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mjotrainbrain volunteered to manage the Truck of the Month section 14 months ago and has done a great job handling it. Tonight I'm happy to announce that in addition to the TOTM section he has decided to become a full forum-wide Moderator as a member of the Mod Team! Please join me in welcoming him to his new position.

A slipping timing belt would not cause something that feels like driveline slip (AFAIK; never experienced timing belt slip myself). The VG33 is an interference engine anyways, so if the timing belt is slipping, unless you're really lucky, the motor would be junk and you'd know. Not really sure what to suggest other than transmission, sorry. There's been a fair amount of conversation here lately about tranny slip, I can try to dig up some of those so you can have some reading to do on the subject.

Yeah, there's is more to that story haha. Note to self: if you're gonna drift, take note of if you're in 2wd or 4x4 first, because it makes a big difference in how the vehicle will react ? There was actually one occasion where a drunk snowmobiler yelled something along the lines of "is that a f#$+!n Lexus?!?" as the groups passed one another, certainly interesting haha. The Jeepers definitely weren't intimidated, but I think they were generally very surprised.

Don’t forget your adjustable headlights [emoji849][emoji23] your Infiniti headlights looked so much better than the pathfinders

With LX570s, GX470s & 460s there are Lexus out there

Had an inch or 2 of snow last night, roads were pretty slick this morning, the new Falkens handled great! Very grippy! Plenty more weather coming this weekend, but so far so good!

I always wondered if there was more to that story than what was told in your build thread!! I never even thought about it, having an Infiniti would add a who new level of threat to jeep guys and what the hell is this guy driving! For people who don’t know cars

HID too, quite bright and not a gross yellow color. Headlight housings, even without the HID ballast, for post facelift QX4's are EXPENSIVE though, so I suggest not drifting into a tree, even if I does lead to you getting an epic bumper. Not that I'm speaking from experience.

Honestly, better than a 2018 Toyota 4Runner TRD Off Road Premium as far as conveniences, I’m constantly amazed our “Premium” T4R is missing things my 16 year older Pathfinder has (auto lights, seat memory, auto climate, gas tank lock, roof rails that extend forward past the rear passenger compartment, 6 way power seats, All Wheel Drive). You can get some of that on the Limited so it’s not entirely a fair comparison & the locker & ATRAC are fantastic, but still - it’s the little stuff. @mjotrainbrain, are you telling me the ‘02 QX4 had heated rear seats? Also, adaptive cruise? I mean, I knew it had the remote rear hatch glass pop (& an analog clock) but, wow, those others are big.

Heated seats front and rear, adaptive cruise control (called ICC or Intelligent Cruise Control by Infiniti), touch screen satellite navigation, automatic climate control, fancy 4wd, etc...and all in 2002! Mercedes has nothing on Infiniti!

After being part of R50 pathfinder family for so many years, Sfcreation is now looking to enter the R51 Pathfinder one. We will soon bring to market our 1", 1.5" front spacers and our 1",2",3" rear spacers. Now since the R51 pathfinder is IFS and IRS, of course the real height of the lift will be greater than the height of the spacers. This is where you come into play ! 2 options are available: 1) If you have a pathfinder R51 and you live near my location (Ste-Catherine, QC), and willing to drive to it, You'll get the lift kit, and I'll install it with you! Reserve yourself a full day ! Measurements will also be taken for a full set of skidplates. 2) If you are good with tools and are not afraid to use them, I'll send you all the items of the lift kits. You will need to install them, send the pictures and you keep it all. All the spacers have been made using suspension items from an R51 (struts, coils), but now we need pictures and real life data about the height in order to finalize the new product introduction. If you are interessted, please contact me at (info @ sfcreation . com) and send me some pictures of your R51. I am looking for clean and very little (if any) rusted R51. This pathfinder will be immortalized on our web site, facebook page, etc.. so it needs to look good ! Je parle francais aussi.. donc aucun probleme avec ça ! Steve.

From what I understand the drivetrain similarities are just in the transfer case, as far as how the AUTO mode operates. The overdrive is going to be totally contained in the transmission which (I believe) is roughly the same in Pathfinders all the way back to '88. I'm not an expert on Nissan drivetrains by any means though. Are you sure the vibration is only in overdrive?

Congrats man that is so cool. He has definitely answered any of my questions promptly and very respectful that's another awesome thing about this form (respect) example: I don't go 4-wheeling but not one time has anyone on here put me down for not lifting my QX4 putting bigger tires on etc. I just love fixing them up making them look nice and enjoying them on a daily basis. Mr Cox 96R50-97JR50

Here's another option for you, if your open to changing the bumper all together. Goliath bumper for an xj that has bull bar, pre-runner(shown) and even a stinger bar as bolt on options. I have less than $400 into my setup, and fabrication was not too difficult. About a day to draw up the plan and get everything lined up properly. The thing I liked about the goliath bumper in my research other than the price was that its wider, so no fabrication of the actual bumper was needed as others have stated they needed to do with other xj bumpers. If you truly just want to mount a stinger bar to your bumper, it may look good, but as others said it will have no true benefit, and can actually cause more damage if in an accident. If your just going for the aesthetic look, go for it and share pics! Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

The third brake light on my '93 sucked when I got it. Some of the LEDs were trying harder than the others, but they were all pretty dim. I too took it apart expecting a smoking gun (moisture, corrosion, something burned up inside) and didn't find anything obvious. LEDs have a life span like anything else, and I figured mine had just worn out over twenty-odd years and 230-odd thousand miles of urban driving. I had a good one in my parts car, so I didn't spend too much time troubleshooting the bad one before swapping it out for one I knew worked. I doubt the issue is one string drawing excessive current. I think you'd see evidence of heat or blown fuses if that was the case. I'd verify that the voltage across each string is the same as the supply voltage (to rule out high resistance in a joint or trace or something), maybe test an individual LED on 3v to see if it lights up properly, and if both of those come up negative, order a bag of red 5mm LEDs and get ready to do a whole lot of soldering. If that doesn't sound like fun, there are aftermarket ones on Fleabay. They've got red ones, they've got black-tinted ones if you like painting your lights so they work less, and they've got clear ones because Altezza, yo. I didn't check to see if Nissan still sells them, but yeah, I wouldn't be surprised.

I have never seen this before but posting it for anyone else who ever has this problem. The right side tail/brake light bulb blows a day or two after replacing it. I thought it had to be a short somewhere but the left side never had a problem. Thinking maybe it was in the light socket I pulled the tail light assembly to check it out. When the assembly was in hand I kept hearing a rattle that sounded like something loose in the assembly. I couldn't find it on the exterior so proceeded to pull the tail/brake light socket out of the assembly and found that the lower cavity was half full of water. For some reason the water could get in but could not drain out. As the water would slosh around and hit the hot lit tail light it would blow the bulb. SOLUTION: I drained the water from the cavity through the light socket hole then drilled an 1/8 inch hole in the bottom of the tail light assembly that will allow water to drain if it gets there in the future. I don't like to drill holes where they don't belong but sometimes it is a good solution to an expensive or unsightly alternative. I hope this can help someone having this problem in the future. Good luck & happy wheeling. BTW the 3.3 engine swap is successful and running great.

Woooo hooooo!!! Wait to go. Haven’t been around for long, but I’ve had nothing but positive experiences with @mjotrainbrain

I'm late to the party, but I'll echo @TowndawgR50's comment in principle, noting that my 04 doesn't have an LSV. But yes, by lifting the truck, the LSV be allowing the minimum rear proportioning available. The valve is meant to increase rear proportion when a load is detected, but the lift basically does the opposite to an extent. To restore the function, you'd likely have to move the spring arm up a few inches like Slart mentioned, but I agree that it might not matter much. I'd just as well suggest disconnecting the spring and calling it a day, or otherwise finding a way to put the lever in a static position that simulates stock-height (or a loaded position if more rear bias is desired).

My 4th gen 4Runner has a locked door, interesting that they did away with it for the 5th gens. And yeah, the heated seats were super awesome, switches were mounted on the back of the center console. The adaptive cruise was super cool while it worked (died after 1 year of ownership, 3 days at the dealer determined it was the sensor in the bumper and would be $3k to fix, so it stayed broken), you could even select 3 or 4 different distances to follow a slower vehicle at.

Agree. Advanced way ahead of the competition. Mr Cox 96R50-97JR50

I am happy to report that after having installed the new fan clutch it solved some issues. For one and the biggest is my pathy no longer sounds like an 18 wheeler driving down the road! It just about sounds 75% quieter which is much more than I expected because I was so used to the semi truck roar. It also solved a squeeling sound above 4000rpm that was driving me nuts thank god. It accelerates smoother and I feel I’ve gained some power back. The issue that remains which is kind of funny because it was a result of the roar is I can now hear the other subtlties of the engine. I’ve had an inkling there might be an air leak somewhere in the engine bay and I can now hear some air escaping somewhere in the rear of the engine up higher in front of the driver side. Dont know if anyone would have some insight on this. I also hear some crackling now in my exhaust near the cats. Dont know if this is normal but it sounds like something is in there bouncing of the walls. It could be just from the fact that I can hear more going on with my car that was less noticeable before. Occasionally though will note after have turned off my car to park it I’ll hear some loud pops from the exhaust from it cooling but pretty loud ones. Regardless glad to have fixed the main issues. I thank everyone who’s commented and contributed to this thread!

My seats take many minutes to warm & have since new. On a sub 32* day, I don’t feel them until I’m over halfway to work (& about 3-5”). It also annoys me how it appears to cycle: warm, luke warm, a little cool, warm again. I’ve always assumed it has some system where it heats up to a certain temp, turns off & then turns on again either at a certain temp or after some time interval. Literally every other car I’ve rented, driven or owned has been better. My wife’s ‘01 Jetta could cook a meal in about a minute. I also liked it’s 5 set points so you could get it just right (though I’d never advocate buying a VW). Our T4R has multi adjust & can warm you through my Mom’s sheepskin covers over leather & even with her little 1” booster she uses. The MDX is ‘09 & similar but faster & warmer than the Path. The G has multi adjust & is much warmer & consistent. All that said, I’ll take it over no seat warmers - I love seat warmers as the truck is almost always quite cold when I get into it.

I wonder if Nissan still sells it? Sometimes they surprise me. I don’t find mine overly bright but I wouldn’t call it dim. I’ll take a pic for comparison.

Quick pic of the R50 getting some work done! It’s dirty, but honestly that’s how it lives most of it’s life...she’s more function than form! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Okay, I'll be the contrary opinion on this point. Full bumper replacements are awesome but cost alot of money, take time to do, were VERY hard to find until the last 6 months and may not visually appeal to you. For all of these reasons I ran a PreRunner bar on my truck for 16 years. On the financial aspect alone bumper replacement was a no go for me for years after I bought my truck. It allowed me to protect my bumper (not a damage multiplier), mount auxilliary lights, absorbed damage in a front end collision & I like the aesthetics. The PreRunner was low and pushed brush & small saplings down saving my OEM bumper when I was simply off road in brush, etc. Upper brush guards are worthless as brush hits your lower bumper first & if you are going a slow, reasonable speed, the lower bumper should push the brush down & out of the way. Also, the PreRunner had vertical rubber bump bars that saved me from countless bumper taps over the years. My bumper looked as good as the day I bought it until my front end collision. Additionally, when I was in a front end collision, the WAAG bar absorbed some of the energy of the impact and saved damage to my truck itself. (I do believe the upper front end brush bars cause more damage but I've already listed why I think they are worthless anyway). All of that was irrelevant as I turned it into insurance and they paid out for the damage to my vehicle plus all of my lights (even though not all were damaged) and my WAAG bar to boot. Overall, the PreRunner saved me tons in bumper repair, probably decreased collision damage and was compensated for by insurance when it was damaged. The second benefit of a PreRunner or Stinger is as an anchor for auxiliary lights. This was the primary reason I mounted mine as I was living in Phoenix at the time and often ended up in the backcountry at night. The desert just requires ALOT of light. I used the lower lateral hoops to mount 2 130w KC Slimlight Flood Lights just inboard of the stock fog lights (which are worthless for anything except seeing potholes right in front of your truck or running a lower light in a campground at night) and I used the upper bar to mount 2 130w KD Slimlight Driving Lights. My Driving Lights punched forward way better than my highs (even with 4100K PIAA Halogens in them) and I had the lateral floods just overlap with the driving lights so that I had about 200* of forward facing light. I think if you just want a stinger bar for aesthetics and to mount some auxiliary lights, go for it. It's cheap if you can do it yourself and it might give you some functionality. Admittedly, the new light bars these days make this less necessary than in the past. Look at @02_Pathy (NPORA) / theblackpathfidner (IG) for a nice LED bar integration. I've seen his truck and I think it is one of the most elegant, simple but functional builds out there. (I console myself that they just didn't have light bars, or LEDs when I was doing my build out). See my Avatar on IG for my front end in its prime. My avatar here is a little worse & below is a recent pic but I’ve pulled the grill to play with an SE grill & Raptor light mod-so it looks terrible-but you can see to some degree how the bar collapsed decreasing overall damage & saved all my lights (though I pulled one off in the pic). I also posted the black Pathfinder to show a great alternative (he’s just showing off by beating me to the Raptor mod-JK). BTW, I think the stinger bar in that pic next to[mention=39321]mjotrainbrain[/mention] looks nice (thanks for the pic).

I highly recommend you replace the crank/camshaft oil seals while you are in there. I didn't and one leaked about 2 months later. As adamzan stated, it took about 2-3 hours the second time.

From Diode Dynamics: Since automotive power is 12V, and LEDs generally run best on 2-4V, depending on color, you must use resistors or other components to drop the voltage to a level the LED can work with. This is why you cannot simply plug a basic LED directly into your socket, or connect it to a 12V battery. The manufacturer will determine what the nominal (normal) voltage is to run a specific LED, known as the "forward voltage." For example, a blue LED might be rated as 3.0-3.2V. Adjusting the _voltage_ lower or higher will change the brightness, but only because it also changes the _current_; higher voltage means the current will increase in an LED. After ensuring that you have the correct voltage available to the LED, the next step is determining current. This is measured in amperes, or amps, but since it's such a small amount of current, LEDs will be rated in milliamps (mA). The more current, the brighter the LED, but there is always a maximum "running" or "constant" current, which is the max you should run the LED at, and usually there is a max "peak" current, which is the highest current the LED can withstand before completely failing. That being said I would suggest that you have either 1) an increase in resistance within the circuit board (likely, considering the possible water intrusion , location and age of the brake light) or 2) a weak grounding point. We know that the voltage is good, so that leaves only either 1) increased resistance (from corrosion, vibration, bad wire, bad ground?) or 2) a reduction in supplied power (cracked wires, poor contact surfaces). Not that this is much help to you but without seeing the board in detail there is a lot that I can't rule out!

Nice! I’m getting the same tires this weekend (32x11.5-R15), hopefully they both treat us well

I will be doing a tire carrier table after my swing gate gets installed. [emoji1303]. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If spring rolls around and you are still interested in doing skids, I'd be glad to work with you to get measurements, mock-ups etc.

By the "at full droop" question I believe he was wondering if the CV's bind when the suspension is completely unloaded; for example when you lift a wheel offroading. I am intrigued by the camber bolts possibly being exclusive to 2005 thing too, when I'm at the junkyard from now on I'll take a peek at any R51's they may have and report back with my findings, or heck, any one I see in a parking lot. I wonder (if the 2005 thing is true), if you can just slap the parts onto a different model year to get OEM adjustability?

Sorry... have been away from the computer for a few days. I have Yokohama Geolander A/T F015's on it. Stock size is 265/70R16 Camber bolts on my 05 are adjustable. Interesting to read Steve's comment about maybe 2005 being the only year. A quick crawl through parts lists or online parts sites may confirm that. I'm not sure what you mean by "at full droop" but my shop was able to get my alignment within spec without spacers/shims/etc. I think I'm going to add another 1" to the rear which will give me 1.5" front and 2" rear. That will give me a little more range/support when I fill the back end with gear/groceries/bricks/dogs/bodies/whatever

As far as I know, the R51 has adjustable camber bolts... but then again I was told that maybe only the 2005 has them. I would need others to confirm or not this statement. in Any case, I believe Nissan does sell adjustable camber bolts if you need them. Since It is a fairly new product for me, I do not have enough post sale feedback as to the questions you are asking. Maybe ksar could answer some of them...send him a pm.. I will post more answers as I get them. Cheers. S.

This is more awesome work from Steve! This is especially awesome because I may end up in a R51 soon! I am curious if there were any alignment issues (any camber bolts needed)? How are the CV angles at full droop? What tire sizes are we looking at for the respective lifts? Any wheel offset issues, like we have on our R50's? I'd love to slap some 285's on factory wheels, without wheel spacers. I think that'd be a perfectly balanced look, increase beach/soft sand flotation, while being a reasonable compromise of beach, trail & daily duties.

The R51 has independent rear suspension, so it shouldn't have that problem.

If anyone has any questions about installation, feel free to shoot me an IM. I did multiple installs to check lift height for different combinations of components so I learned a couple of tricks. Also, Steve's redesign of the front spacers (posts installed) solved the only issue that I found with the prototype design and that issue was not significant unless you are really stressing/flexing the front suspension. Be assured that Steve has safety in mind and has created a nice kit for the R51's.

Thanks to K9sar, SFCreation is very proud to present you with the R51 lift kit. !! Made from time proven HDPE polymer they are as easy to install as they can be. The front spacers directly installs on top of the struts and the rear go on top of the coils. Unlike the R50, the R51 does come with adjustable camber; so no extra bolts to buy. The kit comes with everything including thread locking compound. The front spacers are already assembled with new studs so you don't have to. Simply the most affordable solution to lift your R51 Pathfinder on the market today. Of Course, Like the lift kit we made for the R50, the rear spacers are stackable. This mean if you buy 2" of spacers, you can install 1" or the full 2".. We have the 1.5"fr-1"rr for 1.5" of lift in front with 1" of lift in rear and we have the 2.5" all around. We offer 2 kits but you can always build your own by choosing the front and rear spacers separately ! Here's a few pictures ! 2.5 all around kit 1.5-1 kit Before lift After Lift You can buy the kits and/or the front and rear spacers separately here : https://sfcreation.com/t/pathfinder-r51-platform Cheers !

Thank you...but it seems that we just found our man with K9sar.. Discussions are already in process. Thank you for your interest !

Bingo! I'd just love to see sfcreations expand, I'm a huge fan of my spacers!! Maybe Steve could do 4th gen 4Runner stuff next...

Never saw option 2.. Sure, I'd definitely install them. Had new shocks and struts installed in march so I wouldn't even need to fight with rusted bolts

I see lots of pics of modded R51's, but it seems like many of them are overseas. You would think more people would be interested though, you've got a great opportunity you're offering.....

unfortunately, no one has.... i'm starting to ask myself if there is any R51 owner that uses them to go off-road or has it just died with the r50 (pathfinder models I'm talking here)... I guess the next step is to go facebook, but I wanted to get someone here who is more implicated in the scene...

If you're an R51 owner thinking about doing this, but are unsure of the quality, workmanship or reputation of Steve or his SFC products, do not hesitate! Steve is a great guy, who has produced very high quality products, paired with even higher quality customer service, for a very niche market. I can personally vouch for his R50 spacer kits and skid plates. I'm probably underestimating if I suggest that probably at least half of the lifted R50's on NPORA either are running or have run SFC products. Seeing this offer makes me wish I had an R51, as I'd be all over this! I'm very glad to see you looking to expand the line a bit, Steve!

I would but I'm not close enough.