Few minor issues

It's been almost a year since the last posting to the build log.  Not much has changed since then.  Mostly I've just been enjoying my truck. I had a few more parts to be replaced, so this entry serves more to document time/mileage of replaced parts than anything else.  Truck currently has 258k on it.  I've removed the oil filter relocation kit, as it began leaking in late 2015.  It wasn't a big leak, but with the truck being lifted there's really no need for the relocation kit anymore anyway, so off it went.  In February of this year I had some overheating problems.  I had noticed the truck getting warm but it didn't seem to be a big deal.  Then one day on the way home the temp gauge got just right on the brink of the red during my very short commute from work to home.  I parked up and felt of the upper radiator hose.  It had no pressure on it and there didn't seem to be any coolant in there.  Did some more testing and determined it was the thermostat.  I just replaced the thermostat when I did the big engine rebuild but apparently the cheap aftermarket one just didn't hold up.  I bought a Nissan OEM thermostat from a dealership in New York (via eBay) and installed that.  Wasn't a huge deal to install, but while I was working on it I noticed that my radiator's upper "snout" had broken off.

The radiator that's in the truck is an aftermarket one anyway and it's been in there since I first bought the truck in 2012.  Who knows when it was actually installed, but it was very dirty and probably needed to be replaced anyway.  I got a new one from Amazon for $40 or so.

Old on the left, new on the right

For anyone else running across this, the new radiator had 2 nipples on the bottom of it that the old one did not have.  After discussing it with the guys on Infamous Nissan, they said these were only used on the automatic trucks as some sort of transmission cooler.

The unnecessary nipples

So I'd been noticing this "clunk" noise when shifting gears that sounded like it was coming from underneath the truck for a long time, but didn't think much about it.  I'd asked a few different people and they said that it could be a u-joint or transmission mount being loose or something like that.  I poked around under there a few times but never could find anything wrong.  In March of this year, I noticed that the truck would make a squeaking noise when I first started driving it.  Then it got to where the squeak was every time I accelerated.  I consulted Infamous again and was told that it could be a number of things but to check the u-joints.  Sure enough, the u-joint at the rear differential was bad.

It was a pain to get the driveshaft out.  Those bolts on the flange there (visible in the video thumbnail) were stuck tight.  Even my air powered impact wrench wouldn't remove them.  I ended up getting them off with a 10 amp electric impact wrench.  Ordered a couple Moog 269 super strength non-greasable u-joints from Amazon for $20/ea.  Once the shaft was out I pressed the old u-joints out with my Harbor Freight 12 ton.

rekt

As you can see in the picture above, the old u-joint was pretty trashed.  Both sides of that axis of the u-joint looked like that.  I pressed the new ones in and noticed that they were pretty hard to move.  Did some googling and found people saying that you could whack the ears of the driveshaft with a hammer to relieve some tension.  I did that and the u-joints flopped around with ease.  Put the shaft back in the truck and took er for a spin.  She's running smooth as silk now!

I've also got some more parts for my big electrical system upgrade...

More to come on that later this year hopefully!