I'm starting forth on the neverending Do Cool **** To My Truck path; this week's episode: get a laptop rack built, and set up GPS.

I'm likely going to have a custom rack fabbed at a local metal shop, as I know what I want, and no one sells that.

I want a pivot post coming up from the side of the console, pretty much right in front of the clock, with a swing arm about 8" long to the shelf pivot. That way, I can aim it at me, or a passenger can swing it over right in front of them.

I forsee them being able to bolt some spreaders under the two bolts that hold the console down to the hump, and then the down tube into an angle flange.

Once that's in, I have to figure out where to position the GPS receiver, which is a Globalsat BU-353 -- which, BTW, is an *excellent* receiver if you're looking for one, especially for the price (I think I paid $35 for mine)... and that's the (real :-) topic of this posting.

I can put it in the dash, if I glue down a piece of metal for it to stick to, and that will be a nice short cable run... but I'm not sure what's the best way to fish it from there. Can/should I cut a couple ribs out of the vent grille over the radio, and if I do, how easy is it to get it back out where the console meets the dash?

My alternate is to mount it up in the alpine lights, but that will pretty much require me to unfit the headliner, and mine's in good enough condition presently that I'd prefer not to tease that leopard while it's still sleeping...

On reflection, while I'm getting a decent signal though it, I do have the heated windscreen (though no switch, for some reason), and that may be a issue I should consider as well...

 

before you mount it permanently mess around with it. i have the same globalsat and i used it with google earth, and microsoft streets and trips. i don't have a heated windshield and i was able to get a signal fine where you are referring to. if i were to do it permanently which i condisdered at one point i would run it up the A pillar and into the front of the headliner...

 

I am in fact getting what appears to be an ok signal at the foot of the windshield, next to that little black bump that I dunno what it's for. ;-)

But I can't help wondering if I'm leaving some signal on the ground that would be better spent on tree cover and the like.

 

Regarding the laptop, I HIGHLY recommend a solid state hard drive. I had a laptop in mine on a RAM mount a little over a week before the bumps of driving caused a head crash. Dead as a doornail.

 

+1dnorrell forgot to mention that. the laptop i was using has a SSHD. .. then again i didnt even mount it i just velcrod it to the dash. lol. just wanted to see what that recieved could do.

 

So, as it happens, the wires in the heated windscreen go straight up and down.

As the *edges of the glass* do not, there's a very nice little corner you can drop the GPS puck into, at the foot of the right A-pillar, and there's enough clearance between the plastic and the window for it to fit.

It laces around the corner, down beside the dash, and underneath the glovebox door, for routing to wherever you need it to go.

Pix would be attached, but I'm too stupid to figure out how. :-)

Now then: after pricing a local metal shop to do a custom laptop rack, I've realized that it might actually be fairly easy to build one myself... *if* one thing is true.

Does anyone have a console that's not mounted on the hump, that they can flip over and take a pic of for me? Is the high hump on the edge *hollow*? Cause it's pretty tall; a properly formed metal or plastic bracket could be bent at an angle, and slid up into that, and then pivoted down to lay against the hump. With a pivot at the bottom, and a hole at the top for the up-tube; Bob's yer uncle.

 

now would be the time to install a CDL. when mounting this bracket and pulling the console

 

If I correctly infer the design of the console top, I won't *have* to pull it; that was my goal.