Have you ever noticed that when you look in your side rear view mirrors of your car or truck that there is a “blind spot” that vehicles can disappear into? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a surprised motorist beep their horn because I didn’t see them when changing lanes or turning. There is definitely a way to fix that with what are known as “blind spot mirrors”.
Blind spot mirrors have been around for many years and basically are a 2″ convex (meaning bugled outward) mirror that sticks onto your OEM side view mirror with a piece of double sided tape. They worked but many had a weakness – because they were made from cheap plastic, the mirror finish sound start to fade/oxidize over time and instead of a perfect little mirror, you had black spots obscuring your view and defeating the whole reason you bought the little things.
A few years ago I ran across a vendor on Amazon of glass (not plastic) blind spot mirrors known as “Ampper”. These glass mirrors don’t break down like the plastic ones — at least they haven’t yet on our vehicles. I bought our first set in June of 2019 and have slowly replaced the plastic old plastic blindspot mirrors as they failed. In the case of my new 2021 Dodge Ram 2500, I bought the mirrors and installed them right after I got the truck.
Note, they come with some little plastic swivel mounts that you can optionally use. I find them too light for my liking and instead just clean the vehicle’s mirror and stick the blind spot mirror directly on the OEM mirror.
The Ampper mirrors come in two packs – two mirrors and two swivels mounts – enough to do one vehicle. Note, I don’t use the swivels. Click here for the Amazon listing.
Even though my new 2500 has giant mirrors, I felt like I was more likely to catch a vehicle by the side of my truck by adding the blind spot mirror.
You can see the blind spot mirror provides a different perspective of what is going on next to the truck. I have them on both the driver and passenger.
Summary
I’d honestly recommend these for any car or truck to help reduce or eliminate the blind spot but ultimately you need to figure out how best to make sure there aren’t obstacles/vehicles in your way. You can get them off Amazon [click here] and they are cheap insurance.
I hope you find this helpful.
Note, I have to buy all of my parts – nothing here was paid for by sponsors, etc. I do make a small amount if you click on an ad and buy something but that is it. You’re getting my real opinion on stuff.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
I’ll keep this post short and sweet. A couple of my many-year old plastic gas cans are getting brittle and I needed to replace them. Some years back I bought some steel Chinese ones off Amazon that are doing relatively okay other than starting to rust a bit inside – I looked it up and I bought them in 2014 for $54.50 each so that’s not too bad. I wondered what some higher quality options might be so I did some digging and came across Wavian.
Honestly, when I saw their name I assumed it was some cheap import but then started reading more. Wavian cans are made in Latvia and they are a NATO supplier. After getting mine, I can tell you they are the highest quality cans I have seen since my dad’s old surplus cans from WWII or Korea.
A Bit of History
The “Jerry Can” design dates back to 1937 created the Vinzenz Grügenvogel, the chief engineer of Müeller engineering in Schwelm, Germany. An interesting design requirement of the Wehrmacht-Einheitskanister was that a German soldier needed to be able to carry two full cans or four empty ones hence the size and triple top handle design.
There’s a far more complete historical narrative on Wikipedia including what America did if you are interested – click here.
Fast Forward To Today
Folks, these are really nice cans. At any rate, they have some cool features and I just want to highlight the ones I noticed and want to share:
They are rated for 20 liters which is actually 5.28 gallons of gas
The color you choose, I picked red, is powder coated on and a nice deep color and is gas resistant
The welding and assembly is excellent – cheap cans use tack welds that do let go.
The steel body is 0.9mm (which is 0.0354″ and puts it a tad thicker than 21 gauge (.034375″ 0.873mm)). Cheaper cans use thinner metal.
There is an internal coating to protect the steel – I doubt you will see this in a cheap can – it’s not present in my Chinese cans.
Leave it to the EPA to screw up easy to use gas can spouts. At least Wavian tried to do what they could with the mandate.
The cap closes very securely and the cadmium colored pin you see locks it in place. The pin itself is flared on the far end on purpose so it can’t be accidentally removed all the way and lose – that’s a nice design detail I think.
Brand new Wavian on the left – cheap 8 year old Chinese can is on the right. In all fairness, it’s held up for holding gas but I don’t really transport gas in it. The Wavian is built like a tank.
Here’s a close up of the Chinese can’s filler tube, It’s discolored with age but it works. The con is the it does flip-flop around when you are trying to start pouring. Again, it’s held up being outside all year long so I can’t knock it too hard.
The negative is that they come with a God-awful EPA compliant nozzle. I absolutely hate any nozzle where I have to pull something back and hold it back while trying to hold a can with up to 33.8-37.7 pounds of gasoline in it. Folks, I am 54 and it’s not that easy any longer. At least Wavian tried to do what they could with the mandate. In many cases, if you can push the spout into a filler port on a vehicle, the pressure would keep the spout open but not all gas tank filler ports are shaped that way – for example it will not work on my lawn tractor or generator that both have horizontal gas tank filler ports.
So, I did spend the extra money for a more traditional steel goose neck nozzle that does not have all that EPA stuff on it so I can manage holding and positioning the can with both hands and let the nozzle do it’s thing. By the way, it’s not like Wavian really has a choice – they are mandated to supply a self-closing nozzle but at least they can still sell the aftermarket nozzle.
The EPA-compliant spout is on top. The optional spout that you can buy separately is on the bottom and far easier to use. I will install the longer spout when and where I need it vs. leaving it on the can.
Note, growing up my dad had the old style Jerry cans and kept his nozzles separate from the tanks. I’m going to do the same thing. I’ll grab the nozzle and the gas can I need when it’s time to pour gas.
So, do I like the Wavian can? Absolutely – I just bought a second. If you are looking for just about the best can out there. Get a Wavian. I’ve not seen a modern can even remotely close to this level of quality. I bought both of mine and the fill spout from Amazon:
Note, I have to buy all of my parts – nothing here was paid for by sponsors, etc. I do make a small amount if you click on an ad and buy something but that is it. You’re getting my real opinion on stuff.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
In September I bought my first new truck from a dealership – a 2021 RAM 2500 with the 6.4L Hemi engine. It was a Tradesman with a crew cab and the 2GA customer package group – meaning it had the Snow Chief, Chrome Appearance, Tradesman Level 2, Shift on the Fly transfer case, Power Black Trailer Mirrors, LED bed lighting, and Trailer controller. What it didn’t have was front tow hooks — seriously. I was actually surprised by this. I’ve used front hooks so many times over the years that to not have them wasn’t an option but I figured I could add them later and bought the truck.
Wow – Have You Seen The Price To Add Hooks?
Well, this surprised me. I shouldn’t have assumed the cost wouldn’t be bad. Let me itemize this for you real quick:
Tow Hook – Mopar 68349551AD List $132 Online around $93.36 each – you need two
4 hex flange mounting screws / bolts – Mopar 6512808AA. List $5.10/ea and online they are around $3.84/ea. Again, you need four of them – two for each hook
4 hex flange lock nuts – Mopar 6512809AA. List is $5.10 each and online is about $3.84/ea. Thread is M16x1.50mm. Again, you need four of them – two for each tow hook.
That adds up fast. The list total is $304.80 and online is $217.44 – a savings of $87.36 but that does not include shipping or taxes
This does not include the bezels / changes to the bumper if you do it by the book
This does not reflect labor of maybe 2-3 hours or the shop supply charge either.
Also, confirm with the supplier if they have something before you buy it. When I was looking, hooks were hard to find in stock at any kind of discount plus some dealers say they have things but they do not.
So, this definitely wasn’t looking cheap either in terms of parts or labor if I had a dealer do it or even if I went will all new Mopar parts.
How to save money and not sacrifice quality?
What is quality? Quality means meeting my requirements and what did I require? I cared about brute strength. I talked to some guys and they all told me to go with the Ram hooks but to get them off eBay because salvage yards put them up for sale at a huge savings. Wow, they were right. You can get both hooks off eBay that look like new for less than half the price but usually with no fasteners included.
Search on eBay for 68349551ac or 68349551ad tow hooks. The letter designators (aa, ab, ac, and ad) tells us there have been minor changes and the most current version as of my writing this is the “ad” release. I can’t speak to all of the versions but I can tell you I am using the “ac” hooks, no problem. You could search for an earlier release such as “aa” or “ab” if you wanted – I’m just telling you what I did. If you can get a great deal on the newest version, go for it.
When I looked at the Mopar site, it seems to be the hook for all of the trim styles (Tradesman, Big Horn, Laramie, Limited, Limited Longhorn, Lone Star and Power Wagon) of both the 2500 and 3500 series trucks for 2019-2021.
Note: some eBay sellers list two hooks (meaning the pair) in an eBay listing and some just list one so pay attention.
I also always look at how many sales they have done and their rating as well. I’ll pay more for an established seller vs. gambling on a seeming deal from a relatively unknown seller.
I also noticed some sellers put all of the part numbers in their description so searches pull them up so read the listing carefully.
Click on the following to search for:
The 68349551ac hooks (this is what I bought and installed on my 2021 Ram 2500 Tradesman)
By the way, the RAM 1500 hook is not the same so make sure you get a 2500 hook for your model year truck.
Okay, for the bolts and nuts, I did actually go with Mopar and bought them online. I have read posts of fellows going to the hardware store and buying Grade 8 – 5/8″ x 4-1/2″ long bolts, washers, lock washers and nuts. It’s an option but I didn’t want to gamble with the metallurgy so I bought the bolts and washers from https://store.mopar.com/ and there are other online sellers you could go to as well.
As far as the bezels and stuff go, honestly, just cut the fake plastic grill out of the way. Yeah, you could spend the time and money to make it look factory but this is a work truck and the tow hooks are near the bottom of the bumper so nobody is going to be looking for the bezel behind realistically.
As for labor, you can totally do this yourself in less than an hour. I think it took me about 30 minutes.
These arrived via USPS Priority Mail maybe 2-3 days after I ordered them. They are like new – I doubt they were ever used. Yes, they do weigh a ton. I guess I could have weighed them but that didn’t occur to me as I really didn’t care. The point is that they sure are beefy. These are the 68349551AC series hooks by the way.
Installing The Hooks
You can totally do this if you are comfortable with cutting on your truck (some guys aren’t and that is okay – find a buddy who is and bribe him/her with beer, BBQ or whatever) and can turn a wrench. I kid you not, you only need a 15/16″ socket, 2-4″ extension and a big ratchet wrench to do this after your cut the little grills out of the way. A torque wrench capable of 80-90 foot pounds is handy but not essential.
This is my 2021 Ram 2500 Tradesman. The hooks go in the openings located right under the left and right sides of the main grill or the next opening over from where the fog light covers are.
That is the driver’s side tow hook opening with the soon to be cut out plastic grill in the way.
The part of the frame rail where the town gook goes is that square opening straight back from the center so I planned to cut the top three horizontal pieces out of the way.
This is an Ingersoll Rand model 529 reciprocating saw used for body work and what not. This thing is amazing. Cheap reciprocating saws have a ton of vibration when they run but not this one. It makes cutting sheet metal as easy as soft grill plastic 🙂 This is a fine 24 tooth blade. Use a fine blade on plastic to avoid any snags and tears. Your other option is to look for one of the small hack saw blade holders or other small saw where you can reach in. The more teeth per inch, the better.
This is right after cutting. I haven’t cleaned up the cuts or blown out the plastic cuttings yet. The tow hook will go straight into that center opening and you will need to jiggle the hook around to get the two bolts through.
This is what I cut out. A fine tooth saw really does a nice job – fast and clean.
Here are the hooks, bolts and buts.
I wanted you to see the side profile of where the bolts engage the hook. The front groove actually has a retaining ring cast into it. I installed the front bolt first – and it will take some wiggling around to get it in and then I did the rear. I did all of this with the truck on the ground by the way, Also, I think the design is pretty interesting. They know the force will be applied by pulling forward so that is where they put their emphasis. The sides of the frame rail clamping against the sides of the hook will further lock it in place not to mention the inevitable rust that will happen sooner or later.
/lbThese are the four Mopar bolts and lock nuts. The wings/tabs on the nuts go into openings in the frames so you can focus on tightening the bolt down to 80-90 ft/lbs. They also limit travel of the nut over time to keep the whole assembly secure.
So push the bolts from the outside of rain through to the inside. This is the driver’s side.
So here you can see the bolts with the lock nuts in place.
This is the passenger side. I had just started the bolts into the nuts when I took this picture.
Torque Down The Bolts
Some guys reported that their hooks rattled and I think they were not torquing them down enough. Yes, they will rattle when you insert them in the frame but not once you tighten them down. Thanks to the WWW, I could not find an absolute “here’s what RAM said for the 2500 tow hook” torque spec. I saw numbers all over the board.
I took a different tact, Mopar says the nut is a M16x1.5 on their website so when I look that up, a class 8.8 bolt has a 245 Nm spec and a class 10.9 has a 335 Nm spec. Converting 245 Nm to ft lbs gives us 180.7 ft lbs. Wow. I divided that by half and took the nuts to 90 ft lbs and called it even. No rattling and the hooks feel solid as a rock. If they loosen up, which I highly doubt, I’ll search around again for the torque spec and/or apply Loc-Tite. Given the design of the locking nuts, I really do not think this is going to happen.
If you don’t believe in torque wrenches, do whatever works for you. Due to a variety of nerve factors, I can’t feel how much pressure I am applying any longer so I torque stuff down to spec.
If you do know a definitive value, please email me and I’ll adjust accordingly.
This is big Ed my 50-250 ft lb 1/2″ torque wrench. I have “bigger Ed” that is a giant 3/4″ unit. I also have a number of 1/4, 3/8 and 1/2 torque wrenches for different applications.
The Result
They are rock solid. I haven’t used them yet but am ready for winter.
Driver’s side. I think I could have left the one top section of the grill but I am also not sure if it would have gotten busted off anyways from shackles, hooks, etc. I also can’t get rid of the slight angle of the hook left to right despite trying to make it flat several times so I am not going to worry about that either,
Passenger side
One last comment, I did go in a week or two later and spray painted all of the exposed bolts and nuts with black paint to slow up the rust on the fasteners. In Michigan, fighting rust is an art form and also a losing battle – that salt that gets put on the roads gets everywhere and eventually takes its toll but I sure do try to delay that 🙂
Summary
You can definitely do the hooks yourself. Save some money and get them off eBay, do what you want with the bolts and then trim the front grills so the tow hooks can slide in. It looks pretty good and will do the job.
Note, I have to buy all of my parts – nothing here was paid for by sponsors, etc. I do make a small amount if you click on an ad and buy something but that is it. You’re getting my real opinion on stuff.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
Okay, I’m the proud new owner of a 2021 Ram 2500 Tradesman and the original halogen lights were pretty anemic. I did two things to address this – first, I replaced the high beams with Lasfit LED emitters and that’s a story for another day. With that said though, I’ll tell you that upgrading to the Lasfit LED high beams was stunningly worth it – I can’t tell you the last time I was so happy with an upgrade.
2/13/24 Update: Lasfit is no longer an Amazon seller. If you search on LED headlight options, there are a bunch of sellers out there getting good reviews. Click here to see them in a new tab.
Now that I am done gushing over the high beam upgrade, the second thing I did was to investigate installing a LED light bar on the truck. That’s really the focus of this post.
I guess it must be the pandemic because there aren’t a lot of custom fit aftermarket options right now but there are still a ton of lighting options using general fit LED light bars – the kind that you normally bolt on to a bumper, roll bar, etc.
My first thought was to mount a light on the bumper but I run a Western plow in the winter. I could have mounted a 26″ bar behind the front lower plastic grill in the bumper or even cut it out for a clear shot but it wasn’t really appealing to me.
Then I got to thinking about how tall the truck was. My 2021 Ram 2500 with the snow package is sitting pretty tall in the air. The top of the cab is about six and a half feet (80-ish inches) off the ground. If I mounted a light bar up there, it would have the elevation to cast a ton of light.
Lighting Options
Over the years, I’ve used a number of inexpensive light bars off Amazon and had while some brands weren’t so great due to leaking water into the LEDs, I’ve had pretty good luck with Nilight. You’ll read mixed reviews of their customer service but fortunately I’ve not needed to work with them.
So, I started looking at NiLights and was particularly interested in their triple row light bars as they can output a ton of light. Honestly, for any of these vendors, take their lumen and wattage claims with a huge grain of salt – there’s a ton of marketing hype. In general, bigger bars and more emitters give you more light – that’s just a rule of thumb to go by.
So, I’ve had light bars up to 12″ wide in the past but they were double row and nothing to spectacular in terms of light output. So, I figured I wanted another Nilight and some width greater than 20″ and they have a bunch of options.
In terms of mounting, I really didn’t want to go drilling into my new truck. On one hand I could mount a light behind the plastic lower grill in the bumper but I really wanted to go high because I do plan to install LED fog lights in the future.
So, one way to mount is to use rubber coated magnetic mounts. They are removable and hold pretty good but they honestly do have limits and will blow off the truck if you don’t think things through carefully. I really wanted to go this route, at least for now as I could remove the light when not needed plus move it around to where I needed light.
Going with magnetic mounts does require you to think about some things. First and foremost, are they strong enough to hold the light in position? What you will find is that they tend to be very strong and pulling a magnet straight off a good metal roof is genuinely hard but that’s not the real issue. You need them to not gradually slide backward and come off at the speeds you plan. In general, the bigger the surface area of the light (width x height).
As I thought about it, I reigned in my length to 26″. I sure debated the 37″ bar but there were two reasons why I went with the shorter bar. First, guys reported that the actual draw of the 26″ Nilight 18025C-A light bar was around 5 amps and that was good because I planned to power the light from the dash mounted cigarette lighter – more on that shortly.
Second, I wanted to lower the risk of the light sliding around. The 26″ Nilight 18025C-A bar comes with three mounting points but I wanted to add more to make sure it didn’t move so I ordered additional set of the Nilight 90035B mounting brackets. That then gave me the ability to mount five of the magnetic bases. I figured that would do the job.
Powering the Nilight 18025C-A Bar
With all of the lighting gear on order, the next thing to consider was the power. Since it was going to be removable, I wanted the power to be mobile as well and not hardwired.
For those of us old enough to remember the old cigarette lighters you know where the name comes from. For those of you wondering what I am talking about, I am talking about the odd looking tubular 12 volt power receptacle in your car or truck. Back in the day, there was a little plug that you pushed in that would cause a little heating element to get red hot and you could light a cigarette or stogie from it … or anything else for that matter – it was like a little red hot space heater or stove element.
In most vehicles, the units can provide 15-20 amps. In a Ram, my understanding is that the center dash unit has a 20 amp fuse. If you are trying to calculate watts, volts x amps = watts so a 20 amp 12 volt circuit can provide 240 watts.
Remember my earlier comment about light bar watt and lumen claims typically being higher than reality? The 26″ bar listing says 540 watts. That is a ton of juice — maybe it’s what it would be if some old incandescent bulb was used but it’s not really drawing that.
There are these really cool switched plugs that have a on/off switch along with a momentary switch and a 10 foot cord. They are well made but I do wish the wire was thicker but it didn’t cause a problem. Note, you can buy these with either the ground (negative) or positive being the momentary switched circuit. I opted for the positive momentary switch because I could just turn the light on for second, let go and it would shut off. If you don’t want it at all, you can just cut off blue momentary wire.
Adding The Mounts To The Nilight 18025C-A
I should point out that I did try just using the original three mounting points that came with the bar and three magnets. During some highway driving tests during the rain I thought it moved some and didn’t think that was secure enough, at least not to my liking. The lights are modular so adding a couple more mounts was easily done.
The first thing I did was to unscrew the end cap from the end without the wire. I removed the end cap and the gasket so I could then slide in two extra M8 hex nut for the two extra mounts I planned.
I removed the cap from the end with no wire, moved the gasket out the way, and slid in two new M8 nuts. I was then careful to make sure the gasket was positioned correctly when I inserted and started the little bolts by hand before using my power screw driver to run them down snug.
In terms of the mounts, I found that their supplied allen/hex socket screws were really a bad idea on their part. You can’t access them easily at all and they limit adjustments so I switched to regular hex head M8 bolts.
With an M8 bolt in place, you can turn the rubberized magnetic mounting disc and tighten or loosen it accordingly. I replaced all of the little hex head socket bolts with hex heads as shown above. I took the little hex socket bolt into my local Ace Hardware and found replacements of the same length.
As with the bolts on the rubber mounts, I replaced the hex sockets on the body too. I honestly have no idea why they opted for sockets vs. head head bolts. The hex heads allow for more rotation and easy access with an open end wrench.
I did apply blue Loc-tite to the bolts going into the rubber pads. In hindsight, I think this might have been overkill. If I ever want to take the pads off, it will take a bit more effort but then again they aren’t going to vibrate loose so easily either.
To make the spacing symmetrical I just moved in X screw heads from each end, centered the mounting block and tightened it down. In my case, I wanted the light to point straight head so I did have to play with that a bit and then match all of the mounts to the same angle.
Here’s the rear view. Once I figured out the position for the light to be straight ahead, I approximated the angle on the others by paying attention to the location of the top of the mount relative to the cooling fin.
Wiring The Nilight 18025C-A
Wiring is very straight forward – red line in the light’s short lead cord to the red line on the power cord. If you want the momentary positive to trip the light also, connect the blue and red cord together. Only do this if you buy the momentary positive version of the cord.
Here’s the switch assembly and it’s cord with the black cord from the light swooping in from the top left. The small black tool is used to trim back the protective outer case on cable assemblies so you can then get to the exposed individual wires. They are cheap and very handy. The alternative is careful slitting with a box cutter/razor.
Red to Red, Black to Black and combine the blue momentary positive to the red positive on the power cord – I just twisted them together and then soldered. Only do this if you made sure to buy the momentary switched positive version of the switch. If you mistakenly bought the negative momentary version you will pop the fuse in the nose of the switch housing because that will be a dead short. That fuse is replaceable by the way.
As far as wiring goes, you can use any of the solderless crimp on connectors or you can just solder the lines together. If I know I will need to take something apart then I will use good crimp on fittings. Otherwise, if I want a slim connection that will last, I use a soldering iron and resin flux core solder.
Be sure to test everything before you close up the circuits. I tested the LED light bar itself before I did anything else.
After soldering, I like to put shrink tubes over each line and then over the bundle to keep moisture out and reduce strain. By the way, if you aren’t familiar with shrink tubing, it shrinks when heated – I prefer to use a heat gun but have also used a lighter in a pinch.
If I want to reinforce it further then I may add on a layer or two of quality 3M electrical tape – overkill I know but I don’t want things to fail easily from flexing or moisture.
I also looked at where the light cord was going to rub on my truck’s roof and added a piece of thick decal vinyl to protect the paint.
So the plug and switches work quite well being in the center dash plug like this. Very easy to reach and turn on or off. When on, the little red LED lights up so you do have an in-cab reminder that the bar is on (trust me, at night, you’ll know it’s on).
You can see how I have the cord run. Again, this is meant to be removable and something I can move around as needed. So yeah. there is a loose cord but it is manageable.
So the light us up top and I run the wire in actually just behind the pillar between the driver and passenger doors in the crew cab. I then run the wire behind the driver’s headrest and down along the center console. Note, there is thick vinyl decal paint protector where the line touches the pain – and about two inches on either side just to play it safe.
So the cord runs under the driver side headrest and then up and out the passenger rear door in the crew cab. I wish there was another 2-3 feet of cord so I could have run it to the floor and around the bottom of my chair but you know, it works. I could have spliced in more wire with pros and cons but I decided to keep it simple.
It really clamps down well on the flat portion of the roof but not in the back with the reinforcing bends. I center the light by eyeball aligning the center mount of the bar with the center roof marker light. The actual bottom of the light bar (not the mounts) is about 81-ish” off the ground. Also, you can’t see it but as mentioned, there is thick 3M Vivid vinyl decal material under the cord.
It’s hard to get the 3M Vivid tape to show up unless you get the angle just right to see the edges. There are two pieces here – one wrapping over the edge of the roof and a second wider piece to protect the paint if the cord is blowing around in the wind much.
Nilight 18025C-A Results
Let’s look at some photos that I took at night and the measures at all based on my laser range finder that I measured before hand from the front of the truck:
These are the stock OEM low beams. Notice how they really limit upward light. The bright oak tree trunk you see slightly left of center is at 23 yards. If you can see the silver tarp in the background, that is at 47 yards.
Ok, mow this one is with the Lasfit LED high beams turned on. The leaf pile in the woods is at 57 yards.
Alright, this is with the low, high and LED light bar running. The light output is amazing. You can’t see it in the photo obviously but the light bar was lighting up a ton of stuff to the left and right as well. The next big tree in the left of the photo is at 31 yards and the swing set is at 44 yards. There’s just a ton of light. This is exactly what I wanted – the Nilight LED bar I bought has a mix of flood and spot emitters to generate this much light.
Low beam only from about 7 yards.
Low and High beam lights at 7 yards. The big shadow is the top left light of my plow.
Low, High and Light Bar at 7 yards.
Summary
First off, it is stunningly bright and casts it very well both forward and to the sides – the breadth of the field of light cast actually surprised me. So, in terms of the shear volume of light it is kicking out and it’s ability to light things up in all directions, it definitely exceeded my expectations.
The switch works remarkably well. The switches have a nice feel and I like that there is a fuse in the switch assembly protecting the truck’s outlet. At no time did the cord feel warm due to excessive draw and I can’t see that it is limiting the brightness of the LEDs any so that worked out just fine.
Next, it seems to stay put – even during rain. Most of my driving has been around town and 35-45mph. I did go on the highway at 65-75mph for 10-15 minutes a few times but not for hours on end. I also have no intention of putting this through a car wash – I really am not sure how it would fare one way or the other.
I would recommend that you keep a towel in your truck to clean the roof before you clamp on the light and also inspect the magnets to make sure they are clear — otherwise you are liable to scratch up the roof or where ever you clamp the light to.
I also decided to keep the light stored in an old duffel bag under my back seat vs. having any risk of it coming off. I put a micro fiber towel in there too – I mainly bagged it to prevent stuff from getting stuck to the magnets and then scratching things up.
This is the light bar, duffel bag and towel that I stash under the rear seat.
The only downside is that I would need to know before hand that I might need the light and install it vs. leaving it attached all the time. I figure in the Spring that I’ll look into installing the flood lights and then decide if I want to do anything after that.
Last photo for now 🙂
So, I am very happy with the result and hope this gives you some ideas as well.
Note, I have to buy all of my parts – nothing here was paid for by sponsors, etc. I do make a small amount if you click on an ad and buy something but that is it. You’re getting my real opinion on stuff.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
So I went out to move my wife’s 2000 Camry with a V6 engine. It had been sitting for about a month, it was about 20 degrees outside and, of course, the battery had discharged enough that it wouldn’t turn the car over – I could hear the solenoid click and the starter would just begin to crank and then stop. Great…..
In the old days, I would have wheeled my truck or tractor over with jumper cables, given the battery a bit of a charge and the started the car. Starting some years back, I started using various battery backs with jumper cables – man do they come in handy.
I’ll tell you though, I had a bad experience with four DB Power 1200 battery packs. I wrote about them back in February 2019 and it’s interesting that I can see people searching my blog 2-4 times per month about why their DB Power pack will no longer work. Don’t buy one is all I can tell you.
What was my go-to unit with my wife’s car and in general now? A Noco Genius Boost GB40 1000 amp starter. I’ve used it to start our lawn tractor, my 1996 Land Cruiser, her car once or twice — it’s reliable and it works. I fished it out of another car where it had sat for a month in the cold and it started her car no problem.
This is my GB40 jump starter – I bought it and a storage case to protect it when bouncing around in our vehicles. It has never failed me. I do get it out before a long trip and charge it just to be safe but it’s never empty and it has always worked when I needed it.
I bought the GB40, a storage case and the combination is always with us when we go on trips. They certainly make other models as well so you can pick the combination of size and price that works for you. For our regular cars and trucks – the GB40 has worked just fine. I definitely recommend the Noco products.
Note, I have to buy all of my parts – nothing here was paid for by sponsors, etc. I do make a small amount if you click on an ad and buy something but that is it. You’re getting my real opinion on stuff.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
A fellow asked me the other day how I can run my shop Ingersoll Rand (IR) 2340 compressor, which is an oil lubricated 60-gallon compressor, in the winter in my unheated shop. The reason he asked is that as the compressor gets colder and colder, the oil gets thicker and thicker. The end result is that many compressors will not even start below 32F (0C) – the motor tries to spin the air pump, there’s too much resistance, the motor draws too many watts and trips the breaker… or burns out the electric motor. Because of this, many air compressor companies will tell you not to run your compressor when it’s below freezing. I’m going to tell you what I do and you can decide what works for you.
I’m sure you’re wondering why I just said that last part and it’s because I will not be liable for any problems you may have. I’m going to tell you what I do, or have done, and then you need to do some research, conduct some tests and decide what works for you.
Run synthetic oil – not conventional oil
The first thing I will tell you is to run a good synthetic compressor oil and not the basic Petroleum 30 weight oil that probably came with your compressor. I use Ingersoll Rand’s All Season Select Lubricant because I bought it in bulk a few years back. It’s pretty good but you do have other options as well. Note, it does need a crank case heater to not trip the 30A breaker my 2340 is connected to when it gets really cold (down in the teens or lower).
Another option is moving to the thinner 10W30 Mobil 1 Full Synthetic engine oil in your compressor. I did this some years back with a Husky compressor that I eventually replaced with the bigger IR unit I have today. Some guys go even thinner to 5W30 but I have a hard time recommending really thin stuff like 0W-whatever but there are definitely guys out there who do it on smaller compressors – I’m just saying that I would not do so personally. Note, we are talking about full synthetic oils here and not regular engine oil.
Regularly change your oil
If you have never changed your oil or don’t follow the maintenance schedule of your compressor and oil combination, you really need to. Contaminants and what have you can make it harder for the motor to turn the pump over – even in good weather let alone cold weather.
Run heating pads on your pump
A trick I learned some years ago for stationary compressors is to put one or two of the small oil pan heaters on the pump alongside the oil reservoir. I run one Kat’s 24025 25 watt heating elements that measure 1×5″ on each side of my pump. No more tripped breakers for me.
This is a Kat’s 1×5 25 watt heating pad. It has an adhesive backing to help position it. Clean the pump off first with brake cleaner so it will stick. I then add aluminum HVAC tape on top to hold it in place. There’s another one on the opposite side.
It has two layers of 3M 3350 HVAC tape on top to hold it in place and help distribute the heat into the crankcase. I’ve used a number of these aluminum tapes over the years and the 3M seems pretty reliable as long as the surface is clean,
Be sure to keep your tank drained
Condensation is more of a problem in the winter. The relatively warm moist air can condense on the walls of your tank and then go through your air lines causing your tools to freeze up. It usually happens when the weather really sucks and you need the tools the worst.
Start With No Load
One trick to try in a bind is to start with little to no load. In other words, empty the tank so the motor isn’t fighting both thicker cold lubricant and pressure in the line as well.
The thought process is that your bleed off valve that empties the line from the pump to the tank and to the pressure switch might be frozen up from moisture or bad/failing. For example, the switch on my IR 2340LF-V is a real cheaply made POS – I’m miffed about the quality and am not going to mince words about it. I’ve replaced it once already and as of this writing it’s starting to fail again about a year later after the last time and I already have a replacement on hand.
Also, one trick I learned from an old timer is to add more line or a reservoir between the pump and the tank so the motor can get a running start before it encounters resistance. Here’s a post I did some time back about that.
Conclusion
You definitely can run an oil lubricated compressor in the cold weather. It just takes a little planning and preparation is all. It’s my hope that the above gives you some food for thought and you can then research what will work best for you. You’ll notice that if you do some Googling around, you’re in good company with a ton of other folks trying to figure out what to do as well.
I hope this post helps you out.
Note, I have to buy all of my parts – nothing here was paid for by sponsors, etc. I do make a small amount if you click on an ad and buy something but that is it. You’re getting my real opinion on stuff.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
My wife and I ran into a first for us – she went to unlock our 2008 Toyota Highlander and it wouldn’t unlock with either remote. Yeah, I figured the battery was dead as we hadn’t run it for maybe two months due to the pandemic crap. We put it on storage and I really hadn’t thought about the battery … until the doors wouldn’t unlock.
How to get in the highlander with just the key fob?
Okay, I tried both key fobs and my wife was right – no sounds of any kind came from the Highlander. There was a key slot in the door so I figured Toyota must have had some kind of plan. We bought the car… truck… thing, used and never needed to get in manually until now.
I knew with other keyless cars that I had seen in the past there was a backup key that could flick out of the fob so I took a close look at the fob for the Highlander. There was a small rectangular button on the side with the image of a key on it.
I pushed on it and nothing happened. I then looked at the attachment where the key ring connected and noticed it looked really beefy. The button wasn’t the key, it was a rocker that unlocked the key to pull out.
There’s the release button right there. Push on the circular dot for that end of the release to push in.So push the dot in and pull from the end and the key slides right out of the end with your key ring.So there’s your skeleton backup key. Just reverse the operation to push it back in.
Not Home Free – Expect to Lubricate the Lock
Okay, I saw one key slot in the driver’s door and thought I was home free. Nope. Wouldn’t turn. Not only that, there were no other key slots because I thought I would simply try another one.
There’s the one manual key slot to the right of the handle. You do not want to break your little key off in there.
Okay folks, piece of advice here from past mistakes – don’t crank on the key or you will break it and then you are completely out of luck and will need to pay a ton to get help. I busted a key in college trying to do just that and had to enter from the passenger side and slide across for almost a year before I could afford to have the door fixed.
Push the red tube all the way to the back of the lock and start spraying as you pull it out. Why that way? I tend to find I make less of a mess. I am still standing their with a towel to wipe up the black goo as it runs out. I sprayed and tried the key three times. After the third spray and testing, the mechanism freely turned. This stuff works great for sticking door and ignition key cylinders by the way. I keep it in stock.
So, if the key will not turn, spray lubricant in the slot. You will get a ton of conflicting advice on the Internet. What I have always used is Lock-Ease. Put the little red tube on the nozzle and hose down the inside of the key slot starting as far back as you can. Try and turn the key. If it still will not turn then spray it again. What I have found is that most of the time things turn fee with the first try and almost always by the third. I think the solvent that is carrying the lubricating graphite helps free up what is sticking and then the graphite takes it from there.
Okay, so the door was open and now I could open the hood. The battery read 0 volts – empty and introduced a new hurdle.
Why Smart Chargers Aren’t Always
So this takes us to the topic of smart chargers. The designers built in all kinds of safe guards including the need for a voltage to be present before they start. I really like my NOCO Genius chargers and was using one of the G26000 models. Here’s what I tried:
Just attached the charger – it would not switch to charging
Went to boost mode – it would sense the lack of voltage and switch off
I tried turning on the 5A 12 volt supply mode and that was just enough to make the security system chirp and reset over and over … crap.
So much for the easiest ones. That meant I needed to try and trick the charger. I brought my 96 Landcruiser over and connected good old jumper cables to start charging the “dead” battery and also hooked up a digital meter. It showed the alternator was cranking out 14.09 volts and as soon as I disconnected the positive cable from the Landcruiser, the meter showed the volts dropping down through 13 volts down into the 12s and so forth over the space of a few seconds.
Now this is the trick, for about 5-7 seconds the “dead” battery would appear to have enough juice for me to connect and start the NOCO. So, I staged stuff and had the gear ready to go. I charged the battery for a minute or two, disconnected the positive jumper cable from the Landcruiser, safely moved it out if the way and quickly attached the NOCO charger and it started charging. I jumped the dead battery just enough for it to show a charge to the NOCO that then turned on and did the rest. By the way, I am not faulting the NOCO. They are great chargers and I own three of them right now.
I really like the NOCO G26000 charger and definitely recommend it and their other chargers. Here. the battery is past 50%. It just so happens my camera caught the flashing 75% light while it was illuminated.
After about 12 hours the battery was fully charged and I then set the NOCO to repair mode to desulfinate the plates. The battery appears to be okay and we’ll see what it looks like come this fall when the temperatures start cooling off — the colder it is the harder it is for batteries to work and the marginal ones fail.
Lessons Learned
First, I now know where the spare key is. Second, I plan to hook up my smaller NOCO G7200 charger and run the cable under the power out of the hood so I can periodically top the battery off. Modern vehicles have a ton of electronics in them so I am not overly surprised it ran out of juice.
I hope this post helps you out!
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
So, we have a 2016 Ford Transit F150 van with the 3.7 liter EcoBoost engine. It’s actually surprising how powerful that engine is because it can launch that big rectangle! However, there is an irritating recurring issue that we’ve had and that is the “P051B – Powertrain” message when the Check Engine Light (CEL) turns on. The posts and forum threads weren’t always very clear about what to do so I figured I would write about my experience to try and help people out.
Here’s the error code in Torque Pro. There is a free Torque version and a Pro without advertising. I find ads annoying so I paid some really small amount of money to go to Pro years ago and think it is totally worth it.
The ODB2 port is located just above and to the left of the brake pedal on the lower parts of the dash panel.
What is error code P051B?
The P051B code is returned when the engine control module (ECM), or the vehicle’s powertrain control module (PCM), has detected that the engine crankcase pressure sensor is returning values that are outside of normal operating limits. Isn’t that just great?
Remember the positive crankcase ventilation (PCV) valve and exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) system that cars had when you were younger? This is related to that – the fumes inside of the engine needs to be pulled out and burned. This improves both efficiency and emissions. The sensor is reporting back pressure changes of the EGR.
Now this is where things went sideways. I had a ton of rubbish posts to read through until I found out that Ford used a different name for the sensor plus it wasn’t exactly clear about where the sensor was located on what to order.
What does Ford call the crankcase pressure sensor?
No, they couldn’t call it something that obvious. Ford calls it the Delta Pressure Feedback EGR (DPFE) sensor. So, if you are searching all over for Ecoboost and something with pressure sensor in the search text, you’re going to find a ton of confusing crap. Try searching with DPFE instead.
One other comment – Ford has a lot of free reference information available online but you have to hunt for it. Click here and select the option for Free Resources – that includes OBD2 guides by model year, body repair and much more.
So what can cause the P051B error code?
There are a number of things that can cause this code so let me list them in the order I would check them starting with the easiest:
Is the dipstick fully inserted?
Is the O-ring that seals the cap in the tube intact on the dipstick?
Is the engine oil overfilled?
Is there water/coolant in the oil causing it to be too full? The oil will be frothy and colored like coffee with milk in it.
Are any of the PCV lines cracked or otherwise knocked off?
Look inside the oil fill cap – is there a ton of sludge? If so, pull off the lines and look at the valves to see if they are filled with sludge. You can pull them regardless if you want to be sure.
The pressure sensor might have failed… yeah….
For me, the last two times, it has been #7. It’s getting annoying. I’m now on my third sensor. Note, if it is the sensor then it is not critical but I do like knowing whether the check engine light is telling me something new or not so having it lit all the time is very annoying for me. In other words, you can drive with the sensor having problems but you will not know if a new code is being generated unless you hook up your scanner.
I think the sensor location was a poor choice
Let me tell you that it’s my opinion that the EcoBoost has a design flaw – the crankcase pressure sensor is sitting on a PVC hose and it gets fouled out by moisture and oil. The location can vary depending on your vehicle and which EcoBoost engine you have but on my 3.7L, it’s on the driver’s side of the engine,
So that’s the Delta Pressure Feedback EGR (DPFE) sensor right there in the red circle. Note the oil fill cap in the lower right of the photo to help you get your bearings.
Why they did this, I have no idea and we are now on our third sensor. The first was replaced by the dealer right after we got the van because Ford had revised the design. That sensor then failed and I replaced it myself. It turned out to be real easy.
What to order
Now this is where things get confusing. If you search hard enough, you can find just the sensor unit itself and if Rock Auto is correct, it is the DPFE-30 unit part number FR3Z-9J460-A … but it has been discontinued. I know they revised the design of the sensor to try and reduce fouling and maybe this is the older version. I returned this to Rock Auto and did not install it. I can’t confirm DPFE-30 is the correct sensor just to be clear – I think it is the older design they revised. The part that goes into the tube looked different.
What you want to buy is the assembly that includes the tubing and the sensor. This is the current part number as of my writing this blog to the best of my knowledge: GK4Z-6758-B
Here is the brand new part fresh from the dealer – GK4Z-6758-BHere’s a close up of the assembly’s parts label.This is the sensor still on the tubes. It is held in place by the two black “Ears” – one on the top left of the sensor and one at the bottom left. Gently pry them up with a small blade screw driver and the unit comes right out.This is the part that goes into the hose.
Where to buy the GK4Z-6758-B Assembly?
Okay, you can get it from your local dealership for about $81 or you can buy it online for $38-42+S&H. We were going on a trip so I didn’t have time to wait and went with the dealer. While $81 may sound like a lot, if you mail order the part next day the price difference is less than it may first seem. [Note, prices have gone up considerably due to inflation – as of 5/18/22 it is $45-55 on eBay with free shipping.]
First, use a small blade screw driver to slide under the retaining tab and remove the wiring harness from the sensor. With the tab slightly up, it pulls straight back.
This is the opposite end of the sensor. You need to lift that tab up front just a tad with a small blade screw driver.
The tab just has to rise over that tiny nub just above the “GL3A” printed text near the right end to then slide off.
That little black tab above the white plastic just barely has lift up and then the plug can be pulled back off the sensor.
Next is to remove the tubing from the engine. There are quick connect fittings on each end. You just push the band’s tab out and the band moves out of the slot in the PVC fittings. It helps to look at the replacement hose first to see how the tab moves. With the tab held out, you can lift the tube straight up and off the fitting. It’s actually easy once you do the first one. Again, play with the replacement and you’ll see how it works.
It’s a novel design really. Push that little grey tab to the right and it will allow the fitting to be lifted straight up off the male plug. The one at the bottom of the engine you will need to do by feel but it is the same way – feel the tab, push it out and hold the tab out while you lift.
So, the replacement assembly took less than a minute to click back into place and reconnect the wiring assembly. Done. I cleared the code and a month later, it hasn’t come back.
Lessons learned – be careful while reading on the Internet. There are some people posting stuff that have no idea what they are talking about plus the super secret different name Ford chose to use for the sensor didn’t help matters.
Follow the troubleshooting list I wrote above and if it is the sensor, it is an easy fix. It took me about 10-15 minutes being real careful and I bet the next one will take 5 minutes max. I did have a hard time sorting through all the low-value posts and hope this helps you get your engine taken care of.
5/18/2022 Update: We’ve not had the problem again since replacing the tube & sensor assembly when I wrote this. One thing though is that I do my own oil now and only use Penzoil Platinum full synthetic. I’m not sure if the better oil is reducing particulates or not but just wanted to note that.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@ro*********.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
