Cruiser choice decisions (1 Viewer)

[plasticbadger]

Hi all, I'm looking for some help. After years of running Land Rovers, my time has come to see the light and buy a Cruiser, the question is, what?

My current truck is a '99 Land Rover Discovery Td5. I've owned it for 8 years and in that time it's progressed from family car and work tow truck to more offroad play and expeditions. I now have a '10 Defender for work (don't ask, it's a company car tax thing!), so the main use recently has been running support truck for the Moose Offroad team in Eastern European off road events. In the future I need something for day-to-day work at home (fire wood, building supplies collection etc), plus work with the Race Team and hopefully some more expeditions, including family holidays and hopefully some lighter events such as Transylanvia Adventura, Pindos Trophy and similar.

I've decided to buy a LC, but which one! I've located a PZJ77 with a blown engine, but it comes with a spare turbo engine and factory lockers, or I can source a HDJ80 pretty easy in the UK, again hopefully with lockers. As far as I see it, the pros/cons are:

PZJ77:
Simple and rugged, less to go wrong in remote locations
Retro cool styling, with the rare factor
Less luxury, less comfort for the family on a long run
Parts are harder to get here

HDJ80:
Still rugged, but more to go wrong, however they are reasonably common in most of the places I will go
Likely to be the preferred choice of the wife and kids
Bigger body less suited to the hard core side of what I'll be doing
More power, so better long distance driving when loaded

What does everybody else reckon?

 

[SNLC]

Without a doubt the 80. The PZJ77 is a much lighter duty truck. It uses Hilux drivetrain/axles, not nearly as heavy duty as the 80.

#1 rule for me in any overland truck. Weight. From my experience it is best to take into consideration GVW. How are you going to build it up and what are you going to do with it? An 80 has a GVW of roughly 6500lbs. When I first got my truck and it was fairly stock besides a lift, it was roughly 5200lbs. That gave me 1300lbs before I hit GVW. More than a year later and lot's of stuff added to it, it is basically built now. I run around empty at about 6250lbs and fully loaded with two people, food, water, fuel and all gear 7,000lbs. With the 80, I am comfortable running at 500lbs over GVW. No more though. I had an 04 Tacoma, built for overlanding. Very similar to the Hilux but a little less heavy duty. The truck was really built up. Empty is was about 5,200lbs and loaded over 6,000lbs. Especially if I had the 20 gallon water tank full. This is way over GVW and it suffered because of it. So I went with Cruisers as they are built a fair amount more HD.

My 2 cents

Cheers

 

[plasticbadger]

Thanks for the reply, the PZJ77 is a heavy duty Landcruiser, not the light duty hilux running gear one though, so it has leaf springs all round and full float axles front and rear. I think it has a bigger margin between curb weight and GVW too, but I'd have to check.

I know what you mean about weights, 2 years ago I took my Discovery to Croatia, loaded to max GVW. On the way home our other truck broke down, so we added two extra people and a 3000kg+ trailer. The weight was so high that the rear tyres wore unevenly and needed replacing after the single journey!

 

[plasticbadger]

To describe what I have planned a little better:

I want something that will work as a mix of day-to-day driver (not my only driver), light expedition/holiday stuff and more hardcore play / offroad trips. I envisage something more like an American trail rig style than a traditional European expedition truck. Mods to start with would be a small lift, bumpers front and rear, skid pan and a roof rack / interior storage.

 

[SNLC]

I would still go with the 80. I am not all that familiar with non-US Cruisers though. Been around a few, driven a few, seen a few more. That is about it.

I like my 80, a lot. But I got a v8 in it!

Cheers

 

[77cruiser77]

Hdj80 vs PZJ77 I'd go 80
Hdj80 vs PZJ77 with a 1HD-T hands down the 77.

Age as you noted should be considered. Even if you found a hdj80 with 30,000k on it it'll still be 25 years old and those fancy electrics don't age so well. The 80 is wider and full time 4wd. Up to you if that's a good thing or not. If you get the 77 get a different transmission for it too. The PZJ is a heavy duty platform but unlike the HZJ77 uses a light duty transmission like the prado.

 

[atomicshawn]

...I had an 04 Tacoma, built for overlanding. Very similar to the Hilux but a little less heavy duty. The truck was really built up. Empty is was about 5,200lbs and loaded over 6,000lbs. Especially if I had the 20 gallon water tank full. This is way over GVW and it suffered because of it...

Curious by what you mean by "it suffered"

 

[B Point]

You're going to get a lot of opinions on this. Do you mean you have a spare 1hd-t engine... or a pz with a turbo added? I have a 1HD-T 81 but the 1HDFT 80 is the best 80. That said, my heart will always lean towards the look and feel of a fully loaded expedition HZJ..PZJ77. I've seen guys beat the living shot out of their PZJ's and they always come through fine. They're tough enough. In the end an 81 and PZJ77 are going to be priced similarly so it comes down to personal taste, really.

 

[plasticbadger]

The PZJ77 has a blown original engine, but is offered with a spare turbo converted PZJ. However, it's relatively easy to get hold of a tired HDJ80 with 1HD-T in the UK, so I'm leaning towards buying the 77 and swapping in a complete 1HD, HF55(?) transmission and full time case. I've searched on this and can't find a detailed thread on a similar conversion.

For me the style, size and simplicity of the 77 is winning over the 80, even if I end up buying both and building the 77!