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Project Snow Leopard

248K views 1K replies 129 participants last post by  lzalusky 
#1 · (Edited)
This thread is dedicated to the build up of my 2013 Iceberg 6MT known as Snow Leopard. I have updated the first post to outline the various components I have designed and offered to the community over the years, many of which were carried by Shrockworks prior to their bankruptcy. Links are provided to the relevant sections of this thread to capture their development.

Anyway, I have a bit of catching up to do as I purchased Snow Leopard in July of 2013 and have already done a good bit of modification. I intend to keep the most up to date pictures below, with the build in chronological order following:



Okay, from the beginning. Bought the truck 7/2/2013 with 6 miles on it. She is a 2013 Iceberg 6MT with the following options:
  • Off Road Package
  • Rock Sliders
  • Roof Rack
  • TRD Quick Shifter
  • Tow Package
Here she sits around 7/15/13, with the only addition being Nitto Trail Grappler M/T's in 265/70/17. Figured I would sell the stock tires with as few miles on them as possible.



At the time I purchased my FJ in 2013, there were no washer tank relocation options due to the addition of the secondary air injection system on 2013 and up model years. I set about to design my own washer relocation kit:



And the accompanying bracket, wiring extension and hardware:



Mounting bracket installed:



Alternate tank bracket with secondary air relocation to allow dual battery installation:
Motor vehicle Automotive design Hood Automotive exterior Car




More detail starting here: Washer Tank Development

2/27/14 Update: Designed a new engine cover to replace the stock one. Not exactly a "functional" mod, but it makes me happy when I look at it.



Engine Cover Install (Page 6)

~5/14 Update: Designed and installed a breather setup for the front and rear diff, transfer case and transmission.



SCUBA Mod (Page 11)

Late 2014 Update - Auxiliary Battery Tray Design and Installation:
Machine Wood Metal Flooring Aluminium

Automotive design Automotive exterior Motor vehicle Gas Auto part

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Auxiliary Battery Tray (Page 15)

1/2015 Update - Design of Isolator Bracket:

Rectangle Building Font Auto part Cylinder




Completion of Dual Battery Setup (Page 37)

Design of Additional relay and fuse module bracket (Single and Dual Bussman):

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Hood Motor vehicle Car Automotive exterior Personal luxury car


Complete Engine Bay:
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#82 ·
Wow, your design work on the washer box is amazing; simple and effective too. Count me in once the official group-buy is open! :rocker:
 
#95 · (Edited)
Hmm, well the bracket is certainly strong enough but I don't think the wheel well would support a battery without additional mounting points. I know people do this, but the sheet metal in that region is very thin and I cant imagine bolting a battery to that bracket.

I would say that if you mounted something sub 15 lbs that didn't stick up super high it would be fine. This particular bracket is not really designed for something as heavy as a battery. Maybe if it was street driven, but knowing what we do to our trucks I think the wheel well would fatigue and crack eventually.

I have been playing around with mounting a second battery on the passenger side battery tray and am at this point so far:

Gas Composite material Machine Aluminium Kitchen appliance accessory

Machine Wood Metal Flooring Aluminium


Hope to have more time to mess with it in the near future.
 
#100 · (Edited)
I finally received my ICON 2.5 remote reservoir rear shocks and installed them. In my haste to get the truck ready for my trip I managed not to take any pictures. The install went pretty well though, and I love the ride so far.

Here are a few pics of the full lift installed as well as the trip, which was awesome!

Disclaimer: No elk were harmed or unduly harassed in the taking of these photos. They are ridiculously tame since there is no hunting pressure and they are around crazy locals all the time.

Tire Water Wheel Sky Land vehicle

Tire Wheel Plant Vehicle Car

Tire Automotive parking light Wheel Automotive side marker light Vehicle
 
#102 ·
Nice shots...beautiful spot. Did you have any issues leveling the suspension, or was it level right after install?
 
#105 · (Edited)
Well It's been quite a while since my last update! I have been super busy with work but have had a chance to sneak in a few modifications in the last couple weeks.

First off, tires:

The 265/70/17 Nitto Trail Grapplers I had were a vast improvement over stock, but definitely did not fill the wheel wells very well with the lift. I also felt like the performance on loose sand could be better, even when aired down.

I really liked the performance on and off road with these tires so I decided to get the same type but up sized to 295/70/17. I already have camburg UCA's so I figured I would be fine with this size. Here is a shot of them installed:

Wheel Tire Land vehicle Vehicle Automotive tire


They are huge!:

Tire Wheel Automotive tire Vehicle Locking hubs


Not a great pic but you get the idea. It does not appear physically possible to mount the spare on the stock location with this tire size, so I guess I will be forced to buy a rear bumper to match the front :smile. I have also experienced very light body mount rubbing under hard turns so I guess I will go ahead and do a body mount chop. I am sure this will be a problem off road if I don't take care of it. Time to bust out the welder.

Next up, aFe high tuck exhaust:

I had some difficulties installing this, some of which were my fault and some of which were due to less than stellar build quality. I will qualify this section by saying that I am very happy with the sound and general design of this exhaust. That being said, there are a few things that really irked me during the install.

First off, the packing of this exhaust was a complete joke. It came basically loose in a large box, with all of the pipes and flanges free to bang against each other and anything else in the vicinity. This lead to the exhaust flange being bent and dinged up. I considered returning it but decided it would only take about ten minutes to bang it back into shape, which was less hassle than shipping it back.

I then began the install, only to immediately realize that the remote reservoir on my ICON 2.5" rear shocks completely blocks the exhaust hanger from above. No dice on the rear most section of the exhaust. This is obviously my fault but the routing of the rear hanger still seems sketchy either way. I went ahead and cut off the hanger and TEMPORARILY attached the section with aircraft cable:

Automotive tire Motor vehicle Automotive design Automotive exhaust Rim


I intend to make a hanger that mounts to a threaded hole in the body to properly hang the exhaust like so:

Automotive tire Hood Bumper Motor vehicle Rim


Next came the second pipe and muffler installation. The second pipe went on without a hitch, but I ended up needing to trim the tip pipe a bit shorter to get it to not hit the rear of the frame when bottomed out in the clamp on the second pipe. And then there were the clamps, not a fan. You have to overlap these and tighten them to the point where you think the bolt is going to snap to get them to actually hold tight. I get water dripping out on my driveway from the second joint in during a cold start. Not a big deal, but it shows just how good of a job this arrangement does at "sealing".

I will say that the hangers on the second pipe and muffler were fairly well aligned with the body hangers. The muffler flange holes however did not align with the Y pipe flange and had to be enlarged to allow the spring mounts to pass through and bottom out as they are designed to do. I think I will end up TIG welding the second pipe to the muffler and leaving the clamp on the tip section only. This should still allow removal without the issues associated with the clamps.

Tire Wheel Automotive tire Tread Hood


Also, the pipe and flanges are stainless steel but it appears that the weld filler material is not. Not a huge deal but annoying none the less. Basically I think I will have a great sounding high quality exhaust after a decent amount of modification and annoyance on my part. Can't really give it terribly high marks out of the box, so to speak.

Next Steps:

I am currently finishing up my own take on the SCUBA driver mod and will post that up when finished, hopefully by next week. I am also working on a dual battery tray setup that moves the air pump next to my washer fluid tank and puts the second battery on the passenger side tray. Hope to make progress on that this week as well!
 
#106 · (Edited)
^^^ Yeah I was tired of the slip joint too so I took it to my local exhaust shop and had them weld in a flange for $100, they offered to just weld it up for $40 but I wanted it removable just in case. I didn't really have any of the other issues you had at least nothing a slight bend to the rear bracket didn't take care of.
 
#107 ·
I think I am going to TIG weld the two lower sections together and keep the one upper slip joint. With the revised hanger mounting I have to use to make it work with the remote reservoir it should still be removable.

Also, just for reference the stock exhaust weighed 28lbs and the Afe 35. Not a tremendous increase but something.
 
#108 ·
have you tried mounting the spare tire to the factory rear mount. I've seen others mount that tire size, and say it will clear the bumper, barely, but it does.
 
#110 · (Edited)
Finally got my breather brackets back from the laser cutter. I ended up mounting one manifold in the rear jack compartment to get the rear diff and e-locker, and one in the front to cover the transmission, transfer case and front diff.

The trickiest part was locating the 1/8 BSP to 1/4" barb elbow. I was not happy with the fit of an 1/8 NPT fitting so I tracked down the correct thread. I also went with Nitrile tubing with a nylon overbraid for protection and a factory look.

Here are some shots of the install. The front breather is angled downwards to prevent any water intrusion when washing the engine bay.

Font Automotive tire Auto part Electric blue Machine

Car Motor vehicle Hood Automotive design Automotive exterior

Motor vehicle Automotive design Vehicle Auto part Personal luxury car

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#112 ·
I was able to get the exhaust hanger sorted out this weekend. I ended up cutting the stainless hanger mounts off of the stock exhaust and welding them to a stainless bracket that picks up a bolt in the under body.

I then welded the hanger I cut off of the AFE back on in a different position to work with the new mount. Not the prettiest thing in the world but should work. Everything seems fine with no rattles. The mounting point on the body is not as rigid as I would like so I will be keeping an eye on it for signs of fatigue.



I also finished the breather install:






 
#172 ·
I was able to get the exhaust hanger sorted out this weekend. I ended up cutting the stainless hanger mounts off of the stock exhaust and welding them to a stainless bracket that picks up a bolt in the under body.

I then welded the hanger I cut off of the AFE back on in a different position to work with the new mount. Not the prettiest thing in the world but should work. Everything seems fine with no rattles. The mounting point on the body is not as rigid as I would like so I will be keeping an eye on it for signs of fatigue.

You'll definitely want to relocate that bracket. I had a hi tuck done by a muffler shop here and about a year later it started rattling. The nut had rusted out and broken through the body. The muffler shop did a way worse job than you have, but I'd relocate it anyways, just to be safe.

Nice build!
 
#114 ·
Super slick job on the breathers!
 
#115 ·
Hey guys, been a while!

I was planning to finish the dual battery project but got caught up on a little side project that ended up being pretty cool in my opinion. I got stuck on a deeply rutted and steep hill the other day in the rain. It was covered in crazy slippery clay and it was just my wife and I, so the winch came into action.

I wasn't comfortable having her work the winch, and wanted her away from the whole ordeal in case something went wrong, so I ended up using the winch controller with one hand and trying to drive/steer out with the other. This ended up being a fairly tedious process, and about half way through I thought wow wouldn't it be nice to somehow use these nice steering wheel controls to work the winch.

From there, the FJammer winch control was born! It interfaces with the steering wheel audio controls (Seek up and Down) where they plug into the back of the stereo. Use of the controls is managed by a switch that I intend to mount in one of the knockouts below the radio. Basically, when the switch is on the seek buttons control the winch (and the radio to actually if you roll like that) and you can keep both hands on the wheel while winching.

Below is a VERY ROUGH prototype that I built just to test the concept. Below that is a board I laid out for the actual version. I plan to have it made this week, and do the full install sometime next week.



The board is pretty small, about 1.8"x1.4" and will be potted into a small box. It currently has relays to work a WARN 5 wire setup, or just about any winch if you don't need ground switching as well. The interface is really easy, just two wires on the stereo and +12V and ground.

Stay tuned for the real thing and final install! Pretty excited that it works though!
 
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