75 / 79 Landcruiser Ute

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Senior

Senior

10 Year
Joined
Jan 17, 2011
Threads
2
Messages
60
Location
Wexford, Ireland
This is a project I have been working on over the last two years for myself. The Landcruiser has always been very popular in Ireland but the 75 & 79 series Utes are very rare and so I decided to wait until I had everything I needed to complete the project before going to far.

I have managed to collect everything I need and started the build a short while ago. I started out with a 75 and a 77 PZJ for donor parts and then came across a very clean 2006 79 cab and engine. The plan is to have the 79 cab with a custom built rear tub with the side profile to match the doors of a 70 series.

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We started a complete strip down of chassis and axles first.

New axle seal kits and bearings
New Brake and fuel lines
New shocks all round
New seal kits for brake calipers
Refurbished leafs as they will be changed later on.

While the mechanical work was been carried out I got busy striping the paint from the axles and chassis. Apart from some surface rust the chassis was in very good condition so everything got 2 coats of etch primer, 2 coats of 2K primer and finished with 2 coats of 2K satin black.

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I will post some pics tomorrow of engine block and steel rims I painted up last week.
 
Senior said:
No it's not Garda but I was looking at one but it was too rough to salvage anything from it.

Just in case anybody is wondering what "GARDA" means. It's the Irish for Police.
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You guys should quit talking in code, it confuses the rest of us. :)
 
Engine cleaned and painted ready to go back in but will need to make some new cross member mounts for the gear box as we changed the gear box.

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As the main colour will be white anything else that is not chrome will be painted graphite grey including the steel rims.

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I put the a set of Coopers ST MAX 33"x12.5 on the rims and put them on a PZJ70 to see what they will look like when finished.

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I'm obviously biased but I think that white looks great. :)
 
Engine went in and connected all pipes and exhaust system before cab goes back on.
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Fabricated and positioned new gearbox mounts, I am leaving the original mounts in place just in case I want to revert back to the old gearbox at some stage.

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Cab went on without a hitch.
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good stuff mate its looking good, I went through the same thing and did a ground up rebuild of my 75 series cruiser a couple of years ago


whats the other offroader in the background it looks like its got a winch on the front what sort of comps do you put that into?
 
sadam_husain said:
good stuff mate its looking good, I went through the same thing and did a ground up rebuild of my 75 series cruiser a couple of years ago


whats the other offroader in the background it looks like its got a winch on the front what sort of comps do you put that into?
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Thanks for the comments, its a lot of work but it will be worth it in the end. The offroader is another 70 series, it was a 1989 LJ70 with a very good chassis but a very poor body so 4 years ago my son and myself decided to modify it for offfroading. I will put up a thread sometime in the mod section but basically it has front and rear winch and currently working on a mid mounted factory PTO winch. She runs on Maxxis creepy crawlers 37" X 14.5" with a 1PZ 3.5cc engine and gearbox married up to its original transfer and axles which gives us very low gearing for the offroading we do.
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Because the 70 series pickups are as rare as hens teeth in Ireland, I was unable to source a rear tub so decided to make a custom built tub.
To save time and money I located a 2012 tub from another truck to use as a donor unit.
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As this donor tub was too long I removed 8" from both ends and realigned the ends on one of the reinforcing ribs which made a very strong joint.
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Lifted the tub onto the chassis to line up body lines before fabricating the new side panels and wheel arches.
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The panels will made from 2mm galvanized steel and will be the same profile as the side of the 70 series and wheel arches will be the same dimensions as the front wheel arch extensions which will go on the front wings/fenders.
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