Mailman's Off Road Build and Adventure Thread

Hey everyone,

I've been around for a while and have been wanting to put this together, but I wanted to have a few more things to start it all off with. The point of this thread will be to capture maintenance, mods, and all the off road fun I have with my 2010 HSE, as well as help answer questions about my rig or just talk about offroading in general. The goal with this truck is all about offroading, but it does also do daily driving duties as well. I am located up in New Hampshire and belong to a 4x4 club, so most of my adventures will be on public, unmaintained Class VI (NH) or Class IV (VT) roads, hopefully the North Maine Woods, and any private property that my club has access to. My big goal (whether it happens with this rig or the next) is to do the Trans America Trail, but that is a long-term one that I want to do with the family when the kids are old enough to appreciate it.

Mods completed so far:

• ProSpeed sump guard
• ProSpeed rock sliders
• Goodyear Wrangler Adventure AT in 255/65/19 (32in tires)
• Frontrunner roof rack

There are lots of rocks poking out everywhere up in the Northeast and trails are tight, so having as much underbody protection as possible is absolutely a requirement if you want to wheel as hard as possible without worrying about bashing a rock. ProSpeed says the sump guard doesn't fit but Lucky8 said they had fitted them to the 4.4L Jag motors, and I had no problems fitting it to my 5.0L. I will say it was a very tight fit and everything just barely came together. They also say they don't fit the supercharged motors, but as far as I can tell, many of the same part numbers for the 5.0L NA and S/C seem to be the same, but I can't say for sure.

The rock sliders were just installed last week, but I wouldn't call it the best installation, both on my part and on the car. First, I didn't have an exact drill bit for the nutserts and I had some problems with my nutsert tool, so that added a lot of unnecessary time. Also, whoever owned the truck previously seriously messed up the jack points on the frame (behind/in front of the tires), which the sliders partially rely on to mount. I overcame all that but would definitely give myself a B- on that one. The ProSpeed trans guard went in just fine, even though there are slight differences in the design of the transmission support crossmembers between the Mk3.1 and the rest. Just some longer caphead bolts and a washer for each bolt and things were good.

Next up were tires. Unfortunately the largest tire size for 19in wheels are the 255/65 size I currently have, and only Goodyear makes them (either the AT Adventure or the Duratrac). Both are fine tires and mine have done great so far, but the AT Adventures were ~$250 cheaper so I went for them. No crazy tire noise on the highway, they are wearing great so far, and they have done very well offroad. Eventually I am going to want to go to 18in wheels and up to 34in tires so standby for that in the (distant-ish, but not) future.

The Frontrunner rack was so I could store the spare tire. It may have fit in the wheel well, but it would have had to been aired down a lot and there were sharp body bolts that were poking through that I didn't want near my tire. The rack has been great and really doesn't introduce too much noise on the road. Is it there, yes, but with the sunroof shade closed I really can't hear it. The two things I really like about the Frontrunner rack are 1: I can transfer it to basically any future rig and 2: they have a lot of accessories to add on more storage when I need it later.

Wishful/future mods:

• 2in lift from SGC
• 34in tires (295/70/18), which will require 18in wheels too
• Rear electronic differential