1976 FJ40 Build Up/Resto Thread (1 Viewer)

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Joined
Feb 11, 2004
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Location
Tampa
I bought this '76 about 8 months ago from an older gentleman in Sarasota. He had searched quite some time during vacation trips with his wife, throughout the east coast and mid-west regions before settling on this one. He had planned on a full restore but suffered a stroke and was unable to continue work on it. I promised him a ride once I finish it. It has 52K original miles - documented. The P/O had the 2F rebuilt prior to my purchasing it - even though it didn't need it. I almost would have preferred it not to have been touched but oh well. All mechanicals are sound.

My plans for it are this: I want to drive it when I'm finished with it - without being scared to scratch it - etc. That would be an utter waste IMHO - these vehicles were meant to be well travelled and I intend to do just that. That said, I'm not going to perform a frame-off at this point. I will replace any rusted metal with new, prime it and paint it - sounds simple, but the process will probably take me a while as I also have a full time job and am finishing up my degree. So bear with me as the updates may not be as prompt as I would like. Here goes nothing.


Here's what I started with:
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The only problem areas I noticed out of the gate were the rear sill and upper lips of the rear quarters where the hardtop rested. I'm guessing this was parked on an incline and water may have settled in that area over time. The bed itself is good. In the end it turned out this Cruiser had seen a body man in the past as evidenced by the metal patch panels I uncovered:
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I wasn't sure what was under the previous repair work - so I bit the bullet and decided to cut out all suspect metal and weld in new pieces. I planned to yank the entire sill and most of the rear quarter panel sections. I did some research and saw a layout for a brace to keep the alignment of the rear sections while work was being done. Knowing that I would be doing a fair amount of metal work I also picked up a HH140 MIG after witnessing the magic done with this same machine when wielded by Buckroseau. So far it has not let me down.

With the brace welded in place I proceeded to remove the rear sill and quarters. The sill fought me a bit but in the end you see who prevailed. The trick is to drill out the spot welds and then use a chisel or wedge to seperate the panels. Dewalt makes a "Pilot Point" set that works great. Don't waste your money on those high prices spot weld bits - these work like a champ. Essentially you drill a small pilot hole then follow it up with the pilot point bit - easy.
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Next up was the rear quarter rails. The driver's side rail lip had some rust through in a few spots, so I decided to cut it out and fab up a new piece. I'm using 16 guage cold rolled steel for all repairs unless otherwise noted. This is the same thickness as the original sheet metal. I don't have the luxury of owning an uber-fancy metal-fab shop, so all this is done by hand in my garage at this point. The first pic is the lip removed - cut out with a sawzall. Second is of the replacement lip in place. Still have more grinding to do at the time of the pic:
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Next up was to cut out some compromised sheet metal in the rear driver's side rail. There were a few small pencil eraser sized rust holes in each of the rear top rails.

Driver's side rail - section removed
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Driver's side top rail:
1) New metal in place ready for tacking.
2) Welded in and the welds ground down.
3) Repair is primed with self-etching primer. End repair could use a skim coat and then it would be perfect. I will probably do this before final paint.
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Did some research and a lot of folks seemed partial to replacing the stock FJ40 starter with a newer gear reduction unit. I decided to see what all the noise was about and sourced one locally as my original starter would grind every once in a while. As luck would have it, I picked up a Toyota factory reconditioned starter for $75 - I felt good about that price and installed it. Following the install, I noticed that the engine spins up much faster and fires up almost immediately now. I am pleased with the updgrade:
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Nice to see the work you have done so far. Keep after it. It looks like you and the mig are winning!
 
Nomis it looks great so far. We defintely should get together as it looks like I have basically the same thing ahead of me with Ginny. If I can lend a hand just give me a call. I am happy to assist.
 
Are you going to return it to my favorite color?

You got it! 653 Olive is what it left the factory with - I will keep it this color as I'm partial too it. I'll probably stick with a single stage urethane as well - this is what I used under the gas tank when I replaced it and it turned out well:
 
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I'll probably stick with a single stage urethane as well

Me too. Mine has the original paint on it, and I'm pretty resolved to patch it instead of repaint the whole thing, for this reason:

I want to drive it when I'm finished with it - without being scared to scratch it - etc. That would be an utter waste IMHO - these vehicles were meant to be well travelled and I intend to do just that.

I also like the rivet and spot weld dents and the factory orange peel look.

I'd really like to get a couple spray cans of this color.

You can see above the tail lights that I need metal patches. There are more on the bottom of the windshield frame, and the bottom of the bib.

The first picture in My '78 FJ40 thread below is the day I got my 40. It had the same wheels as yours.
 

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