Progress! (Finally) Land Shark Outfitters Drawer Kit
I think I may be the first here to install the final production version of these drawers in an 80 series so here goes. I'm happy to answer any questions or provide more photos to anyone who is interested. @CruiserDave , feel free to include as much of this on the main drawer thread as you'd like.
First, let me say that CruiserDave worked tirelessly through the holiday season to get these drawers out to us and I am profoundly grateful for that.
This is an excellent product and it is WELL worth what he is charging for it.
That being said, there were a few minor obstacles to overcome during installation but nothing insurmountable.
Ok, to begin, you need to understand that all of the wood in these kits comes unsanded. This is no big deal but there are a number of splinters so, if you're diabetic and need to watch out for such things, I'd suggest gloves. I'm not, so I soldiered on. Th
The first thing you'll want to do is hit the edges of each piece with some sandpaper to remove the "fuzzy wood pubes" so that everything will fit together cleanly.
Next, take the supplied Allen wrench and clean out all of the holes.
You can see how this would prevent this panel from seating properly in the dado. One pass with some sandpaper and you're good to go.
Next, take a whisk broom or a paint brush and clean the splinters out of the dado. If you don't do this, the drawers will never go together square.
The shipper must have dropped my package at some point but again, a little sandpaper put things right.
Now you can begin assembling the drawers. My suggestion is to assemble them once without glue or Loctite to make sure everything goes together square, then assemble it again with Loctite. Although the instructions don't call for it, I added wood glue inside the dados for extra strength. IMPORTANT NOTE: because there are screws in every surface, these drawers will scratch the F#$K out of whatever surface you're assembling them on. I did it on our coffee table (hey, it was raining) and now I get to refinish it. My wife is way less amused than you might think. WAY. LESS. AMUSED. Don't be like me.
Note that the slides are just about centered on the drawer. Don't worry, you can't screw this up, the holes are all pre drilled.
With the drawers done, it's time to assemble the framework skeleton. the main thing to watch out for here is that you know which end is the front. It's the end closest to the camera.
Now, fit the wings and drawers. I bolted the wings down in this step (you'll see why later) but did not Loctite them as they'd be coming off one more time.
This is the point where you want to take your time, sliding the wing panels forward and back to close up the gaps and have a nice clean front edge.
Go ahead and have a beer at this point, you've earned it. (This is actually in the instructions) Go get your wife and show her! She'll be pretty stoked until she opens a drawer and sees how bad you dicked up the coffee table...
Time to head outside! This is why I bolted the wings on earlier. I flipped the whole unit upside down on some rubber diamond plate mat so I could cut out a piece to cover the top.
Go ahead and pull the wings off and slide the unit into the truck. Bonus points if your flip flop breaks and you trip and break your passenger side tail light like me!
Fits snug to the wheelwells
I'm still not sure how I feel about this. The first picture is with the bolts run down until they made contact with the wood. The second pic shows how much the wood flexed and sucked down when a bolt was tightened. I may add a metal plate later.
http://i398.photobucket.com/albums/pp67/msapers/IMG_0237_zpsfz5qzz1x.jpg[/IMG]
http://i398.photobucket.com/albums/pp67/msapers/IMG_0238_zps0apc8qmt.jpg
Now the wings go back on for the final time (Unless I decide to hinge them later) The rearmost T nut on each side is a whore but you can do it.
Plenty of clearance for the wings to swing and access to both the jack panel and storage panel is no problem.
Time to put the drawers in! Except this was where I ran into the only real problem. The bottom of the drawers hit the plastic on the tailgate carpet panel, preventing them from closing. For today, I just removed the carpet from the tailgate which allowed them to close fine. I'll be installing one of Notch's tailgate storage lids and I'll reevaluate clearance at that time and plane the bottoms of the drawers if necessary. Again, no big deal.
All done!
I think I may be the first here to install the final production version of these drawers in an 80 series so here goes. I'm happy to answer any questions or provide more photos to anyone who is interested. @CruiserDave , feel free to include as much of this on the main drawer thread as you'd like.
First, let me say that CruiserDave worked tirelessly through the holiday season to get these drawers out to us and I am profoundly grateful for that.
This is an excellent product and it is WELL worth what he is charging for it.
That being said, there were a few minor obstacles to overcome during installation but nothing insurmountable.
Ok, to begin, you need to understand that all of the wood in these kits comes unsanded. This is no big deal but there are a number of splinters so, if you're diabetic and need to watch out for such things, I'd suggest gloves. I'm not, so I soldiered on. Th
The first thing you'll want to do is hit the edges of each piece with some sandpaper to remove the "fuzzy wood pubes" so that everything will fit together cleanly.
Next, take the supplied Allen wrench and clean out all of the holes.
You can see how this would prevent this panel from seating properly in the dado. One pass with some sandpaper and you're good to go.
Next, take a whisk broom or a paint brush and clean the splinters out of the dado. If you don't do this, the drawers will never go together square.
The shipper must have dropped my package at some point but again, a little sandpaper put things right.
Now you can begin assembling the drawers. My suggestion is to assemble them once without glue or Loctite to make sure everything goes together square, then assemble it again with Loctite. Although the instructions don't call for it, I added wood glue inside the dados for extra strength. IMPORTANT NOTE: because there are screws in every surface, these drawers will scratch the F#$K out of whatever surface you're assembling them on. I did it on our coffee table (hey, it was raining) and now I get to refinish it. My wife is way less amused than you might think. WAY. LESS. AMUSED. Don't be like me.
Note that the slides are just about centered on the drawer. Don't worry, you can't screw this up, the holes are all pre drilled.
With the drawers done, it's time to assemble the framework skeleton. the main thing to watch out for here is that you know which end is the front. It's the end closest to the camera.
Now, fit the wings and drawers. I bolted the wings down in this step (you'll see why later) but did not Loctite them as they'd be coming off one more time.
This is the point where you want to take your time, sliding the wing panels forward and back to close up the gaps and have a nice clean front edge.
Go ahead and have a beer at this point, you've earned it. (This is actually in the instructions) Go get your wife and show her! She'll be pretty stoked until she opens a drawer and sees how bad you dicked up the coffee table...
Time to head outside! This is why I bolted the wings on earlier. I flipped the whole unit upside down on some rubber diamond plate mat so I could cut out a piece to cover the top.
Go ahead and pull the wings off and slide the unit into the truck. Bonus points if your flip flop breaks and you trip and break your passenger side tail light like me!
Fits snug to the wheelwells
I'm still not sure how I feel about this. The first picture is with the bolts run down until they made contact with the wood. The second pic shows how much the wood flexed and sucked down when a bolt was tightened. I may add a metal plate later.
http://i398.photobucket.com/albums/pp67/msapers/IMG_0237_zpsfz5qzz1x.jpg[/IMG]
http://i398.photobucket.com/albums/pp67/msapers/IMG_0238_zps0apc8qmt.jpg
Now the wings go back on for the final time (Unless I decide to hinge them later) The rearmost T nut on each side is a whore but you can do it.
Plenty of clearance for the wings to swing and access to both the jack panel and storage panel is no problem.
Time to put the drawers in! Except this was where I ran into the only real problem. The bottom of the drawers hit the plastic on the tailgate carpet panel, preventing them from closing. For today, I just removed the carpet from the tailgate which allowed them to close fine. I'll be installing one of Notch's tailgate storage lids and I'll reevaluate clearance at that time and plane the bottoms of the drawers if necessary. Again, no big deal.
All done!
