I found the only way to remove torx head bolts like that is to weld a nut with a center hole almost as big as the head of the bolt to it and then use a regular socket and impact on them. Ford uses torx bolts for truck beds and they will never come out whether they are rusty or not.
Yeah the weld on trick works pretty good because it adds heat at the same time. I thought about doing that but the belts were bolted in through the carpet, I was afraid to start a fire, and at the time I didn't plan to remove it. I ended up removing it to try heat and even welded a stud on it but that was after I drilled it through so much there wasn't enough to weld to. So I just kept drilling...
That dark gray carpet looks great
Thanks, I think it will look fine, even brand new vehicles have two tone interiors so dark and light gray should look just fine together.
Me and my son were working on an oil change on my Polaris Ranger, I knew the oil plugs for the differentials are a pain and strip out easy.
The front diff plug was being a pain.
My son had his service truck with him so he said hang on! But you’re not going to like it.
We got out his long barrel Snap on air hammer and an adapter for sockets.
It was a torx head bolt, but anyhow with that and a wrench on the adapter it came out like butter!
He called it shake and break, never fails. He uses it on exhaust manifold bolts on tractors.
I used my M18 impact gun, that one rated for 1200 lb-ft, and it snapped off 3 torx bits almost immediately. I didn't try my air hammer, what is this air hammer socket "adaptor" you speak of?
I have a preposterous amount of experience with sound deadening. I don't know if there has been a product I haven't tried. Some are truly terrible for the price (Noico). On my motorhome I probably put $4,000 worth of sound deadening into it.
In cost per performance per weight, these are the products I prefer:
Design Engineering Boom Mat Liquid Sound Deadener
Design Engineering Boom Mat Spray-On Sound Deadener
Design Engineering Floor & Tunnel Shield II Heat Barrier (peel and stick fiberglass panels with a perforated aluminum shield)
Design Engineering Muffler Shield (wrap the muffler)
Dynamat Xtreme
Dynamat Hoodliner
Design Engineering Titanium Exhaust Wrap
Siless Max 120 mil (adhesive is iffy at high temperatures)
Siless Liner 157 mil
The DEI Boom Mat liquid stuff stinks really bad. It's basically glorified paint. However, it dries nicely eventually, and is paintable. I use it a lot anywhere the surface is irregular or I need to seal/flatten spots to run Dynamat Xtreme over. It makes more of a difference than it should. I usually apply Dynamat Xtreme over it.
The reason I bring all of this up is you are building something really nice, but often people get tired of riding in something like that because it's loud.
Thanks, I'll keep that in mind, I'm doing this in stages, and if I add sound deadener it will be at the painting stage, which for me paint is last. I'll probably stick to spray on stuff mainly do to moisture traps in the midwest but also weight. That stick on sound deadener is usually pretty heavy from the little I have used. Is that boom mat liquid not a spray on? You just brush it on or how does that work?
I got more done...
For the carpet cage and seat holes I chuck a tube the size of the hole I need in the lathe and put a 20-30 degree edge on it. Smaller stuff 1" or less you can just whack it with a hammer and punch the hole, bigger holes you may need to heat it up with an induction heater or a propane torch.
Ignore my poor cage painting skills, I got some bubbling in spots I think from too thick of coat but I don't know, I suck at painting.
The seats just pinch the carpet but since the cage is bolted under the carpet I used spacers for where the front harness bar bolted to the floor so it's solid but the carpet still slides under it then drop the spacers in and pull the carpet back to bolt it up.
Big thank you to the generosity of
@Blue85 for the front seat bases and sliders. He would not accept any money for the seat parts. If you take factory seat bases and blast them and punch holes in them and dimple die them, then paint them, they start to look like race parts....
I made adaptors to bolt the PRP seats to the factory driver's seat slider. My 1st mockup set was too high so this 2nd set I made so low I had to use a flathead screw in the front to not rub on the seat.
The passenger side I was planning to do the same for rear seat passenger access but I changed my mind for a few reasons. It was a little longer and hit the seat so it would of had to have been higher. Plus with the front harness bar behind it sliding it forward still left acrobatic access to the rear seat. So I changed plans and made the cage so you could walk through the middle made adaptor brackets to mount the passenger seat rigid to the factory seat base. This also saved weight without the 3 sliders on that side.
Add rubber guards and ran 14 awg speaker wire to all the speakers. Sounds a lot better with 4 speakers than 1. The rear speakers were already there, Pioneer 4x10, but not hooked up at all. The front 3.5" speakers are Alpine, but one had a bad connection. So only one speaker was working. Not they all have 14 awg wire and sound much better, probably overkill since its larger than the power wire for the 200W Pioneer head unit.
Tied the cage into the bedsides in one of the open factory hard top holes on each side. Made them removable so I can get the rear side panels in and out. This winter I plan to make custom side panels and put maybe some 6.5 speakers toward the front of the side panel instead of 4x10 all the way in the back.
