Mad Max V

maybe go white to reflect the florida heat?

 

After I bought the station wagon, I was going to paint my 2014 Prius in Krylon military flat Olive green this summer. The neighbor borrowed it for a week, wanted to buy it and made me an offer that I decided to take him up on.

 

Never sell to someone you know

Never sell to someone you know

Buy an extra hv battery, brake booster, inverter and engine. You will also need Techstream for troubeshooting and brake flushing after replacing the brake booster. Also plenty of engine oil.

 

Already been there. Hybrid pack replaced with Nexcell Lithium. New heater core- THAT's the most painful intensive job on that vehicle. A brake actuator, a motor and a hybrid battery is a walk in the park compared to a heater core. A heater core on a Prius Gen 3 is exactly the kind of job that I would want my worst enemy to do. Along with a few other things.

It runs on 215/75R16 (27") on Corolla S 16X7 wheels with about 2" of lift and Firestone airbags. The sidewall is fat enough not to gouge the wheel. Zero road rash.

206K with a 38K 2019 Gen 4 long block.

The wagon is getting set up similar- still working on it- with 255/40R18's. It's a very nice very low mileage car, so no camo/military jobs on this one. It's not going to be the mule like the sedan was. Even though it has a lower final drive ratio, it's a heavier car with the same motor and I've scaled down somewhat for what I need to haul.

Some cool ideas I had toyed with to get that military/ suedo Mad Max look was to run some Charger/Taurus cop car steelies with the poverty hubcaps and 5X4.5" wheel adapters, but the weight is a killer (30lbs). Any tire on it would put in well into the 50's. The wheels alone weigh almost as much as a 15" Prius wheel with a 195 tire. As it is my Corrola S 16X7's with a Bridgestone weigh in at 41 pounds, which isn't too bad- the OEM 17's on the wagon with a Cooper tire weighed 47 lbs.

I had also considered American Racing Wheel Torq Thrust D 5 spokes (the all time classic hot rod wheel ) . I mocked it up one weekend with the set I have on my '63 Avanti, but the offset and the adapters would put the wheels about 3" outside of the body and require trimming the front fenders, although I did figure I could get away with 225/50R 15's on a set of 15X8.5's if I wanted to pull it off.

Weathertech molded floor mats get you close enough to that cool rubber floor /no fuss cleaning like what you find in a fleet truck today. Used to be the norm before they all became soccer mom trucks.

The Rhinoliner spray can products that you can find at AutoZoo work well for detail parts. I did the tire well area in it, but expect about 2-3 days to dry- and that's in the south.

The hood and the lower rockers are done in Krylon satin black. Pretty good straight out of the can, but if you are patient you can get a nice smooth low gloss look if you let it dry for a week and wet sand with 1200/1500- people think I wrapped the hood. I did the back spoiler with a can of Dupicolor gloss black lacquer, waited a half an hour, wet sanded with 1500, and installed it with no buffing.Picasso would have been in awe.

I also have aluminum skid plates on both vehicles.

With the sedan- I also pulled a trailer with a 2" hitch. 1600 miles round trip with a Uhaul 5X7 going to shows, over a mountain in 90 degree weather with the Schneiders and JB Hunts at 30MPH. 23-27MPG. I've done that about 8 times. I also have no issue running local business with a trailer. Only unless I'm lazy will I use my old Chevy truck. Probably 40K-50K of this vehicles life pulling. I'm torching brakes around 60-70K and I pull the hub bearings when I do the brakes (Brembo's or genuine Toyota parts). CV joints have been fine. I also run an oil cooler. I'd run 62 mph max, so I'm basically crusin' with Schnieder and the JB Hunt.

I had also toyed with building a pipe bumper on the sedan for the front and ditching the nose cone. I drove it for a while without the front bumper cover after I changed the engine. It nuked about 4-5 mpg and you really feel it pushing wind on the highway. If I was pulling the trailer on the highway, I'd put the nose back on.

Regardless, if I had kept it would I have done it? Yeah, I would have. Why? It would have been a no fuss mule car. Scratch it?- no worries. A trip to Lowe's fixes that problem. Bump a sign? The sign loses. Curbs are no longer an issue. No more popping the spoiler edge. Just drive over them. Possums? Just put another check mark on the bumper.

With all this said, I still offer the caviat kids please do not try this at home. I've done some really hard and cruel things to this car- I've pulled a trailer out into the woods with this thing with an inverter, disabled traction control, cleared 10 acres of land- all while driving it to and from work sites every day. What also appeared to be the worst three year old former lease vehicle I could have bought from CarMax ( I'm not sure what was worse- the masked dogh$it smell and the hair, the soiled diaper odor or the cockroaches that had to be rectified with dissasembly, repeated cleanings and an ozone machine- at least it wasn't upholstered in apartment complex tan inside) it gave me the self sufficiency to no longer be a 9-5 W2 wonk, buy a house and give me a property to run a business on as I lived in this car for about a year in 68 degrees of hybrid powered glamping. Homelessness at it's best. Tip- if you want to live among nature, then move there. It's cheaper. and you don't have to go get a gym subscription to take a shower. Glampers are not living a lifestyle. They're just telling you a lie.

I've had a lot of fun with this car yet I have never compromised it with cheap parts, half $$@ed craftsmanship or neglected maintenance. I had to replace the rear axle in it from my offroad forays, yet the only cosmetic damage this vehicle has suffered- 2 front and 3 rear bumper covers - was done by $$@holes in parking lots. It also never experienced as much as a dent or a door ding.

Besides it's made me a lot of money. At least 62.5 cents every mile. You want Mad Max? This is the car you want. At least for a while, as at some point everything made after 1973 will serve no purpose. Talk the smack as they may about Prius’s, yet Nobody is going to find the plastic parts or the tools to rebuild their 9 speed transmissions in their Fiat trucks either.