- Joined
- Mar 21, 2016
- Posts
- 6,224
- Reaction score
- 8,785
- Location
- Haslet, TX
- Ram Year
- 2012 Lonestar Edition converted over to a Sport
- Engine
- 5.7 Hemi
5 years ago I purchased a 2012 Dodge Ram 1500 5.7 Hemi Lonestar Quad Cab with 60k miles on it. At the time it was the only real good deal out there on a 4 door anything. It was 24k. I had it roughly 1 month and we had a random winter hail storm that came out of no where. The truck was parked under the carport, but it didn't matter. It destroyed the hood and got the top a little. I didn't immediately file a claim as work picked up and I was unable to really let it go down for a week or so. Flash forward to the spring of 17. I finally claim on it. They paid me pretty good and even for a few PDR dents in the door and bed. So by then I was really regretting not getting at least a 13, but then again there was nothing in my price range. So here I am. I hate chrome and this truck had a lot of it. I had already painted the wheels and running boards. Debadged it. I did VHT on the lights and converted the truck to a fully LED conversion. Pretty much every light was converted. Now back to truck. It originally had the cowl hood on it. As much as I like the cowl hood, that sport/R/T hood really looked good. So did the whole sport look in general. Man I was really wishing that I had gotten a sport. At the time sport hoods were impossible to find. They still are hard to locate. So I went with an aftermarket fiberglass hood. I ended up with this hood. https://www.carid.com/amerihood/clg-...iABEgIXFPD_BwE It has been a great hood. Worked with the factory latch etc. Plus I was able to do more to the truck. I am lucky to have a family member who paints. He has done it for 30+ years. He happened to be slow at work, so he took care of it. They painted the hood, painted the chrome bumpers, grill, and door handles. It all came out perfect. He even painted the lights and man when he sent me the picture it was one dang good looking truck. I then ditched the stock Goodyear tires for a set of 285/55/20 Nitto Terra Grapplers. It wasn't long after that I moved to my current home. I was doing a lot of commuting and the truck was starting gain the miles. We paid it off and decided to part ways with it. I sold it to my dad who took fairly good care of it. Mechanically it was always sound. Still is. He just hated the blacked out look, so in typical older person fashion over that last 3 years added all the chrome and stock lights back to it. So where did that leave me? I bought it back, and had to do so much cleaning on it. It was bad. I still have more to do cleaning wise. I need to get another short ram CAI, I deleted the mufflers, but I am now thinking heavily about a carven exhaust. Over all plans are black it back out, add off road tires again. Toyo or General are my top two with nitto not being far behind. It needs about 3/4 of the LED lights back in it. I already added the shorty antenna back, I have the stereo back to where I can play music via iTunes, Amazon music, and I think I can use XM through my phone. I need to do a tune up, transmission fluid change, and a coolant change. I want to add a tuner through this one, because my 19 Charger R/T leaves me wanting more. Thoughts on my rebuild?
