Project Overland

VTCruiser · 01-09-08, 10:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 89s rule

nice to see progress. Now to a comercial break until May???

hopefully that won't be the case!

Trollhole · 01-09-08, 11:06 AM

Nice Gehn. How did you pull the dents?

VTCruiser · 01-09-08, 12:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trollhole

Nice Gehn. How did you pull the dents?

with whatever I could find in the garage! shameful really, I used a hammer, pry bar, random pieces of scrap wood and a blunt steel rod. I was able to get behind most of it. A proper hammer a dollies would have been nice, but for such small about of work I couldn't justify (well, afford...)buying them.

72cruiser · 01-09-08, 12:47 PM

looks good bud.

has the other frame/suspension got any work planned on it soon?

i've heard rumors of you moving out and renting the garage from chris?

malphrus

VTCruiser · 01-09-08, 02:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 72cruiser

looks good bud.

has the other frame/suspension got any work planned on it soon?

i've heard rumors of you moving out and renting the garage from chris?

malphrus

I am going to put the other frame a locking axles under the truck with the leaf springs so I can still roll the body on a trailer to take to the paint shop which is where its going after I sell the original axles and frame. The work on the other frame and axles will begin after the body comes back from paint.

I'll be staying at the house, for the most part...

VTCruiser · 01-09-08, 07:09 PM

the remaining shackle bolt ended up being a

to get off. It was such a

that I feel obligated to share how much of a

it really was.

The sleeve was seized to the bolt and refused to let go. You can see in the pic that the sleeve actually started to crumple on against the shackle. Also pictured is the nut that was threaded onto the end of the bolt when I was beating it with a hammer while trying to save the threads. 3 bruised knuckles, 2 hours, and 1 broken pry bar later I ended up cutting the shackle off with acetylene. Not the cleanest way to do it, but it sure was gratifying.

VTCruiser · 01-11-08, 08:04 PM

As mentioned earlier I have a rust free '90 62 frame from another parts truck, so I figured I may as well use it. Today I removed the fuel tank, disconnected all the brake and fuel lines, wiring and steering between the body and the frame, and separated the two. before Monday I hope to slide the old frame out, the "new" one in, get the new axles in place and have it back on its wheels. But since I had to sacrifice a rear shackle, I'll need to dig up another pair.

The fuel tank...

half way there...

the front support blocks...

separated...

the rear...

I also snapped a couple pics of the sway bars that were on the truck. The after market ones are a good bit larger than stock as you can see in the comparison and they are made be GT Suspension. Anyone familiar with them?

That's all for now...

cabron · 01-14-08, 01:49 PM

Keep up the good work!

VTCruiser · 01-14-08, 04:28 PM

while I had both frames side by side I compared the differences between a 62 ('90) frame and a late-model ('86) 60 frame. Aside from the obvious differences such as transmission and engine brackets (though the engine brackets were close) there were only two others that I found. One was the rear-most cross-members. The 60 has just one piece of channel connect the rails, where the 62 has two welded together to form sort of an "X".

'86 FJ60:

'90 FJ62:

The other difference was with the round cross-member at the upper mounts for the rear shocks. The 60's is straight with respect to the north-south (front-to-back) axis, where the 62 has a slight forward offset of the right mount.

'86 FJ60:

'90 FJ62:

Otherwise, the frames appeared to be identical. What's also interesting, is that my original '86 HJ60 frame has the same cross-member designs as the FJ62.

I spent the rest of the afternoon removing hardware and cleaning the "new" (62) frame the best I could which was an immensely tedious process with degreaser and small hand brush. I finished at dark and slid the 62 frame into place.

Before:

After:

GLTHFJ60 · 01-14-08, 05:01 PM

That's very pretty. Why didn't you coat the 62 frame with POR or something?

VTCruiser · 01-14-08, 05:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GLTHFJ60

That's very pretty. Why didn't you coat the 62 frame with POR or something?

I have a lot of modifications to make on the frame such as boxing the rear section, fabbing up my 1HZ brackets, relocating the tranny x-member brackets, and fabbing up suspension link brackets and spring buckets. After the modifications are complete, I plan to tear it back down and send it off to be dipped and galvanized. Then I'll probably paint it to give it a black finish and start the final assembly.

FinHJ60 · 01-14-08, 08:48 PM

So you are replacing that perfect 60 frame with that as goog as new 62 frame. Wish we had anything that good around here. Just welded some patches on my 60 frame beside transfer, frame for which I made completely new rear end two years ago.

Nice project you have there.

VTCruiser · 01-14-08, 09:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FinHJ60

So you are replacing that perfect 60 frame with that as goog as new 62 frame. Wish we had anything that good around here. Just welded some patches on my 60 frame beside transfer, frame for which I made completely new rear end two years ago.

Nice project you have there.

haha, yeah rust-free is definitely a theme of this build. My original HJ60 is a Canadian truck and rust has long since claimed its body and chassis which is why I am doing all this to begin with. But rust isn't the reason I am swapping these frames.

fernandol · 01-15-08, 05:48 AM

nice job cleaning that frame Ghen, good to see all the progress

89s rule · 01-16-08, 10:47 PM

I found out about the frame differances when going to mount up the new to me IPOR rear bumper. Which was on a 60. Still have to decide what I am going to go with that.

Looks good keep the updates going!!!

VTCruiser · 01-28-08, 09:42 PM

Sunday I got the 62 frame bolted up to the body, and installed the "new" axles to get the truck back on its wheels so I can roll it around. The objective here is just to make it easier to get to the paint shop. After mock-up it will be disassembled again, so only 4 body mounts were installed.

the rear axle in place...

rear wheel on...

I had to buy a cheap trailer shackle since one was destroyed. It was under $5 at Northern tool. Not safe to drive on, but will work to get the body to the paint shop...

The front axle reinstalled...

notice the driver side tie rod end rotated 180deg and zip-tied in place. the threads were damaged during removal and i couldn't get the nut back on.

I haven't ordered new ones yet, so this will work for now...

and a close up of the good stuff...

GLTHFJ60 · 01-28-08, 10:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by VTCruiser

and a close up of the good stuff...

You have everything I want. Cable lockers, a diesel, and a rust free frame. DAMN YOU!

What color are you painting it? Sorry if I missed that....

More importantly, what are you doing with that 60 frame??

VTCruiser · 01-29-08, 07:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GLTHFJ60

You have everything I want. Cable lockers, a diesel, and a rust free frame. DAMN YOU!

What color are you painting it? Sorry if I missed that....

More importantly, what are you doing with that 60 frame??

the color will be tan, either 464 or 4E9 (haven't quite decided yet, but leaning toward 4E9) and will have brown and orange vinyl stripes to replicate period graphics.

and the 60 frame is for sale!

89s rule · 01-29-08, 10:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by VTCruiser

the color will be tan, either 464 or 4E9 (haven't quite decided yet, but leaning toward 4E9) and will have brown and orange vinyl stripes to replicate period graphics.

and the 60 frame is for sale!

Have you bought your paint yet? I have soem LC tan, but dont know the code off hand that I need to get rid of. Thought I would use it but I doubt I will soon enough. Hit me up with a PM and I can look at what code it is when I get home. Its Single Stage PPG.

MauiVince · 01-31-08, 07:09 AM

NICE WORK!!! This is very inspirational!!!

VTCruiser · 02-02-08, 04:17 PM

i got a couple hours in on the cruiser today managing to pull all the remaining glass and get the firewall cleaned up.

the start...

midway...

after a little scrubbing...

What was left of the glass was the windshield, rear quarter glass, and rear hatch glass. they all came out with out too much trouble and I was able to save all the seals except the windshield seal which I didn't even try to.

rear quarter and hatch glass removed...

proving there is no such thing as 100% rust-free, I discovered a couple bubbles under the windshield seal. Nothing a little sand blasting and welding won't fix, and I am glad I was able to catch it now and can take care of it before it gets worse. I can only imagine what my HJ looks like under there. If you have wet floor boards after a rain this is probably the culprit. This one isn't to that point yet, but the HJ certainly is.

VTCruiser · 02-23-08, 11:09 AM

Today I worked on the HJ for a little while. I wanted to crank it up and let it run for a while. Since I had it in the driveway, I used a couple jacks to speculate what the cruiser might look like after the suspension is done. I used approximations of the compressed lengths of the OME J coils and how I plan to mount them in 60 and jacked it up to about where it would need to be. Here are a couple pics with me standing next to it for scale (i'm about 6'). The front needs to come up a little more, but the tires started to come off the ground.

Current:

"Lift":

and a couple more from a slightly different angle...

the 4" lift coils will be about 4"-5" of lift on the 60, hopefully. I am trying to stay below 5".

I also took some pictures of the rust to justify why I am doing this in the first place...

there are more here...
gfujii/1986 HJ60/Rust - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

VTCruiser · 03-17-08, 05:34 PM

finally an update! I took the cruiser out for a little sand blasting today. Just around the windshield frame on the body and a couple spots on some other panels. I've got a couple holes to weld up and then i'll send it off for paint!

pics...

eventhough · 03-18-08, 06:31 AM

Your rust didn't look as bad as my Piggie until I saw the frame!

Looking good Gehn - you are definitely doing a nice job!

72cruiser · 03-18-08, 11:37 AM

lookin good buddy,

why didn't you get those new fenders stripped all the way down? just curious

any idea what time y'all are goin to make it up here this weekend?
also, what beer do i need to get you for the fridge?

malphrus

VTCruiser · 03-18-08, 11:57 AM

sand blasting is pretty aggressive and should be sanded smooth before painting. I only wanted to address the rusty areas and the rest I'll just sand down. I could have had him switch to soda but it would have taken him more time and cost a lot more money. I only pain $40 for the work I had done.

I'll drink anything so don't get anything special for me. Plus, If i have the opportunity to get the body painted this weekend, I may not make it to Nashville. The plan it to leave after tim gets off work friday around 6:30 or so.