Never Nothing

Talking To Myself Again

I recently had a weird sit-down talk with myself. I have too many projects. Everything I own needs something, I haven't completed anything in a long time, and I'd like to park in my garage again. I made a six month plan to get my house complete(minus kitchen), finish the boat, and get the 1 ton finished. But I realized something.

23 Years Of Projects

I don't have projects because I like completing things. I have projects because I like to have a half dozen things to focus on. Something to research, something to learn, something to do, something to ignore so my Netflix and pizza nights feel more justified, something to blow all my money on. Here is all of my projects that have at least two wheels. I'm not sure I document my other projects well enough to post about them.

Before we get into all that, bask in this piece of America.

From My First To My Most Current

I know you guys like pictures. Here comes buckets of them.

My first and most expensive car. It was a poor decision. Four front bumpers, three rear bumpers, and lots of shades of red. Met its ultimate demise to a well placed tree.

And shortly after, I bought my first truck.

But it was ugly, so my brother and I made this.

Then Phil wrecked his truck. Naturally I bought it.

Years later, still have it.

Then I bought one like this, sans the whole front end. Had it for 2 weeks, added a fuel pump and made $900 on it.

The blazer. My pride. I love this truck more than most things.

The "Zombie Outbreak Response Vehicle" stickers made this thing internet famous.

Seriously. Google it. This truck is kinda famous.

I'm starting to lose track of the timeline. But I think this was next. My first motorcycle. It was pretty, never rode it.

Then I got this one. But I think there was some vehicle in between these.

Jew wrecked it. Time for apartment living room rebuild.

Wasn't joking.

The duct tape stayed forever. I rode this thing at sturgis. Got so many weird looks.

Oh yeah. The Rac'n mower. Built that in highschool shop class. Never finished it, still have it.

Christine. This car was a devil. And my first 3.1L headgasket job.

We left at 10PM for a 6 hour(read 12) road trip to trade the monte for this thing. I will own another. I loved that thing.

Traded the LS for this. Long story. Not happy about it. I hated that thing.

Sold the Taurus to buy this beauty. Sold it for dumb grown up purchases(read: houses are expensive)

This fits in somewhere around this time period. Man did we have some fun with all 125cc of that bike.

I wanted a tractor. Bad mistake. Shouldn't have done that.

Easily top three favorites. Ugly as sin. So fun to drive. Bought it for $400, put $100 into, drove it for 60,000 really hard miles.

Bought this from a coworker with good intentions. It was so cool. Had too many irons in the fire.

I LOVED THIS TRUCK. But the PO really fucked me. Traded it for a .45

I only drove it twice, I swear.

Maybe a mistake. But it was fun for the 2 days that it ran.

A little love, aircraft stripper, and plasti dip and it looked way better.

Upgraded to this beauty. Had 16 hours on it. Rolled it. Ran it hard. It was stolen.

The 300C. Put 50,000 miles on it in under two years. Still proud of it.

Ok, ok. I know it's a ninja 250. But it was $250. I taught dozens of folks to ride on it, and spent many nights cruising dirt roads on it.

Remember the raptor that was stolen? Replaced it with a sportsman 850 with power steering. Real dope wheeler.

But I kinda wrecked it.

And my bones just couldnt hold it together.

So now I have some muffler strap and 7 drywall screws in me.

THE OLD DODGE! Probably the coolest first gen cummins in the county. Love that crusty bitch.

It's a v6 station wagon. It shouldn't be cool. But it's so cool.

Wagon life tho.

When my friends wreck their trucks, I buy them.

Real smashed. 

Currently in the process of cab swapping that truck. You'd never imagine the work that goes into that. It will receive its own post when I'm done. In the mean time, here is a few pictures of the progress.

Step 1: Purchase new cab.

Step 2: Leave cab there to make your yard more trashy.

Find neighbor with A-frame.

And you're gonna want a chain hoist.

In case you were wondering, I'm as trashy as you thought.

This was 20 hours more work than I thought it would be.

My truck is so dope.

There might be a couple I'm forgetting. This doesn't include the 100(probably literal) other vehicles that I've done work to that I don't own. At some point most of these have been sold. I currently only posses the Dakota, First Gen, K5 Blazer, and the 1 Ton Ford. The 300C and the Magnum are still around, but owned and driven almost primarily by my father.

Side Projects - Dave's Wiring Disaster

Good At Things

Between working on my house, my actual job, and some less-than-glamorous side jobs, I like to work on fun projects. Some of my own, some for other people. They almost always involve wires and something with motors because they're simple creatures that I understand. So here is a post about one of my more shiny accomplishments.

When you have to fit 36 RasPi in an old server case

Things People Say Not To Do

So Dave get this dope motorcycle. But it has some issues. Issues like: There are no gauges, no wires for gauges, the ignition is ghetto, and they don't make parts to fix it. The previous owner of the bike was converting it from a Road King to a Road Glide. The latter of these has a full fairing with six gauges and a radio. The Road King only one gauge built into the tank and zero fairing. Long story short. I need to turn one gauge and a few lights into six and more lights

Alright, assuming that someone has already spent that absurd money to buy all the big parts, all you have left is to connect them with wires.

Issues:
-you need the factory interconnect harness for the fairing
-you need all of the wiring diagrams
-somehow procure all of the opposing gender connectors
-you'll need to find some patience

So lets get a game plan:
-write out all of the pin out info you have
-write out all of the pin out info you need
-cross those together into a list of "pin X to pin X"
-make a harness
-add the extra sensors
-add a couple wires

Since this is a blog and people like pictures, I'll explain with those too.

This is the available wiring on the bike.

This is the fairing harness. I had to connect the available wiring to the plugs on the left and right of this diagram.

This simple looking thing took more than one day

Note the question marks and scribbles, they're important

Once you get that done, build a harness. Sadly, I don't have much to show for that. It happened without many pictures. But once the harness is done, you end up with a process that looks like this:

Remove the outer fairing and any previous wiring for the stereo

Remove the inner fairing. Get a little nervous.

Remove the tank and get down to the wire. Literally.

This is the wiring that runs the rest of the bike. But some of it was useful to me.

Remove the bags and side covers so you can fix the ignition

This is the point where things got a little rough. At first I was like "Come on Dave, this shits easy, lets just rip into it and throw it together." Well, it wasn't. At least not as simple as moving a couple wire. Mostly a test of my already damaged patience. Reminder: I don't have a floor in my house at this time.

Here is the factory harness that goes in the fairing.

Through the magic of pictures, the new harness in and the inner fairing is on.

This was a beautiful sight. Except it didnt work.

Here is a fun thing: sometime I do things wrong. Again, I make this shit up. There was a bad connection. I crossed the neutral and oil pressure light, that was actually kinda funny. The security system was going ape-shit and it wouldn't start. Soo. Drink a beer, go home, and try tomorrow. 

And when you're all done, go wash all those hand prints and second-hand depression off. 

Loose connections are easily fixed, wires are simple to repin, and batteries in fobs are cheap. It was a couple weeks of working when I had time and when we had parts. It wasn't the most fun, it isn't perfect, but all the people saying it's not possible are certainly wrong. Sadly, Dave still hasn't let me ride it.