k3g's R1T build thread

[k3g]

I'm interested to hear what sort of problems you had with your R1T. If you already posted them elsewhere and don't feel like rehashing it could you drop a link (if that's allowed here)?

Thanks

I didn't do much of a writeup. In short, my truck's Central Gateway Module (CGM) began to, and then failed while I was driving cross country. This first showed up as intermittent fast charging failures, and it grew to be a total failure to charge. I didn't write much about it because there's too many early owner posts talking about component failures, and I didn't see any need to add to it. Rivian Service was amazing in helping me stay on the road, so I want to make sure that's the highlight!

One truck update, I hit a pothole on the way home from a rather sendy weekend in the dirt:

I was able to use a friend's winch to straighten it a little, and then we used wrenches to adjust it outwards so the truck would stop going into Turtle mode due to the really bad alignment. It was juuust enough for me to be safe to drive home in the right lane at 60mph.

Kinda funny that an entire weekend of rally and drift mode shenanigans didn't do any harm, but one little pot hole did me in. Ah well.

Here's the truck looking good at camp the first night:

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[k3g]

Tie rod has been fixed, and now I have spares for the next time I bend one!

In other news, my prospeed rack is here, and I've got it installed onto the truck. I did a full writeup of my thoughts over here in the prospeedrack thread.

Here's a few pictures:

 

[k3g]

Rack updates, and some photos:

The edge trim on the front of the rack quiets it down nicely. Soon I'll be putting some lights on it, but for now it's holding my traction boards. I've got some handles and side lights on the way for it as well, but after this last trip I'm contemplating an awning for shade when stopping in random places.

 

[k3g]

I'm going to wait until I can get the truck cleaned up for some good photos after installing lighting on the roof rack, but here's two teasers of what's gone onto the truck lately!

First, a bracket to mount a Garmin Powerswitch under the frunk trim of the R1:

Install was super easy. The powerswitch comes with all the wiring you need, and Rivian was kind enough to leave a nice 12v stud free on their main LV power distro. Don't stress fellow DIY-ers, I'll be dropping a lot more details once I get nicer photos of the final lighting install.

If you want to roll your own garmin powerswitch mount, here's a link to the bracket. Note that in my install, the main 12v input wires are on the driver side. I should have wired mine the other way to give a little more room around the AC compressor, but as-pictured it's fine.

If you have some other switch controller you want to mount, I can probably be convinced to tweak the CAD of mine to mount other options. Send me a DM with a link to the product you're trying to mount, so I can figure out the mounting dimensions.

The powerswitch is for powering too many lights, like this Baja Designs S8:

Also visible are some of Prospeedrack's grab handles with side lights.

A lot more photos to come once I get the truck cleaned up for some photos!

(full disclosure: I make a few bucks if you buy my garmin bracket from sendcutsend!)

 

[zgStevieD]

I ordered some Megawatt rock sliders a while back, and they've come in!

The install was super easy, there's great videos and instructions from Electruck4x4 on how to get them on the truck. I used my badlands jack to easily position the sliders while I worked on them.

Installed, they've got great wheel to wheel coverage, with nearly no clearance impact. I've had tough sliders on other trucks (bamf sliders on my taco, for example), and these are in the same league for sure. Really high quality welds, beefy steel components. Very good product, I recommend them.

Love my MegaWatts too! Definitely Beefcake 2000!!! Though I did realize I can't bench press what I used to during the install... lol

 

[k3g]

Love my MegaWatts too! Definitely Beefcake 2000!!! Though I did realize I can't bench press what I used to during the install... lol

They work pretty good, too:

 

[zgStevieD]

They work pretty good, too:

NOICE! I was gonna say, can't wait to test 'em out... only been traveling on snowy roads (and working too much) since I've had them on!!! Summer's coming tho...

 

[Engineer]

NOICE! I was gonna say, can't wait to test 'em out... only been traveling on snowy roads (and working too much) since I've had them on!!! Summer's coming tho...

Any trouble getting your door open with all that snow and ice on the boards? Do you think adding mud flaps would help? I have megawatts on order but will be moving to MA soon where there is a tiny bit more snow than where I am in NC.

 

[zgStevieD]

Any trouble getting your door open with all that snow and ice on the boards? Do you think adding mud flaps would help? I have megawatts on order but will be moving to MA soon where there is a tiny bit more snow than where I am in NC.

Nah… pretty much just scrapes off when I open the door ?

 

[k3g]

Long delayed, but it's time for some build updates! I've done a few small things since last updating here, but mostly I've just been busy using the truck and having a blast with it.

Frunk Lighting:
If you toss more than a few items into the frunk, you'll notice that the lights in the sides of the frunk tub leaves you desiring more useful light. For this mod, I've added a single Baja Designs dome light to the frunk lid. It's a very simple mod if you have some basic tools like wire crimpers, strippers, and cutters.

Here's the parts you'll need:
1. Some of these connectors. I bought the three pin ones since I'll use them elsewhere, but we actually only need the crimps for this project.
2. Some wire. I used some black 18ga and red 18ga nice silicone rubber wire.
3. Cable sleeve. Gotta be fancy!
4. A Baja Designs dome light.
5. Some heat shrink to neaten up the cable sleeving
6. VHB. Get the real stuff.

The tools:
* A crimper like this will work.
* Wire strippers
* Wire clippers
* A heat gun if you're gonna heat shrink

Light harness build-up:
I built my harness off the truck. You should probably do that too, it's easier.
1. Cut 80" of both of your 18ga cables.
2. Sleeve the harness, heat shrink both sides.
3. On one side of the harness, add a pair of SOCKET style crimps from the amazon kit above, like this:

Note the water plugs: You should definitely include those.
4. On the other end of the harness, crimp on one of the connectors you bought from amazon. You'll need to disconnect the other end here and there, so might as well use the connectors you already bought.
5. Crimp the mating connector to the pigtail on the Baja Designs dome light. Your total harness by now should look like this:

So, we're ready to install this into the truck.


Install process:
1. Open your frunk. Pop off the plastic trim panel between the frunk tub and the driver side quarter panel.
2. Under the frunk tub edge you'll see this connector. Unhook it from the little latch holding it down, then unplug it.

3. Once you've got this connector disconnected and accessible, pop out the pictured green insert. You can use a pick, there's a nice little feature in the dead center for hooking it and lifting it out. Next, flip around the plug side (pictured above in my hand), and remove these two water plugs (pictured missing below, top left and bottom right):

4. Use the harness you made now. AS PICTURED ABOVE, insert the red (+12v) crimp into the upper left hole. Before clicking it into place, ensure that it will connect to the PINK wire on the other end of the connector.
5. Pop the ground from your harness into the other open hole (bottom right as pictured above).
6. Reinsert the green latch mechanism into the tip of the connector. It won't go in if the crimps are misaligned, and it won't click if something else was wrong.
7. Now is a great time to plug the connector back into the other end of the housing, and meter the other end of the harness you made. Check for 12v (if the truck is awake it'll be like ~13-14v), and ensure the polarity is correct BEFORE you plug the baja light in.
8. Run the harness you made up along the wire close by that goes up to the frunk lid next to the driver side A pillar.
9. Pop loose the frunk lid plastic panel.
10. Drill a small hole here, de-pin the connector on your baja light, and feed the wires through. Add a grommet an/or some silicone, but please do seal this up or risk moisture in the frunk. Note that the left/right positioning of the hole below corresponds to gaps in the metal structure behind the frunk lid plastic. There won't be room for screws or cable pass throughs right next to the light without also drilling into metal. I wanted to avoid that, so I tossed a hole where there's a gap in the structure behind.
11. VHB the light onto the frunk lid panel as shown:

12. Spend a bit of time tucking the wire away into available channels, adding zip ties where needed.

Congrats, now you have a really really bright frunk light that allows you to see the inside of the frunk regardless of how much crap you pile in!

Here's a crappy example showing my messy frunk with both light options:

 

[Phatman113]

Long delayed, but it's time for some build updates! I've done a few small things since last updating here, but mostly I've just been busy using the truck and having a blast with it.

Frunk Lighting:
If you toss more than a few items into the frunk, you'll notice that the lights in the sides of the frunk tub leaves you desiring more useful light. For this mod, I've added a single Baja Designs dome light to the frunk lid. It's a very simple mod if you have some basic tools like wire crimpers, strippers, and cutters.

Here's the parts you'll need:
1. Some of these connectors. I bought the three pin ones since I'll use them elsewhere, but we actually only need the crimps for this project.
2. Some wire. I used some black 18ga and red 18ga nice silicone rubber wire.
3. Cable sleeve. Gotta be fancy!
4. A Baja Designs dome light.
5. Some heat shrink to neaten up the cable sleeving
6. VHB. Get the real stuff.

The tools:
* A crimper like this will work.
* Wire strippers
* Wire clippers
* A heat gun if you're gonna heat shrink

Light harness build-up:
I built my harness off the truck. You should probably do that too, it's easier.
1. Cut 80" of both of your 18ga cables.
2. Sleeve the harness, heat shrink both sides.
3. On one side of the harness, add a pair of SOCKET style crimps from the amazon kit above, like this:

Note the water plugs: You should definitely include those.
4. On the other end of the harness, crimp on one of the connectors you bought from amazon. You'll need to disconnect the other end here and there, so might as well use the connectors you already bought.
5. Crimp the mating connector to the pigtail on the Baja Designs dome light. Your total harness by now should look like this:

So, we're ready to install this into the truck.


Install process:
1. Open your frunk. Pop off the plastic trim panel between the frunk tub and the driver side quarter panel.
2. Under the frunk tub edge you'll see this connector. Unhook it from the little latch holding it down, then unplug it.

3. Once you've got this connector disconnected and accessible, pop out the pictured green insert. You can use a pick, there's a nice little feature in the dead center for hooking it and lifting it out. Next, flip around the plug side (pictured above in my hand), and remove these two water plugs (pictured missing below, top left and bottom right):

4. Use the harness you made now. AS PICTURED ABOVE, insert the red (+12v) crimp into the upper left hole. Before clicking it into place, ensure that it will connect to the PINK wire on the other end of the connector.
5. Pop the ground from your harness into the other open hole (bottom right as pictured above).
6. Reinsert the green latch mechanism into the tip of the connector. It won't go in if the crimps are misaligned, and it won't click if something else was wrong.
7. Now is a great time to plug the connector back into the other end of the housing, and meter the other end of the harness you made. Check for 12v (if the truck is awake it'll be like ~13-14v), and ensure the polarity is correct BEFORE you plug the baja light in.
8. Run the harness you made up along the wire close by that goes up to the frunk lid next to the driver side A pillar.
9. Pop loose the frunk lid plastic panel.
10. Drill a small hole here, de-pin the connector on your baja light, and feed the wires through. Add a grommet an/or some silicone, but please do seal this up or risk moisture in the frunk. Note that the left/right positioning of the hole below corresponds to gaps in the metal structure behind the frunk lid plastic. There won't be room for screws or cable pass throughs right next to the light without also drilling into metal. I wanted to avoid that, so I tossed a hole where there's a gap in the structure behind.
11. VHB the light onto the frunk lid panel as shown:

12. Spend a bit of time tucking the wire away into available channels, adding zip ties where needed.

Congrats, now you have a really really bright frunk light that allows you to see the inside of the frunk regardless of how much crap you pile in!

Here's a crappy example showing my messy frunk with both light options:

That's a nice update! If you use "Camp Courtesy" mode, it keeps all lights off when opening doors and things, do you know if this light would still come on, or is it powered with the same line as the built-in ones?

 

[k3g]

That's a nice update! If you use "Camp Courtesy" mode, it keeps all lights off when opening doors and things, do you know if this light would still come on, or is it powered with the same line as the built-in ones?

This light is powered without software control. If any of the vehicle's 12v sockets are "on" this light can be turned on via the button on the dome light itself.

Here's the truck with the new frunk dome light on, showing that the light covers a wider area than just the frunk itself:

...and some vanity shots from a trip I just did:

 

[Ghersey]

Adding a couple of 12v sockets in the bed for camping

 

[Mark_AZR1T]

Current truck state:

Things that didn't come with the truck but are now on the truck:

Aesthetic/Exterior:
1. Lamin-x amber film on fog lights
2. Brain exploder emblem vinyl blackout kit
3. Builtrite license plate holder (I snapped off a plastic one crossing a river:

)

Electrical:
1. s00nish ditch light bracket
2. Midland MXTA26 GMRS antenna
3. Midland MXT575 GMRS radio (in cab)
4. Abstract Ocean roof glass sunshade

Camping:
1. iKamper mini (version 2)
2. 3x aliexpress 50w solar panels
3. Ecoflow delta2
4. Cheapo amazon fridge that just won't die

Non-vehicular:
1. custom keyfob

This is an enjoyable post!!!

 

[Soju1]

Adding a couple of 12v sockets in the bed for camping

is this just spliced from the gear tunnel 12v? Any issue with load if you have stuff connected to all three?

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