brandonjansen - 2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited Build Thread

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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Feb 14, 2013
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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
A few more pictures to share – 5/4/15

Being the last one on my job site makes for some good photo ops
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Used the truck to haul my great Uncle's '53 Studebaker pickup to a local car show. My Uncle built it for him and right now it's worth about $500,000 as she sits. Has a TON of custom work done to it that most people wouldn't pick up on unless you had a stock Studebaker sitting next to it.
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Parked beside my Dad's 2002 Peterbuilt 379 long nose with a 550 CAT in it.
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"Sometimes after I wash my truck I just sit and stare at it" ;)
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Best looking tow rig around my local area, that's for sure!
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Thought this was a good shot of my truck and Dad's car sitting on the driveway yesterday
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Front End Face Lift – 5/4/15

As I've mentioned a number of times I had a few more items to take care of on the front end to get the truck looking the way I wanted. I had Jeremy at Retro Shop build me a set of custom headlights and got a paintable grille so I could get it color matched mineral grey.

The headlights turned out top notch, exactly what I wanted. Jeremy absolutely killed it on the build.

'14 OEM sport projector headlights
Color matched mineral grey
FXR projectors installed
LED switchbacks installed in the lower LED section
XB LED halos/strips installed on the projector shroud​

Before Jeremy sealed them back up
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Started pulling the truck apart on Saturday morning to do the headlight install and the grille swap.

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I didn't take any pictures of the headlight wiring but I used the quad - projector adapter harness that Jeremy supplies. Very well built piece which made everything very easy to install. I mounted the resistors on the metal area just below where the headlight sits and cleaned up all the wiring with some zip ties and it was good to go.
Got the headlights installed and then just needed to button up the extra wiring/connections for the LED halos/strips.

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I have the LED halos/strips spliced into a wire under the TIPM that is only on with the key in the run position. Because my truck is a 2012 I definitely didn't want the DRL's to be the low beams at half power so I kept them turned off with my MiniMaxx and am running the LED's as DRL's. I originally wanted to run them white but unfortunately the "white" present on the halos isn't as white as it should be. It has a bit of a blue/green tint to it. Not worth running as DRL's and running the risk of being pulled over. So at the moment I'm running them as amber but am talking to Jeremy about some possible solutions for my problem.

I then installed my Ram logo and chrome inserts back into the grille shell, gave it a quick coat of wax, and installed it back on the truck.

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Obviously I could post a ton of pictures of the front end of the truck with all the different LED colors. But here are a few quick ones that I took/put together.

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(Top picture is what I'm running as DRL's. Looks pretty sick if I do say so myself)
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Cutoff line with the FXR projectors
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Video showing the LED's cycling through the colors. The uploaded quality isn't great; it looks a bit jumpy. In person they're nice and smooth.
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Video showing the LED switchbacks (parking lights/turn signals) in action. Again the upload quality isn't great. In person they're nice and smooth and don't flicker.
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
1965 Nova Project Car – 5/4/15

So with the truck pretty much looking how I want I’ve been starting to think about a new project. As most of you know my family’s into muscle cars/drag racing. Well a super good deal came up over the weekend and I bought a '65 prostreet Nova yesterday. Very well built car, just needs some TLC to really get it looking good. The whole frame/chasis, susension, drivetrain, and body is in great shape. Needs some paint work and a little work on the interior and then a really good detail of the engine and it will be an awesome car.

  • Full 12 point roll cage
  • Aftermarket front clip with tubular A-arm suspension and rack and pinion steering
  • 4 link rear suspension with coilovers
  • Fully tubbed
  • 350 stroker dyno'd at 550 hp
  • Turbo 350 transmission with trans brake
  • 12 bolt rear end
  • Wilwood disc brakes on all corners
  • Fibreglass flip front end
  • Fibreglass trunk with aluminum wing
  • Lexan side windows
  • The list goes on...

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As you can tell the paint is pretty bad in a few areas. It looks like someone started to wet sand it and didn't finish the job. I've started polishing out some of it and it's already looking a lot better. Eventually I will get it painted though.
Based on what we think the car weighs (haven't actually weighed it yet) and the power it makes (dyno'd at 550 hp) it should run low 10's or high 9's in the 1/4 mile.
In the next month or so I want to get the car cleaned up really well. Get all the paint polished out and looking as good as it can. Get the car lowered a few inches all around so it's sitting right. Pull the wheels off and polish them up and mount some 31x14 slicks on the back end. Fix up a few interior items and get the gauges sorted out where I want them. Then in the beginning of June I'll be taking it racing up in Ashcroft, BC at the Old Time Drags.
Next winter I'll pull the engine and trans and clean them all up, detail a bunch of stuff and paint it the proper colors (get rid of that ugly red). Stuff like that.
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Feb 14, 2013
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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Updated Front End Pictures – 5/11/15

Here's a couple better pictures of the color matched front end after I cleaned the truck up this weekend. Still only with the iPhone but you get the idea. When I get some more free time I plan to do a full shoot with my Canon again to get some good pictures

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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 14, 2013
Posts
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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Picture Updates – 5/26/15

Well as I may have mentioned already, truck mods will be put on the backburner for a while as all my time, energy, and money has been going into my Nova lately; and probably will be for the next few months at least. However there still will be updates with the truck. Obviously pictures will always happen plus at some point next month I need to do a full detail on it (cut polish, finish polish, wax, wheel polish, driveshaft polish etc.). So when I get that going there will definitely be stuff to share. For now here's a few pictures I have over the past few weeks.


Transformation picture from a couple weeks ago. The truck wasn't 100% clean as you'll see but it gets the point across. At the time of that picture I had owned the truck for approximately 20 months. It's definitely come a long way in that short time.

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Current mods list:
Performance
H&S Performance MiniMaxx with custom tuning by Double R Diesel
Sinister Diesel EGR and cooler delete
Flo~Pro 4" turbo back stainless straight pipe exhaust
K&N crankcase breather
ARP 425 head studs
S&B Intake with Scoop
Turbo silencer ring removed
4.56 AAM/Yukon Gears

Exterior
AntennaX 7" Billet Stubby Antenna
White LED's in cargo, reverse, and license plate lights
Removed B-pillar vinyl
BakFlip G2 Tonneau
DeeZee Tailgate Assist
5" dual walled stainless exhaust tip
AMP Research Powersteps
8" BDS Suspension Long Arm Lift with Fox 2.0 Shocks
Fox 2.0 Dual Steering Stabilizer
Hell Bent Steel Steering Box Brace
AMP Research Bedstep
Mag-Hytec Rear Differential Cover
1" Top Gun Customz Front Coil Spacers
5000K 35W Morimoto HID's in low beams and fogs from Retro Shop
30" Curved LED light bar - flood and spot combo
3" LED pod flood beam reverse lights
22x12 -40 offset American Force Independence SS8's - polished
37x13.5r22 Toyo Open Country MT's
Metal Lugz spiked lug nuts
Color matched OEM grille shell
'13+ projector headlights (color matched, FXR projectors, LED switchbacks, XC LED halo/strips)

Interior
Removed dash center speaker
ISSPRO EV2 4th Gen Factory Match Gauges - Boost, exhaust back pressure, pyrometer
Cabin air filter​


A couple more pictures I snapped with the LED halos/strips on. If only I could run colors on the road....

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Mean looking!

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Had the truck hooked onto my Dad's 28ft enclosed trailer to move it on our property. Didn't use the equalizer bars so the truck had some hard cali lean going on. The trailer weighs about 5000lbs empty and has a ton of tongue weight with all the cabinets/equipment in the front and no car on the back end to even it out.

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Snapped this picture driving home on some back roads last weekend. There's definitely no lack of light driving my truck down the road at night :cool:
5000K HID's in FXR projectors with cut off flap up (high beams)
Regular halogen high beams
5000K HID fog lights
30" curved LED light bar (flood/spot combo)

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I think this is the first picture ever taken of the truck actually showing the top of the hood/roof

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Driving home one night there was a pretty good sunset going on. Couldn't resist the opportunity to pull over and snap a few pictures of the truck in front of it. They turned out pretty decent for iPhone shots.

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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Nova Update – 5/26/15

For those of you interested I've also been doing a TON of work on my Nova lately to get it ready for drag racing in Ashcroft in a couple weeks. It's literally been taking up all of my free time from when I get home from work until I got to bed (with working on it until 2:00/3:00 in the morning a few nights). I've got most of the stuff done to it that needs to be done for now to make it street worthy and safe for racing. There's a few small things to take care of yet but it's close. I actually got it on the road this past weekend to drive around a bit which turned out to be a good thing because we found a few more small issues that we need to take care of before racing.

Here's some updated pictures of the work I've been doing and how she's sitting right now:

Removed everything from the truck, repainted it all with proper trunk paint, cleaned up the fuel cell and polished the aluminum brackets (it will be getting a larger fuel cell eventually), installed a proper battery box, redid all the wiring to the tail lights, kill switch, and fuel pump.
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Polished up the rear wheels
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Got the back end back together and buttoned up. Installed a new rear diff cover with main cap preload bolts, polished up the wheelie bars, installed new 150lbs springs on the coilovers, wiped down everything.
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Interior all done for now. Redid a bunch of the wiring (the previous owner made a complete mess of it and had redundant switches for a bunch of things), made a new switch panel, installed new race buckets, new 5 point harness on the drivers side, new AutoMeter tach/shift light on the dash, removed a bunch of excess lights/wiring, installed a new shifter with line lock button, cleaned everything thoroughly.
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Don't worry... that ugly red cluster bezel will be replaced with a proper one at some point. Along with a new custom built console to move the shifter down into the proper location.

Finally all back together and sitting on the ground
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Obviously a HUGE difference from when I brought it home 3 weeks ago. And will only get better from here.

The first ride out wasn't without a few small issues. Luckily we found them now rather than at the track. Ended up pulled over on the side of the road until my brother could come out with a jack and some tools to fix it up.
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Afterwards I may have done some line lock and trans brake testing as well ;)
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Overall it's been a super fun project so far and I've had a really good time working on it with my Dad. Couldn't have done all of this without him. I'm definitely looking forward to getting a few of these small issues fixed up and then seeing what it does up at the track.
 

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If I where to build a truck.........well, ****, I'd just come get yours ;)

Looks KILLER!!
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Haha thanks Jeremy! I appreciate it. :waytogo: Definitely helps that you built me a sick set of headlights! ;)
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Abbotsford, BC, Canada
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2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Hey all! Haven't posted any updates lately; been too busy with a number of things going on. I'm finally getting all the writeups done that I wanted to post up so I'm finally catching up with everything from the beginning of June until now.
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Blown Nova Engine - 7/9/15

Unfortunately it's not the good kind of blown....

Back in early June I took the Nova out on a Friday night for a nice cruise through town and then was heading back to my house on some back roads in the prarie, from a stop sign decided to lay into it... and well, it didn't end well. It was hesitating a bit pulling through first gear, hit 6000 rpm and BANG she went. Pulled over on the side of the road and flipped the hood, sure enough, there was a rod sticking through the oil pan. So my Dad came down, picked me up and we ran home to get my truck and the trailer to tow it home.

Cummins to the rescue!
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We got it home and unloaded and immediately starting pulling the engine apart to find out what happened. Definitely an easy car to work on when you can pull the entire nose off it.

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As soon as we pulled the pan off we saw the main cause of the failure... a stock cast crank and rods. Parts that definitely can't handle 7000 rpm or the power that the engine was putting out. So obviously the previous owner was completely full of it when he said it was a stroker.... but how do you know unless you pull it apart right? Part of the gamble of buying a car built by someone else. It ended up spinning the number 6 rod bearing which then broke the rod, took out the block, wrecked the crank, and shot the piston up into the head bending the valves and push rods. Definitely good and broken....

Here's some of the broken parts we ended up pulling out of the engine. There was even more shrapnel in the bottom of the pan but I didn't feel like pulling more of it out of the sludge.
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So just like that it looked like bringing the car to Ashcroft was over for me... definitely a big disappointment after the push to get the car all ready for it. Saturday we made a few calls to different people we know to try and buy a new engine for it but no luck.
Then our luck turned around... Saturday afternoon we headed over to one of my Uncle's shops to see how they were making out on a car they were getting ready for Ashcroft. Walked in the shop and looked over in the corner and there sat a 350 Chev on a stand... It was my cousins spare engine for his stock car (circle track racing). Long story short, he decided to let me borrow it for the summer for a small rental fee. So by about 6:30pm we were back at my shop ready to get working!

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Didn't take us long to pull the engine and transmission out of my car (around an hour or so).

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From there we swapped the flexplate and transmission over to the new (actually 8 year old) engine, and threw it back in the car.

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By about 11:00pm that night we had everything buttoned up and ready to run. Just needed to get a new rotor for the distributor and it was ready to go!

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Definitely a bit of a crazy weekend to go from blowing up an engine and thinking the car would be sitting for the rest of the year on Friday night to throwing a new engine in on Sunday night. A lot of thrashing to do a full engine swap in a few hours. Especially when it was only 3 days before we were leaving for Ashcroft. Very stoked to get it all done and be able to race though!​
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Joined
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Posts
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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Ashcroft 2015 Part 1 - 7/9/15

Introduction

I'm a little late getting this posted up as it happened almost a month ago now... but better late then never. As some of you will know from previous posts I go on a family trip to Ashcroft, BC for the BC Old Time Drags every year. This year we had a few less cars than in the past since a number of my cousins were either away or busy working but still a really fun trip nonetheless.​

Towing

This year I pulled up my Dad's enclosed trailer fully loaded up with all of our tools/equipment and his car. We figure it was around 10,000 lbs all loaded up from knowing the weight of the trailer empty, weight of the car, and estimate of all of our tools/equipment and mini bike that we had in it. So definitely the heaviest pull for my truck to date. The main change on the truck this year over last was the 4.56 gears. They obviously make a huge difference for towing and made the whole trip pretty easy for the truck. Overall it met my expectations as far as performance goes but I think it's got a little more in it yet. My main issue was that I was reaching 1200 °F EGT's pulling up hills while only hitting 20 psi of boost. So it wasn't making as much power as it could have... As soon as I got home I talked to Ray Rich (who does all my custom tuning) about this and he's already written me a new custom tune with a little more turbo put back into it and a little less fuel. This should keep the boost up and keep the EGT's a little lower to get some more power out of the truck. Even at that... I was still pulling up 7% grades at 105 km/h (65 mph) in 5th gear with no issues. So really I don't have much to complain about. lol.

All loaded up and ready to go
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Stopped to hike down to the old Alexandra Bridge in the Canyon
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This bridge was originally building in 1863. Really an amazing piece of construction for the equipment they had bad in that day.

One of the 7 or 8 tunnels through the Canyon
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A Forest fire started just south of Lytton, BC about 45 minutes before we got there so of course we had to stop to check it out. Pretty crazy how much damage was done in a short 45 minutes. With how dry everything is up there it just burns like crazy!
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Drag Racing

My parents pulled up my Nova on the flat deck trailer behind their motorhome. We figured we might as well give them the lighter weight setup to pull with the CAT and let the Cummins pull the heavy weight ;)

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We got everything setup at the track and finally got my Dad's Dart and my Nova side by side to take a few pictures. Can't beat a good father/son setup.

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On the last run of friday night test and tune my Dad and I actually got up beside each other for a run. Unfortunately his engine blew (cracked the number 6 cylinder which ended up breaking the piston and taking out the rest of the rotating assembly). So we never got to make a full pass side by side. Here's a few pictures of his engine when we took it apart back at home.

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Obviously not what you want your parts to be looking like when you pull something apart. Safe to say that the entire engine is shot. It pretty much took out everything other than the very top end (heads, intake, carb, distributor, etc). It bent the camshaft bad enough that we had to spend about 2 or 3 minutes hammering it out of the engine.
So since we had the block and rotating assembly to build a 440 cubic inch alcohol engine that's what we're doing. Just need to get a new cam and carb and do a bit of touch up work on the heads and it will be good to go. We figure it should make around 870 hp all said and done. :waytogo:

continued on post 72...
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Ashcroft 2015 Part 2 - 7/9/15

My car actually performed a lot better than we expected it to given the circumstances (borrowing an 8 year old 350 stock car engine and being the cars first time at the track). The car itself worked awesome; launched great, went straight, everything was setup very nicely. It just needs some more power now. My best run was a 12.04 @ 111 mph.
I ended up winning 2nd place overall in my class of +/- 64 cars. Very stoked on that. Won a little bit of a trophy and $200 cash so that paid for my race entry/camping fees at least.

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Here's a few more pictures I snapped of some family members cars up there.

My Uncle Alvin's 1969 Dart. 500 cubic inch big block, 3 speed 727 torqueflite. Running 10.57 @ 124 mph.
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My Uncle Ken's 1970 Cuda. 572 hemi, 4 speed G-Force (manual). Running 9.80 @ 134 mph.
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She was WAY wheels up for that launch. Carried the front wheels well past the 60 ft mark.

My cousins 1966 Acadian (Canadian version of a Chevy II). 930 hp blown small block, 2 speed powerglide. Running 8.90 @ 157 mph.
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Our setup in the pits. Best looking row of cars there for sure!
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My truck sitting in the pits. No joke it drew way more people than our cars did. There was almost constantly a group of people checking it out throughout the weekend.
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Exploring Ashcroft and Cache Creek

On Saturday night my friend and I went out exploring Ashcroft and Cache Creek in the truck. Had a couple good photo ops worth sharing.

One of the old mining trucks on display in Ashcroft
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Explored a few back roads in Cache Creek, stopped to feed some horses and when I turned around to go back to the truck I saw this. Couldn't pass up the picture. I think it may be my favorite picture I've taken of the truck to date.
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Towing Back Home

A few more pictures I snapped heading back home

Stopped in a Skihist Park to dump the tanks on my parents motorhome
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Family tradition to stop in at Canyon Alpine for dinner on the way home. This doesn't even show all of the motorhome/tow rigs that were with us...
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All in all it was a very good trip and I'm already looking forward to next year. Hopefully with a new engine in my Nova that will put me down into the low 10's or high 9's ;)
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Picture Updates - 7/9/15

As some of you know I'm a project manager/estimator for a general contractor (Humphrey Construction Ltd.) so I'm on job sites a few times a week checking on progress, meeting with trades/clients, and meeting with my superintendent. The main project I've been working on for the past 14 months is getting closer and closer to being done so I've had the chance to take a few decent pictures of my truck in/around the building. Once it's fully done I definitely want to get a few good pictures with my Canon simply because the building and the truck go so well together.

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I also finally snapped a few pictures of my truck and Nova side by side. Really shows the size difference between the two. And shows how large the truck really is.

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Snapped a quick picture when I was stuck in traffic the other day as well to show my point of view driving this beast every day. It's definitely convenient being able to see over top of every vehicle around you.

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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

Senior Member
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Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
American Force Wheel Polishing - 7/9/15

Canada Day (July 1st) was finally the first free day I've had in the past couple months to catch up on some items that I wanted to take care of on the truck. Polishing up the wheels was number one on my list as it's something I've been meaning to do since I got them. It was also time for a tire rotation so it worked out perfectly.

I pulled all four wheels/tires off the truck and gave them a good wash front and back. From there I brought them back to the shop to get ready for polishing. Two products that I've used for years and have been really impressed with are Autosol and Busch Super Shine Aluminum Polish so those were my two products of choice for the wheels. I also recently bought a Mothers Power Cone to try out as I talked to another detailer who said he really liked using it on his wheels. Figured it was a good way to get away from a rotary buffer/wool pad which I didn't want to use on these wheels.
I went over the entire front side of the wheel twice including all inside edges with the Autosol/Power Cone, removed all the excess product with a clean Microfibre, then did a quick hand polish with a Microfibre and the Busch polish to really get rid of any left over polish marks and give them a perfect shine. Overall I am extremely pleased with the results and won't be hesitating to use the same products again next time they need to be polished.

The pictures really don't do them justice as they make them look sort of clouded in some areas. But they look amazing in person... literally close to mirror like they're so good.

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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

Senior Member
Joined
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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Future Mods - 7/9/15

Two items that I have on my list yet to do to the truck:

1) 5" turbo back straight pipe
2) Subwoofer/sound system upgrades​

I've toyed with the idea of a 5" exhaust for quite some time. I originally didn't like them at all but with the 5.9cr tune that I'm running I think a 5" exhaust will sound really good. I've heard a few trucks in person lately running them and I just need to have it. My plan is to get an aluminized system rather than stainless this time and then either powder coat it (I can get it done for free at my brothers shop) or paint it with high heat paint. Obviously powder coating would be the better option but I'm not sure if it will withstand the EGT's of a diesel exhaust.

I definitely want to upgrade the sub as well. The OEM one just doesn't have the kick I want. At this point I'm on the fence between a JL Stealthbox and 500W JL mono block amp or having my local audio shop build me a custom fibreglass box with a JL TW3 in it. Also on a JL mono block amp. Either way it can only take up as much space as the stock enclosure as I need the other side for storage. I'm planning to run the amp off a Coastaltech Lockpick as I think that will be the best option for now.
I've thought about putting an aftermarket head unit in as well but I'm still not sure if that's something I want to do. I like how the OEM unit integrates with the truck too much... plus I don't really want to spend the money on one right now.

I'm not sure what order I'm going to end up doing those mods in... I keep flip flopping back and forth. Either way, nothing will be happening until September-ish as August is pretty much a write off for me as I'm going away on holidays for 2 weeks. Need to keep some spending cash for that!

If anyone has any advice on sub setups I'm more than willing to hear it. I haven't done a lot of research on 4th gen setups yet.
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
First Show - 8/27/15

I'm finally catching up on posts from the beginning of July since I've been slacking since then.

For the past few years one of our family friends has been the head organizer of a car show put on in Abbotsford, BC (Mill Lake Cruisin') and it has turned into one of the bigger shows in the Fraser Valley. He asked me to bring my truck out for it this year so I figured why not. It was also a good excuse to give the truck a really good detail again.

Because I work full time and the truck is my DD I was working on different parts of the truck after work every night.​

Tuesday Night: Undercarriage wash
I finally got underneath the truck on a creeper and gave the underside of it a good wash. I got completely soaked doing it but at least it cleaned up all the items that you can see from standing outside the truck and checking it out.

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Wednesday Night: Interior detail
It was high time for another interior detail on the truck as it was getting pretty messy inside by my standards. Vacuumed all interior surfaces, wiped down all the plastic and trim with Meguiars Supreme Shine Interior Protectant, wiped down all the leather with Meguiars Rich Leather Cleaner, and finished off all the windows with Jax Wax Streak Free Window Cleaner.

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Thursday Night: Exterior wash
Gave the remainder of the exterior of the truck a good hand wash using all Jax Wax products. It then went to hide in the shop until Friday night for me to finish it off with a good coat of wax and tire/trim dressing.

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Friday Night: Wax and Tire/Trim Dressing
Put a good coat of Jax Wax Liquid Carnuba wax on the entire truck including the tonneau cover. I've always been happy with how easy their product is to use. I then finished everything by apply Jax Wax Super Blue to the tires and all rubber/plastic trim. Ready for the show now.

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Saturday: At the show

My Dad ended up bringing his chopper to the show so we parked it out beside my truck. They definitely looked good sitting side by side. Both of us turned a lot of heads and I had a ton of guys checking out the truck, crawling underneath it, etc. and got asked to join a few more local truck clubs. I didn't win any prizes but didn't expect to at this type of show. It focuses more on older cars and prizes are awarded based on that. Overall it was a lot of fun though.

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The next weekend I ended up taking it to another local 4 Wheel Drive Show while it was still clean and got quite a bit of attention there as well. No pics from that show to post up though.​
 
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Picture Updates - 8/27/15

Here's a few more pictures of the truck I've snapped in various locations for those who love seeing pictures.

At the jobsite from up on the roof. Not often that people see any of the top of the truck.
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At the jobsite.
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Down by the Fraser River.
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At a friends place. Couldn't pass up this photo up in front of their ridiculously nice house.
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Showing off some of the light on a rainy day.
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Who needs a mirror when your truck is this shiny? ;)
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Snapped a few pictures with one of my friends that has a 3rd gen with Oracles.
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Using the truck as my bike caddy to get up the local mountain.
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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 14, 2013
Posts
1,701
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Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
BDS Dual Steering Stabilizer Bracket - 8/27/15

Introduction:
I was never completely happy with the dual steering stabilizer setup on my truck that I originally installed with the BDS lift but at that time they didn't have any better option for the 2012 trucks. Since then they came out with the new bracket kit that's similar to the 2013+ kit. After doing a bit of research and finally getting confirmation that my existing steering stabilizers would work with the new brackets (thanks to iRIDElow) I pulled the trigger on the new bracket kit. I ended up buying it locally from North Shore Offroad (for those of you in the Fraser Valley) as their pricing was exceptionally good on the product and they had it in stock.​

Installation:
The re & re of the bracket kit was about as simple as it comes; there's not really much to explain there... While I had everything off I cleaned the shocks up really well and finally got all the sticker residue off the tie rod that the dealership left on when they replaced it for the N49 recall. The most difficult part of the installation is getting the shocks bolted back up as they don't want to collapse very easily. It's definitely a two guy job to get them back on. Overall I'm very happy with the new kit; looks 10 times better.

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brandonjansen

brandonjansen

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 14, 2013
Posts
1,701
Reaction score
1,012
Location
Abbotsford, BC, Canada
Ram Year
2012 Ram 3500 Laramie Limited
Engine
6.7 Cummins - Tuned and Deleted
Diesel Sellerz and H20 Guard and Gloss - 8/27/15

Diesel Sellerz Shop
On my way back from holidays with my family this year we passed through Salt Lake City, UT so I decided to get the address for the Diesel Sellerz shop to stop in and check it out. I was able to talk my way into the shop to check out a few trucks and ended up running into Diesel Dave right away and he offered to give us a full tour of the shop and move the Mega Ram Runner out to take a few pictures with it. The projects they have going on in that shop are unbelieveable; there's going to be some really cool stuff coming out of there in the next few months. Dave and everyone else I met there were super nice and great people to talk and hang out with as well. Really great experience for sure.

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Coming back to my truck after checking that thing out made my truck feel tiny.​

Adams Polishes H2O Guard and Gloss
When I got home from holidays it was time to give the truck some love again. I gave it another good hand wash and then tried out Adams Polishes H2O Guard and Gloss on it that I had purchased just before leaving. It's a water activated sealant that you apply when drying the truck off and it definitely does leave an incredibly glossy shine. Very happy with the product; I will be using it again and plan to buy more Adams products in the future.

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