New to the forum, but not new to the Dodge. Been building this truck for a while now, figured I'd share it on here. Some of you may know me from ********.

Little backstory before I begin this. I was in the process of building up a 99 WJ for off road use, and was in the market for a daily driver pickup. I was looking at buying a new 2014 Ram Tradesman black edition when I came across my 01 sitting in their back lot awaiting the auction. I started inquiring about it, as 2nd gens have always had a sweet spot in my heart, this being my 3rd one. The salesman I was working with was less than thrilled that I was looking at a 30+ thousand dollar truck, then second guessing myself for a 13 year old auction truck. Had to come back the next day to find a new salesman to actually find the keys and show it to me.

To start off, this truck was bone stock. 2001 Ram 1500 Sport. Had 105k on the odometer, 225/75R16 tires, but overall was clean and after inspection came across with needing nothing short of some maintenance done.

I went into the dealership with 6k to put down on a brand new truck, the dealership wanted $6400 for the truck. My main reason for buying a newer truck was to rebuild credit, so I wound up putting 3k down and picking it up for $6200, and they threw in 2 replacement key fobs and factory style keys since all it had was a wal-mart cut.

Starting the actual build thread here, there is some stuff I don't have documented with pictures. Stuff like the differential rebuilds, transmission rebuild, and a few others were done by separate shops or by coworkers as I didn't feel comfortable doing them. Short of that, everything else on this truck was done by yours truly.

Here's how it was at initial purchase.








I'll fast forward the descriptions as the pictures do enough talking for themselves here. I had a hard time deciding where to take this truck for a while, as I was essentially just building it up as a decent looking daily driver. So I'll skip ahead to where that "build" ended.







































Now, at this point is where I started to focus on actually building this truck for off road use. My WJ wound up cracking the block in the 4.0 straight 6, along with had the axles pulled out with it sitting on jack stands. I got lucky and sold it to a guy who's kid had a 99 with a blown motor, so they picked the Jeep up and I took the money and started building up the dodge.

I started with some basics to set it apart a little more. Graphics. I planned on running the MTR's but never wound up with them.
























From here, I took it out on a longer drive with one of my buddy's who has a 3rd gen.


















Working in the off road industry, I had the truck on display at a lot of different off road shows. This show was the Big Nasty Hill Climb, which we had our Razr out there to display the two of them. Truck got its first professional detail as well here.















Little touches adding to the color scheme. In this case a RBP locking gas door.





Interior wise it was time for an update. I went with a Soundstream bluetooth stereo, Soundstream 1500w amp, Kicker C10's with an underseat box, console extension, then an Autometer 2 gauge pillar pod where I mounted my Edge CTS2 tuner & Garmin GPS. For the most part this is still the same setup, short of the amp shorted out and it now has a Kicker 1200w amp and bass controller. No pictures to document this part, but meh.









From here I was having issues with the LED tail lights from Depo, so I wound up buying a nicer set of the Spyder G2 tail lights in red. These are the kind that have a C for park lights, and the square lights up for brake/signal. During the day with park lights off the entire tail light illuminates. At this time I added some Sylvania LED backup bulbs as well.

















Some random shots of a short trail I wound up on. Also the sweet spider that my wife made me later remove haha.

















At this time I began really weighing my options for making this thing a true off road rig. I decided if I was going to do this, I was going to go BIG.

So to start, I wound up ordering in a cheap bumper that I really later regretted. But here's a few shots of when I started the build on it. Nothing special, a MOVE base bumper with winch mount. Accessories changed up quite a bit, but still to this day I'm running the Engo 12k synthetic winch, Factor 55 1.0 fairlead and a red prolink.

















During this bumper build process, I got rid of the cheap Winjet headlights and purchased the Spyder black sport headlights.

 

Finishing off the MOVE bumper build, I finally dragged it down to my shop and hit it with the real welder. Had to cut the entire top section out to clear the sport grille, which gave it an "underbite" appearance but I got over it shortly after. After the welding and fitting was done, I hit the backside with some POR 15, then the front side with some UPOL 2k primer and the UPOL Raptor Liner tinted PR4 to match the truck.



















































Installation on it was a breeze after pulling the bumper off the truck probably over 20 times to make sure the brackets were being welded correctly in place.













From here I threw some cheap CSI lights in it, which wound up changing several times after that. I don't remember what all I kept swapping it out with, but I finally ended the light scenario with a pair of Rigid SAE Dually's, and a set of the Rigid Midnight edition Dually spots.





Now that the bumper was finished off enough to call "done" I focused on suspension. I pulled the BDS 3" out and ordered in a slew of parts. BDS 5" long arm kit, dual shock brackets, dual steering stabilizers, JKS quick disconnects for a TJ, BD Diesel adjustable track bar and a Synergy steering box brace. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of this process, just one taken from when it was up on the lift. But you can see the axle droop with the long arm. Pretty insane.

























After driving the truck a few days, I came to the conclusion that the dual shocks was the stupidest thing I could have done. It rode like a tank, rough, every crack in the road was felt. I also had spent a lot of money on the dual shock kit. Brackets retailed around $300 and the shocks were about $40 a piece, so closer to $380. Rather than throw that amount away, I pulled the stock location shocks out. The secondary shocks had more travel than the stock location shocks, and also eliminated the stem mount which opened up options for different shocks in the future. These shocks are still in the truck unfortunately ha.



From here, I pretty much just enjoyed the truck for a few months. Couple shots of it flexed on the rocks out front of my old work, as well as a few in the snow. Also mounted my 20" light bar on top of the opening which looked ridiculous, but I didn't have much choice due to the winch control box. Winch mount sat too close to the radiator, and the box couldn't fit between the grille so the light bar couldn't fit inside the bumper as intended.





















Next, I decided it was time to do something with the rear. I had a plan a long time ago which I executed later down this list, so I didn't want to spend the money on a rear bumper just to have to replace it later. So I did the N-Fab rear runner.







As you can see in those pictures, my tires were starting to wear down a little bit. I decided with the winter coming in harder, it was time to do something new again. I got a "Christmas special" on my tires, and picked up some wheels as well. Ultra Xtreme 102's in satin black, and some 315/75R16 BFG KO2's. I also finally swapped the rear block to bring the rear level with the front.



















Working in the off road industry, we got a lot of referrals from tow companies for people stuck in the mud. This is something I found great joy in, and made quite a bit of money doing. But I stopped doing this after an incident I'll get to later on.

This one was extremely simple. Kid took his truck out the night before to a bonfire, got drunk and slept out there in the truck. It rained overnight, and he was the only one left when he woke up, 2wd couldn't make it out through the mud.







Sweet tonneau cover I had on the truck for like a month. Got it for free off my buddy's OBS chevy, unfortunately it was a tilt style and I wounded up hating it.



Here I decided it was time to do something with lighting again. I couldn't get a light bar in the opening, and so I decided to do some 9" round LED's with a red face to match the truck. With the amount of towing I did with the truck, I also picked up some 1A Auto tow mirrors with the LED signals built into them.



















Fun recovery on this one. My little brother has a 2000 2nd gen, and he decided to show one of his high school buddy's how to "off road" with his daddy's duramax. Needless to say, they buried the chevy at 2 in the morning and wound up calling me instead of either parents. So I headed up the snow mountain, dragged the chevy out in the middle of a rain storm, and at the base of the mountain wound up having to plow through the mud pits to get back to pavement. Truck was washed that same night, as I hate mud.

 

Here is why I no longer do recoveries from referrals. Long story short, used the winch for the first time pulling a Camry out of a ravine. Destroyed the bumper, broke a headlight mount, and broke the grille frame. Also snapped an outer stub shaft pulling the car back to the top of the muddy hill.















So back to the stock Sport bumper and a cheap set of Anzo's since my Spyder headlights were on backorder.



From here, I ordered in everything to build my axles to somewhat bullet proof. Yukon alloy shafts, 4.88 gears, Yukon install kits with Timken bearings, Auburn limited slip and an ARB air locker for the front. At this time, we only did the rear to help try to save the transmission.









I turned my focus slightly to the interior again, and ordered in a Simco gauge face kit.











Then wound up buying a used shell to start up a Safari shell build.









Then came new bumper time. I went ahead and ordered a Fusion, along with a 30" Rigid Radiance and the LEDConcepts halo's for my duallys. I run the halo's on an ignition source and have them set to ambe for full time use. Also got a non sport black grille so I could avoid that underbite I had with the MOVE.














































































Then came install. Winch didn't fit, but rather than put the sport bumper back on, my excitement got the best of me and I threw the Fusion on without the winch.































Then came more fun. I went ahead and ordered in a Wilco TireGate and full size spare, along with a Smittybilt I Rack to add accessories to.

 

From here, I ordered in a set of Rigid A-Series rock lights in red as a set of 6. I also got the 12V accessory expansion from Edge to control my lights off my tuner.



































From here I focused on the cooling aspect. Being as I use this truck for a lot of different types of off road, the truck would occasionally heat up in the summer at slow speeds in 4 low. So, I ordered in a Poison Spyder hood louver for a Jeep JK. Unfortunately during install, I broke my sawzall blade and wound up just drilling about 30 holes in the hood to make it somewhat functional before a large run the next day. The following weekend I got it all cut out so it's now 100% functional.







Next came some more storage. I had installed an Undercover Swing Case a while before these pictures, but it wasn't enough to hold all of my recovery gear. So I ordered in a Smittybilt Adventure Box and bolted it to the floor of the bed.











Now came accessories for the I Rack so the rear didn't look so naked. I started with relocating my license plate to the lower section making it easier to be seen, and followed up with a 2 gallon fuel and 2 gallon water containers from Rotopax. I had one extension and a locking mount, securing them to the back of the truck. Unfortunately they overhung the back by quite a bit, so I wound up removing the extension and water can and they were placed in the adventure box for future use when needed.











Now here's a section I have no photographs to show as the work was done at another shop. Transmission went out, 2nd gear band snapped along with numerous other issues. I ordered in a Monster In A Box from Monster Transmissions and had it installed at a local transmission shop. I later had issues, which Monster covered both parts and labor for the shop to rebuild it again.

One photo I do have is of the exhaust. While up on the lift, the trans guy called to let me know my crossover for the exhaust was limiting my front axle droop by about 6 inches. So he cut it out and sent it up to the muffler shop to have them extend it out. At full droop the drive shaft no longer comes close to the exhaust anymore.



Next came time to finally get the winch in the bumper. I took some flat steel I bought from the hardware store and put it in a vise, then drilled new holes in it to mount it, but lower the control box closer to the winch. Got it in the opening with a little room to spare. Along with it I aligned and torqued the bumper down. Winch has been used more times than I'd like to acknowledge, and this setup has worked since day one with zero issues.









Then time came to start playing with bump stops. Got the rear dialed in, front I had to rework a couple times, but in these photo's it got 38" off the ground before picking up the passenger rear. I forgot to grab photos of the rear, but it got about 48" off the ground before picking up one of the fronts.

Currently the way I have the bump stops and shocks setup, I have about 44" front and 50" rear of flex.















With my job, we did a lot of shows and events. One of the first events of the summer we couldn't find a pop up canopy to bring with us, so rather than having my boss buy one, I ordered in an ARB 2000 awning. I also ordered in the Touring Room which came a few weeks days later, but at least at the event I had shade. This also began the build of the safari shell at long last.













With the shell back on the truck, I started getting excited about the whole overlanding deal. So I picked up a used Hanson trail rack for a Jeep JK and retrofitted it to my TireGate.







At this time, I was still a giant 2 wheel drive due to my front end having the broken stub shaft and not being geared to match. So I went ahead and ordered in a Nitro Girdle cover for the rear, and finally convinced my coworker to finally hold his end of the bargain up and regear my front end.













Couple pictures of my name finally added as a graphic to the truck.





This past summer we were planning on taking a trip to Nevada to finally run the Rubicon trail. Unfortunately this never happened, but we did go out on a 2 day camping trip to see how the truck handled off road with the new front end. I also went ahead and ordered and installed two 4 gallon fuel cans from Rotopax and attached them to the sides of the trail rack.







Adding to the overland build, I ordered in a Go Rhino SRM100 60" roof basket.















Later this last summer I ran into major overheating issues. A faulty mechanical fan clutch was the culprit, so that issue was resolved with almost 4000cfm in electrical fans. Truck also got a new timing cover, water pump, and a 195 thermostat for the upcoming cold season.

 

Finally got the truck out on a more extreme trail. Truck handled everything with ease and kept up with all the Jeeps like it was born to be out there. Impressed me, but best of all, impressed everyone out there.











One issue I came across while out there was rear clearance, as seen in one of the photo's. I finally pulled the trigger on doing a comp cut, and it was damn worth it.



























While on a modification spree for a bit there, I also picked up a set of the JKS Flex Connects which make the truck ride like a dream.



Then came time to get it out on the trails again for a test drive with the comp cut in the rear. Zero clearance issues on the same trail.



























From here, that's pretty much how the truck sits today. I've just been enjoying the truck for the past month or so with constant weekend trips and more fun.























Only stuff done to it recently was mounting my Smittybilt WASP on the trail rack, replacing one of the 4 gallon fuel cans.









To which later that night I yanked the shell and rack back off. Then today I finally replaced my blown BDS hydro's with the new 8500 series Nitro shocks I've had in the adventure box for the past 5 months as a warranty awaiting install.







Now, as for upcoming winter, I've got major plans that will essentially disable the truck from driving until probably May. I will be updating as I go along, but here's what I have already, or have on order at the moment.

1) Dodge Off Road custom built double adjustable arms to replace the BDS arms.
2) Synergy HD Steering
3) Fox ATS pass through steering stabilizer
4) Synergy shock tower conversion
5) Fox 2.0 air charged coilovers
6) Eibach coilover springs
7) Dodge Off Road shackle flip kit
8) Fox 2.0 air charged shocks
9) Cali Off Road Dirty Life 9302MB Beadlocks 17x10 4" backspace
10) Maxxis 37x12.50x17 Trepadors
11) 4BT Cummins and engine to trans adapter
12) Lund Rivet Flares

To go along with it, I'll be stripping all the graphics off the truck, sending it out to get professionally detailed, cut and buffed, etc. I'll be building a custom rear bumper for the truck as well, then sending those off to be powder coated.

And that's where it stops!

 

Excellent build. Though, do you think the current axles are going to be happy with 37 inch tires??

 

I forgot to mention that. I will be trussing both front and rear axles before it's set down on the ground on 37's. Thus far on 35's they've held up with zero issues, and the 37's are going to technically be a lighter tire, although larger around. I'll be going from an E rated tire to a D rated, so ultimately as far as drivetrain goes I should be just fine, especially with the truss front and rear.

 

Was the bearing carnage on the rear axle from removing them then?

 

The bearings were damaged from being pulled, but the broken clutch pieces were stuck to the magnet on the bottom of the differential. The track lock had grenaded.

 

Oh, they never do that.......

It'll be interesting to follow this, and see how it holds up. It's a big, heavy, truck to begin with...... although, being lighter than the previous version of wheels/tires..... you need to keep us up to date on how it all works out.