not like all of this extra weight.
Lots more to come, but the build has come a long way since January!
