Achievement Unlocked: FAIL harder than ever before

I find it hard to put into words my feelings after work today.


Despair, regret, frustration, confusion... none quite get it.


Here we go.


A friend of mine told me that a good way to test the 4x4 on a truck was to find a gravel road or some such thing, turn the wheels and dump the clutch to see if gravel/mud/whatever slug from that side, then repeat for the other side.  We've been having a lot of rain lately, and on the way home from work today I found this place:

Red circle = my doom

It actually is worse in that picture than it is now (the area wasn't completely flooded) but it was still rather squishy.  I was doing about 30 when I saw the going get rough and braked.  I slid roughly 100 yards and didn't move again after that.

4x4 != Godmode

I think it would have been ok if the front passenger wheel hadn't sunk up to the rim.  Even in 4L it would rock a bit but just wouldn't get out.  I had a 2x6 in the bed and tried to wedge that in there, but it was just too soupy.  The tires on that truck are clearly not meant for this type of activity.


I've never been in a situation like this and had no idea what to do.  I called my dad, who retrieved a tow strap and began en route in his RWD 05 Silverado.  His expedition was unsuccessful.

Dad got to approximately to where the blue circle is before his truck nosed into the mud and wouldn't move anymore.  At this point we balked and called a wrecker, who would be there in an undisclosed amount of time.  During this time we flailed about madly for roughly an hour and managed to get his truck free.  By this time it's 7pm and dusk.


The wrecker arrived and was like "lol, I can't go back there" and left.  This is where I reached the very depths of the pits of despair.  All hope was lost.  I was unwilling to accept that I'd have to leave the truck out there for who knows what to happen to it... but could see no other option.  Eventually the guy that owns the land drove up.


Luckily, he was a decent fellow.  After talking to him for a while he said that he'd pull me out for $100.  Great, done.  He retrieved a dozer and yanked the truck out.  At 8 I was back at home, 3 hours later.  What I'd intended to be a 10 minute 4x4 check turned into a 3 hour debacle from the pits of hell itself.


Lessons learned:


4x4 != godmode
I am a huge n00b
My dad is awesome for being cool the whole time
Silverados are entirely too heavy
Never derp on private property again
I am a huge n00b
Roads are good ol' guys, and from now on, I believe I will use them.

Tweeter/pillar installation

Didn't feel like trying to come up with any creative titles today, lol.  Anyway, got up this morning and decided that I'd get the new pillars installed so that the tweeters wouldn't be just sitting loose on the dash anymore.  I had looked at this before and decided it was going to be a fair amount of work so put it off for later.  So I looked at the new pillars and did a test fit, and it was immediately evident that there was going to have to be some serious cutting.  I wanted to avoid modifying the pillars if possible, so the first thing I did was tear the tweeter grilles off.

It was closer, but I still needed to lose another 1/4" or so of depth.  Behind the pillar grilles was some plastic framing.  I'm not really sure what it's purpose was, and it didn't look like it was critical to holding the grilles in so I cut that away.

the back side of the pillar post-cutting

After that the tweeter would just almost fit flush inside the opening in the pillar.  I stuck the tweeter in there and did a test fit.  I literally don't think you could get it closer.  It's touching both the grille on the pillar and the metal of the cab, but works.  Still sounds great too.  I can tell a big difference having them actually angled properly instead of just lying about.

The way the sunlight is it's kinda hard to see much detail, but you can tell the pillars are in and look pretty flipping sweet.  While working on this I went ahead and put the defrost vents back in.  I actually did the driver's pillar first, then these vents, then the passenger pillar, so the pictures are a little out of order.  Dad suggested leaving them blue might add some accent and kinda pull the colors of the pillars together, I actually like it a lot.  Unfortunately the dash is a little warped so they don't fit flush, but I think I can fix that with a little epoxy.

Notice the waves in the dash cap along the left side wiper

It's getting there :)  I'm really happy with how it's turned out so far.  Few setbacks here and there, but that's to be expected.  Overall I'm pleased.  I'm planning to replace the oil pan gasket and change the oil on Monday.  After that the next step will be the passenger door lock.  I'm tired of the doors being all naked :P

FFFFUUUUUUU!!! Factory speaker wiring SUCKS

I was all happy a week or so ago that I'd be able to use the factory speaker wiring to go to the doors.  Then it quit working on the driver's side >:(  So I got to re-run it to that door anyway.  It took about 45 minutes to get this done.  Those grommets are stupid thick and the one behind the dash is down in a hole in the side, requiring me to bend a hanger into a really weird shape to fish down behind the dash, through the opening in the cab, through another hole that's in another piece of metal because trolling, then through the opening where the grommet is.  This better work when I actually get it connected...

The lower grommet going into the door

The upper grommet going into the cab, this is the one that required the mystic hangar voodoo

Flipping proper amirite?  At least it will have moar legit wiring than the factory stuff when it's actually connected.  I'm hoping to do that today.  I did this on my lunch break yesterday and didn't have time to come back and finish it up.