Gotta love job perks!

[Gardenfan]

Forgot that I hauled this truck in last year. Owner hit a Moose, had no insurance, so my Boss bought it off of him. It could be rebuildable if someone wanted too I suppose. But anyway, it is an 04 or 05 1500 with 20" Ultra Mako wheels.

Now I wasn't going to go 20", but I basically paid 25 dollars a wheel lol. Have to pick out some tires to go with em now. Need quiet highway ride that will have decent trail manners. No mudding really, too annoying to clean off.

I will probably refinish them as he thinks they need it, hard to tell with all the mud.

http://www.ramforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=5150&stc=1&d=1336765219

 

[wermbang]

nice

 

[Stroked]

Sweet deal!

 

[quietpeen]

Not bad, and you can't beat the price

 

[talon6]

heck of a deal.

 

[LB3711]

nice

 

[MADDOG]

Nice deal. I like the Toyo AT tires. Nice for the highway, do OK off road.

 

[Gardenfan]

So I went down to the boneyard today to remove the wheels from the truck. One of them put up a serious fight, I don't think the owner ever rotated the tires, because it was stuck on hard. Aluminum wheels on steel rotors causes some nasty corrosion if left unchecked due to dissimilar metals. So let this be a lesson to you if you never pull your wheels off lol.

I sourced a gear driven bottle jack from another truck in the yard to finally pop it off.

http://www.ramforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=5163&stc=1&d=1336879554

Took them into the shop and pressure washed them and used some power spray clean, and then finally hit it with some acid wash to get all the grime off of them. The clearcoat was badly damaged from the muddy lease roads he was driving on. The inside of one rim was gouged, looks like he dropped a ball joint, or sheared studs at one point and the rotor rode the inside of the rim. Oddly that is the only one that was still holding air, so I think the rim is fine, but I will know for sure when I get the tires off the rims on monday. Our machine only goes up to 18" so I will have to take it to a shop monday to get the tires stripped so I can refinish these rims.

What I am going to do is strip that clear off of them, and then acid wash them which will give them a satin finish, and then respray the black parts, and reclear them.

All of the aluminum on the tow truck is acid washed so you can see the finish I am talking about.

http://www.ramforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=5164&stc=1&d=1336879583
http://www.ramforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=5165&stc=1&d=1336880153

Looking at 275/60/20 procomp all terrain radials. Was going to go with 35's, but that is a lot of tire to push around for no real reason, I like to go offroad, but if the 33's can't get me through it, I don't want to be there anyway.

I can get some tire brands at cost, not nitto's though as Kal Tire has the exclusive rights to them I guess, so I figure I can get those procomp's for less than 200 a tire, and reviews on them have been good from what I have seen.

 

[Gardenfan]

Got the rest of the Procomp Nitro level lift kit installed today. Very happy with the results, rides like stock.

This was stock ride height



With 2.5 inch spacer up front stock rear



and finally 2.5 inch front, 1.5 inch rear



Test fitting the new wheels. Funny, the lugnuts that came from the 04 ram, won't thread onto my studs. They must have changed the thread count or something. Kind of annoying.

 

[0212353]

pretty cool

 

[jacsyl94]

Any updates on your wheel swap. It's going to look nice...

 

[Gardenfan]

I have to refinish the wheels, and been pretty busy lately. hoping to have them on in 3 or 4 weeks.

Priced out tires, and the ones Jj has are 570cdn. holy crap. so going with the procomps at 1280 for a set my cost. can't get nittos at cost as kal tire has exclusives on them here.
Sent from my HTC Ruby using Tapatalk 2

 

[OutlawTrucker]

You need splined lug nuts. 9/16"x18 thread. Summit racing sells them.

 

[Gardenfan]

ya I was happy because I snagged the lugnuts off of the donor truck, buuut they are a different thread than a 4th gen apparently.

 

[Gardenfan]

35inch grabber at 2 will be installed end of summer, studded of course. When i bought the truck i really wanted 35s, but was kinda trying to talk myself out of it due to cost. Decided that getting what i really wanted to be more important. 35s inch grabbers on 17 inch aftermarket will go on next summer.

Jesus that is 4 grand in rubber, i must be insane.

Got a k&n cai and 14 inch magnaflow on the way as well, will be here next week.