71 FJ40 Family Heirloom "Refresh" (1 Viewer)

[Stepmurr]

My brother bought this 1971 FJ40 in 1973 after he broke his
CJ-6 in half (long story). I grew up driving this cruiser and my Dad's 1974 FJ-55.

The cruiser was originally purchased in Okinawa by someone in the Air Force and it was brought to the USA on a cargo plane.

It has a few oddities because of this - like fine spline ball & claw axles, and my brother has had to get parts from 69, 70 & 71 to repair various things.

My brother gave it to me in 2010 and I have been "refreshing" it ever since.

I am going to show the work I've done in this thread.

So far I have done the following (in no particular order):

Rebuilt 8 drum brake cylinders, new shoes & drums turned
New junkyard brake booster (from 84 pickup)
Replacement fuel tank from Mark's offroad
New parking brake drum
4" Skyjacker lift & shocks
Trollhole carb
Electric fuel pump
Orion transfer case with twin sticks
Replaced rear third with used, rebuilt rear and installed in front
Lockright in rear, ARB locker in front
New rims & 35 inch BFG KM2s
New alternator and starter
Dual batteries with a Hellroaring isolator
Saginaw power steering
4X4 Labs Frombe steering linkages & arms
Designed & built a front winch mount for Warn 'cause the PTO winch can't be used with the Orion
Replaced rear sill and body mounts
Designed & built a rear bumper & tire carrier
Puma compressor
Bucket seats (3)
Minor rust removal
Replaced ball & claws with Longfields
Longfields didn't fit the ball & claw spindles, so installed FJ60 knuckles
FJ60 knuckles had disc brakes - WOO HOO!!!
Bunch of other stuff I can't think of right now

Pics!

My brother in 1974
My brother & sister-in-law after they returned from their trip through Mexico & Central America
Sitting in the shed waiting for me to pick it up
Leaving under cover of darkness
Halfway home

 

[Stepmurr]

Trip to new home

The first thing I had to do was get the 40 home.

U-Haul wouldn't rent me a trailer because the cruiser outweighed my Tacoma, but they did have a towbar for sale.

I dropped the rear drive shaft and flat towed it several hundred miles (including through Salt River Canyon) home to Arizona on ancient dry-rotted tires. NOT recommended!!

Second thing was making sure I could stop. I found that 7 of the 8 brake drum cylinders were seized.

I had to try three different NAPA rebuild kits from 1970 & 1971 to get the proper rubber pieces for the cylinders, but the cylinders honed up nice and I had good working drum brakes after NAPA turned the drums for me.

Pics

 

[DSRTRDR]

 

[cruiserkreutz]

I love stories like this, subscribed!

 

[apeterson]

cool!

 

[JohnnyC]

very nice!!

if you said here is a picture of Johnny Deep with my sister-in-law i would have believed ya looks like he used those bumper guides and found rocks with them

 

[Stepmurr]

Fuel Tank Woes

So now that I had (or thought I had) good working brakes I pulled the fuel tank and washed the rust out.

Turns out it had bigger problems than rusty innards. I started sanding down the outside in order to give it a coat of paint and found the bottom was as solid as Swiss cheese!

I contemplated a quicky fix using epoxy, fuel tank repair tape, bubble gum, etc, but decided I needed something safer.

I never was comfortable with carrying a bomb around inside the cab, and a leaky bomb was just too big of a risk for me. I ruled out a poly tank, and called around to some of the previously owned parts places.

Mark from Marksoffroad hooked me up with a decent tank of the right vintage (no extra hose fittings to block off) and after a quick paint job & inside scouring it has served me well.

I put two fuel filters in series just in case, put a few gallons of go juice into it and fired up the engine for the first time - WOO HOO it started!

Pics:
Fuel tank bottom
Rust sanded off to expose Swiss cheese
Newly painted tank from Mark
First run - not out of focus it was really running and shaking that bad!
Good oil pressure though

 

[DSRTRDR]

WOW, some shake there

 

[Stepmurr]

Fun with Balls & Claws

While I was waiting for the fuel tank to show up I figured I would pop open the knuckles & put a dab of grease into them.

Boy what a can of worms that was!

I knew from the grease stains on the front passenger side rim I had diff oil getting out of the knuckles, so I started on the passenger side first.

After removing the Selectro locking hub I found out that the ball & claw hub bearings have 52 MM nuts. I looked online and in several stores but nobody had a 52 MM hub socket.

I welded strips of metal onto the end of a Ford spindle socket and was able to get the outer nut loose, but the outside diameter was too large to reach the inner nut.

So I bought a 2" socket that fit the nuts, but was too shallow to reach the inner nut because it hit the end of the axle shaft. Kwap!

So out comes the welder and I attached the 2" socket to the Ford spindle socket and then sliced the end off the 2" socket.

Now I have the magic tool so I don't need to chisel off the nuts!

So I finally got the bearings off & pulled the axle shafts.

I was pleasantly surprised to find the inner axle had fine splines. This meant I had interchangeable thirds and could put a "normal" ARB locker in the front.

The inner bushing seemed to be in good shape, and although it was obviously too worn to make a good oil seal, it seemed gudenuff to put back together. Especially 'cause the bushings are unobtainium these days.

So I cleaned as much grease out of the axle housing as I could, replaced the upper & lower knuckle bearings, tossed the ball & claws back in, and filled the knuckles with Sta-Lube extreme pressure Moly-graph.

Knuckle rebuild instructions are all over Mud, so I didn't bother taking any pictures of the messy part.

Pics:
Greasy oily passenger wheel

Claw axle shafts - note inner fine splines and coarse outers

Ball & Claws

Inner bushing - note the "R" for right side bushing. The left side has the inner grooves running the opposite direction for oil control as the axle rotates in the forward direction

The magic 52 MM tool

 

[Stepmurr]

WOW, some shake there

Yup - I'll get into why it was shaking so bad a little later on in the thread

The bench seat is actually Toyota stock, although my brother bought a lot of Confer stuff - roll cage, rear fuel tank, rear tire carrier among them . . .

 

[Stepmurr]

More Fun with Balls & Claws

Since I had so much fun and learned so much refreshing the passenger side axle & knuckle I foolishly thought the driver's side would be a piece of cake.

Nope

As I pulled the driver axle out the brass bushing came out with it. These bushings are supposed to be pounded into the axle housing and shouldn't be falling out.

Sometime in the past the bushing started spinning in the axle housing, and wore quite a bit off the outer surface.

Since I can't buy a replacement bushing, I had to try to refresh it.

Pics:

New style Selectro on passenger side
Old style Selectro on driver side
Driver's side inner axle with loose bushing
Worn down bushing

 

[Stepmurr]

Last Resort Bushing Repair

I didn't think the wiped out bushing would do much good if I just reinstalled it, so I figured I would attempt to repair it or ruin it trying.

I very carefully brazed blobs on the outside of the bushing letting it thoroughly cool in between blobs so it wouldn't warp too much.

Then I chucked in my lathe and turned it down to a scosh over 40 MM.

There was quite a bit of wear on the face of the bushing, so much that the "L" was barely visible, but I figured I would quit while I was ahead and not try to build up the face.

I drove it into the axle housing and it lasted until I replaced the ball & claws with Longfields.

Interestingly I discovered that behind the bushings was a recess milled out in the axle housing that would fit the normal Birfield axle seals.

Apparently the same axle housing was used for these "new" style fine spline claw as the Birfields. (remember that USA stopped getting ball & claw axles way before 1971)

Pics:
Blobbed up bushing
Ready to turn down
After turning
Final measured 40.04 MM - this was about what the unmolested portion of the bushing measured
Reinstalled

 

[JohnnyC]

Nice!!!!

Nice bushing repair ... You are going good

Conferr was the place to get many goodies.... Too bad they are gone... Ask your brother where he got the side view mirror arms ... I ask because when I bought mine 20 years ago it had them on it

 

[Stepmurr]

Nice!!!!

Nice bushing repair ... You are going good

Conferr was the place to get many goodies.... Too bad they are gone... Ask your brother where he got the side view mirror arms ... I ask because when I bought mine 20 years ago it had them on it

Funny you should mention the mirrors - after I broke off the passenger side arm I asked my brother if they came with the hard top because they are almost the same color blue.

He said he bought them at the local auto parts store and they were *eep mirrors. In the "Johnny Deep" picture the arms have rectangular mirrors, but when I got the 40 it had circular mirrors. He had to drill holes in the window bracket to mount these arms.

I now have Cool Cruisers of Tejas mirrors, but I can't get the passenger side to adjust so I can see out of it. I plan to bend a new telescoping arm so I can see the mirror, but haven't had the time.

 

[DSRTRDR]

I can't see anything in my passenger side mirror, either

 

[JohnnyC]

I can't see anything in my passenger side mirror, either

i have the larger of the two round mirrors and the solid bar I bent in order to see ... but... i rely on the wife to spot me you need a good spotter.... keeps them in practice

 

[Stepmurr]

I can't see anything in my passenger side mirror, either

I could move the blue armed mirror so I could see through the front windshield, but the cool cruiser arm won't go that far forward.

My plexiglass door window is so scratched up I couldn't see a mirror anyway, but I run without the door as often as possible.

I know I can make a new arm that will allow the same option of seeing the mirror through the windshield or out the side, just haven't got around to it yet.

 

[Stepmurr]

... but... i rely on the wife to spot me you need a good spotter.... keeps them in practice

Smokey is my spotter but alas he looks neither to the right nor the left . . .

 

[Stepmurr]

Hub woes

After I got the axles squared away I had one more problem on the driver's side.

There were only four bolts, one was missing, and one was snapped off deep in the threaded hole.

It also did not have any drive pins :whoops:, and the holes were too wallowed out to hold stock pins.

I bought a set of oversized dowel pins from Bobby Long that came with 5/16" pins, a drill bit, and a cool jig for drilling new holes. Great product!

First I had to get the bolt holes refreshed and the broken bolt out.

I was barely able to hold the hub in my lathe's largest vice and milled out most of the broken bolt. Then I pounded a screwdriver into the bolt and easily screwed out the remnant.

Pics:

1 & 2 milling out the bolt
3 & 4 unscrewing the remnant
5 Bobby Long's oversize dowel pin kit - photo from Bobby Long's website http://www.longfieldsuperaxles.com/other-products/6/extra-dowel-pins-for-your-toyota-hub.html

 

[lostmarbles]

I love stories like this, subscribed!

Me too..