84wagoneer

I started this project about a month ago. i havent had many long periods of time to work on it, because of work and fishing. but im finally finished!


EMT roof rack



















the rack was all made out of 1" EMT conduit. i practically copied Warthog's roof rack (thanks man!). the pieces of metal between the two conduit "rings" is 2" by 1/8" by 5 2/4" tall flat stock. i also wrapped the rack with 1/2" 14ga expanded metal. the diamond plate wrapping the corners is 15" long by 14ga im pretty sure. might have been thicker. all mounted to the factory rails with 5/16" u-bolts. i think its plenty sturdy, i was laying in it the other day and im 200 lbs so im not afraid of it breaking.



the light rail









i used a piece of 1" strut from work, and welded 2 pieces of 1/8" flat stock to either end, and bent them out with my vise. drilled three holes in it, and used some pecker point pan head screws with loctite, and screwed it into the stock rail.

i know some of you are probably a bit leery of my fastening means, but its very solid, and it does what i want it to do 100%. im not worried about it getting ripped off somehow, as i live in the southern alberta desert (some call it the prairies? i dunno) and there are very few trees in these parts.

ground the welds smooth, blasted it with some tremclad gloss black, drilled 4 evenly spaced 1/2" holes, and bolted my Canadian Tire offroad lights onto it. i think they were Blazer brand lights? i dont remember. they do look a lot like a style of hella lights though.

wired them with 8 awg wire, as i can get it for very cheap (free actually). i didnt take a picture of it, but the wires enter a 1/2" hole that goes under the drivers side roof rail. silicone is your friend here. no one wants a leaky roof and a wet headliner.




the Onboard Air system









here i have mounted an 8.5 gallon air tank with 8 1/2" ports, and 2 Viair 480c continuous duty air compressors. on the top of the tank is a 16mm air solenoid for the roof mounted horn and on the front i have an industrial air coupler/chuck whatever you want to call it. the right port has a 175 psi safety popoff valve, the left is a 110 on 150 off pressure switch, and the bottom is a drain ****.

i monuted the whole unit to a piece of 3/4" plywood, cut 42 3/4" long by 20" wide. routered the edges, and applied some grey solid stain. the piece of wood wedges nicely in between the wheel wells, and now everything is nice and solid in the back of the truck, and i dont have to drill any holes into the body to mount anything.

the four relays i screwed to a lip under the hood on the drivers side. from left to right they do: horn, lights, compressor 1, compressor 2.

from empty to 150 psi it takes roughly 6 minutes, and from 110-150 it takes a little over 2.


Nathan Airchime K3L Locomotive Horn


















I mounted this beastly unit right to the roof, directly behind the front roof crossmember in the ceiling. the horn is sitting on top of a piece of 4 3/4" x 4" x 1/2" steel, and the plate on the inside of the cab is the same except 1/4" thick. the two pieces of metal sandwich the one metal lip of the roof crosmember, which give the horn its rigid mount. it again is impressively solid.

i had to sacrifice valuable space in my rack, but it was worth it the second i hit the horn button

i ran 1/2" DOT air line from the tank mounted solenoid, up the side of the interior, into the headliner, and to the fitting in the center of my ceiling (which is now hidden under the headliner).

i have the newly added horn relay set up so that when the switch is open (off) the regular horn honks when i push the steering wheel button. when the switch is closed, it activates my air solenoid, honking the train horn.

this puppy sucks air, it goes from 150 psi to 110 psi after maybe 3 seconds of solid blasting.

i plan on making a video of it, except i dont have a video camera, so im going to search for one,and at that time i will post a video!






My switches!





i didnt get to mount them in the exact positions i wanted because of the dash bracket behind the trim, but i still like them. the top one does my roof lights, middle is the horn switch (alternates between regular and train), and the bottom is the compressor switch. they are very bright, and they look very nice. these are the little things that sets off an install, and makes it appreciated that much more.



the rack and light bar i built myself, the nathan airchime horns i bought from Curt Sonnenburg at www.buyrealtrainhorns.com, the switches are from www.otrattw.com and the onboard air system i bought from www.hornblasters.com.



Thanks for reading my thread, and i hope it gave people ideas or cleared up some blurry ideas or plans.

dbabicky90

That set-up looks awesome !! nice job on every thing !! I dig the horn's,(I'm into Train's,I dig them !), but, GAWD-DAMN they're spendy !!

the_mutt

Great set up!! and I'm sure i will not be the last one to say this but nice rack It's all a very clean install

warthog

Can't see the pics yet from work computer but no problem man. I bet it turned out great

XJ740

Holly !!! That's AWESOME!!! I love it! Well done!

But now ya make'n me cause I want one too!

EMTXJ98

very nice. I'll have to keep this in mind for when I do my roof rack!

Baker97xj

Looks great! I hope to make one for myself this summer.

elguapo

Looks very cool. Love the rack.

powerslave1966

Nice Rack!!!LOL I'm diggin' that on board air.

invictus89

love the set up. ill be makin a rack here pretty soon just like this one. ill post pics of the build.

warthog

Now that i see the pics man that does look awesome. I encourage anyone with basic fab skills to build there own. You can make it exactly like you want it.

porphyry

Very nice set up. That's one hell of a rack and a nice clean install.

ufvj217

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but I'm getting ready to build one for my excursion. Just got some 1". How did you connect them, weld?

Also, how did you bend those ends flat so you could screw them on?
Thanks!!

peep

Nice work, really like your super clean install, congrats!