Slartibartfast

Rammed it through the snow berm left by the plow... dunno why people would get their driveways plowed, this is more fun than I've had with it in a while.

Two-tone looks good. The column switch is the thing just behind the steering wheel that you shove around to make the turn signals and headlights work. You can get to it by removing the column cover (the two-piece cover between the dash and the wheel), and then it's held in by a few screws/plugs/etc. Take it apart carefully, make sure you don't lose any of the little pieces, and give the contacts a good clean. Test it before you reinstall! I bent the contacts around a bit in mine for a better connection, but bent them too far, so I couldn't turn the lights off... glad I discovered/fixed it before putting the column back together. It's not a difficult teardown, but you might want to take a few pictures as you go to help get it back together!

I've heard that many 4x4s run a slightly higher ratio in the front to help them track straight... just don't drive on pavement and you're fine.

The bacon/chocolate didn't really work for me. Then again, I tried to make teriyaki with leftover cherry pie filling the other night, so do your own math!

I've been looking at CVT/IVT/mechanical torque converters lately... it's a great idea, rather than having a crazy number of gears where each has its own butter zone, it's basically made of butter. The execution just tends to be somewhat lacking. Half of them rely on belts and metal balls and special fluids, and the others use one way clutches... which means no engine braking. I dunno, maybe we should just go electric. 100% torque at 0RPM. Just gotta figure out that battery thing...

I like the idea, but they're a little gas-station-bathroom-fan for my tastes. I'd want to cut louvers right into the hood if it were me. Keep in mind, there's a lot of bracing under the hood, which could get in the way.

I just checked the FSM ST section (http://www.nicoclub.com/FSM/pathfinder/1995_Pathfinder/st.pdf, page 17), and while there does appear to be one more bolt, it shouldn't be holding the pump to the engine. Maybe somebody over-torqued one and bent a bracket? I'd say more BFH is required, though not to the pulley. You might even want to put a chunk of wood on the pump and hit that to help spread the impact.

If you're sure you got all the bolts, maybe it's just held on by habit. Give it a thump and see if that shifts it.

The stock headlight harness is weak anyway, might as well redo it with relays and proper wires while you're at it. Before you tear into the wiring, try cleaning out the column switch, mine got to the point where only one of the lights would turn on at low beam.

The power light is for the transmission's 'power mode.' The little switch it's on turns it from normal mode to power mode. There's also a little button under the gas pedal, so when you floor it, it goes into power mode, which essentially means it shifts later. It's a lot more fun to drive in power mode, though I don't imagine it helps fuel milage any. If the light's flashing steadily, that means the transmission is either broken or confused, and it's put itself in limp home mode. It'll have no power/acceleration until you turn it off for a bit and it resets. Doesn't explain why the engine wouldn't top 2k though. It's got a limp home mode as well, but I thought that was 3k. Another guy recently had a similar issue after doing some doughnuts in the snow... perhaps it's the same thing. If it happens again, try disconnecting the negative battery lead for a few minutes, then reconnecting. Does the oscillation happen when it's cold, or when it warms up, too? Mine wouldn't idle well (dipping and surging), and I never tracked the problem completely down, but messing with the intake and the wires to the MAF and TPS seemed to fix it. It'll still do it when it's really cold if I put it in gear before it's warmed up. They are fun... gotta get mine out more... most action it's seen with me was a dirt road.

I did, but whenever I change sources and it hits USB it beeps anyway.

I dunno, they painted it, but that's all the evidence of rust prevention I've seen. How much rust are we talking about? Surface rust, holes in the body, swiss cheese frame? Pics would help. Mine's got a little bit of surface rust around the sills, patches under the rear seats, a trench above the exhaust pipe, and patches above the rear axle... didn't even realize it was rotted through until I started beating on it with a hammer. Panel replacement is probably the easiest way to deal with body rust in the fenders sills etc. Other spots may be better to patch. Whatever you do, make sure you grind or cut all the rust away before you sling putty! Ever seen a 'restored' car where the bodywork's blistering all over?

Sony Xplod, Boss Audio 6x9s in the doors (blew out the stock ones with the tape deck!), all the rest is stock. I plan to bypass the amps at some point, once I figure out how to do that without killing the factory tweeters. It actually sounds pretty nice, but the little beep sounds the xplod makes are deafening through the amps.

IIRC mine was around $1600, with a few issues and a little body damage. We didn't know about the rust.

Can't wait to see.

Seems like the advantage of a standard turbo is that it's using what would otherwise be wasted energy, and probably not dragging too badly against the engine. The advantage to an electric blower would be that you wouldn't have to re-do the exhaust, though it does sound like it would seriously load the electricals. Now, if we could just find a way to run a turbo from excess engine heat... maybe stick a couple Peltiers on the exhaust manifolds... actually you'd probably have to cover the entire engine with them to get anywhere close. Guess you could just stick a turbine in the exhaust, with a generator, then wire to an electric turbo... minimal plumbing work and a little wiring. Less effective than a standard turbo of course, but it wouldn't be dragging the alty. Probably better to use something not meant as a boat cooler, though! At that point, though, you're already chopping into the exhaust, so you might as well just straight-up turbo it. (Don't mind me, just overthinking stuff as usual.)

Tough choice, they're all so damn nice.

I know what you mean... my locks are bad enough in the cold that I've considered just gutting the wiring and re-rigging it without the timers and whatnot. Sounds like you've pretty much got it nailed down, though. The fuse box is off, but power's getting to the relay. So pull the dash, trace the wire, there's got to be something amiss.

Time to start unplugging everything?

94 has a point, that's kinda like getting halfway through an episode of House before finding out the patient is a crystal meth tweaker. If it's running like crap, I'd expect it to stall out. Even if it's not related, it seems like something to fix. Check the ECU codes. I'm not sure what would cause 30 sec of shuddering. Fuel delivery issue, maybe? The shuddering might be one or the other injector rail not getting fuel... my dad found a leak in the pipe going between them on mine, if that was somehow draining the fuel from one side, it would run like crap until it got fuel back to that bank. I'm just blowing smoke here, though. (Fuel filter?) Also, how cold are we talking about? When mine gets really cold (sitting outside all night at eight degrees F) I have to let it warm up a little before putting it in gear or the RPM dips and surges.

I'm surprised it runs at all at that temp. Is it getting to operating temperature? You might try the computer, see if it's throwing any codes. I've heard the coolant temperature sensor can make the engine die, so maybe check that out. The only other thing I can think of is that the air going in is sufficiently colder/denser to confuse the ECU. You could try disconnecting the battery for a few minutes, then hooking it back up; this will make the ECU relearn how to operate the engine in your atmospheric conditions. (It'll also clear codes, so check those first.) If all else fails, maybe try some kind of intake heater? The signals not working isn't too surprising. Mine (and others I've heard about) get louder when they're cold. The flasher unit relies on heat to cycle the bulbs on and off (like the flashing bulb for xmas tree lights), so in the vat of liquid nitrogen you seem to be living in, they may just not be heating enough to cycle. If this is the case, they're just turning the light on solid. IIRC, heavy duty flashers/flashers for LED turn signals are set up differently, so you could swap one of those in and get your flashers back.

Assuming this was mounted before the MAF, wouldn't that tell the computer how much air was coming in? It would still be blowing hard at idle though, that wouldn't be good... maybe tie it into the little button under the gas pedal so it only comes on when running balls out. It would also make a great replacement for a ticking heater fan... not for $45 though. Good links, Freckle.

I'll try to spell it out more clearly. Here's what you said: The first part of this is true. You have added potential energy by lifting the truck. What you are missing, however, is how potential energy works. Drive to the top of a steep driveway, and you're exerting force to fight gravity. You gain altitude, and thus potential energy. When you coast back down the hill, you trade potential energy for kinetic energy. Basically, you get that energy back. Potential energy does not add mass. This means the truck does not weigh more, or take more force to move. I think the root of your misunderstanding is thinking that the energy is somehow stored. It's not. It's spent to change the physical or chemical states of matter. Lift the brick, you'd added potential energy, but only because you changed the distance it'll fall. A tree uses sunlight to combine carbon dioxide and dirt, producing cellulose and oxygen. Burn the wood, and you recombine the cellulose and the oxygen. The chemical bonds change and spit out energy. This is storage in an abstract sense, because you can put it in and take it out, but it's nothing like how you'd store gasoline in a tank. What you're storing is not matter. It's energy. It has no mass. So, let's say the OP lifts his truck two inches all around. He's added a little potential energy. The truck's mass is unchanged. The only difference is that, if his springs magically disappeared, the truck would hit the ground a little harder than a truck at stock height. On snorkels: your hands make lousy pipes. Try blowing through an actual tube. Additional tubing and turns will offer increased resistance to flow, but a ram-air type snorkel should provide more than enough force to counteract this. Keep in mind also that the snorkel is, in theory at least, sucking colder and thus denser air. Payload: Fill a stock Pathy with a ton of heavy stuff, and it'll bottom out. A lifted car has more travel before bottoming out, so it's got more room to sag before bottoming out. OP: Sorry about the thread jack.

Assuming Adamzan's right, and it was run without enough oil at some point, that's probably when the wear happened. Now that it's properly oiled, it'll take a while to get worse. Keep in mind, oil circulates, so whatever wears off gets caught (hopefully) in your oil filter. And I don't know rockers, but that's a lot of play.

IIRC the ride control has some kind of valve inside the shock absorbers that makes them harder/softer. I can almost tell the difference with mine.