While this is a build thread of my Land Cruiser, I figured that because this is my first Mud thread I would give myself a little introduction too.
I’ve always been into cars from a very young age. While I never had the facilities to work on cars myself (and I still don’t), I was always fascinated about the ins and outs of how they worked. Once I had been introduced to the 4WD scene by some friends in high school, I purchased a 2007 Holden Rodeo dual-cab ute at 17, after an unfortunate accident in my beloved Honda Jazz thanks to a HiLux driver (typical!). It was used as a service vehicle by the local Isuzu dealership and thus had over 380,000km on its 4JJ1 engine. Still one of the best diesel engines I have experienced, even with the very hard life it had.
I did many camping trips in this car, and despite it being my daily driver, I had no little to no issues with this vehicle during my ownership. Not much was done to it aside from removing the huge steel toolboxes from the tray, adding 31 inch all-terrain tyres and a mint stereo system, for a 17 year old anyway. Would like to mention that the car in its entirety was paid for by myself which only really makes sense when I mention that I went to a private school where most kids had their cars paid for by their parents.
Fast forward two years, the Rodeo was long sold (I still regret this today) and I was driving a somewhat modified 2007 Honda Accord Euro, which ended up getting defected for being too low and excessive camber. Not sure what they were on about…
Getting the car defected was inevitable but it did put me in a bit of a state. My girlfriend and I had always been talking about me buying another offroad vehicle so we could go on more camping trips together without having to borrow the father-in-law’s petrol Rodeo or hitching a ride with someone else. I was still very much into the 4WD scene despite owning a low car - apparently owning one type of car is meant to restrict you to only liking that type of car in today’s social media influence - and I had a particularly keen eye for the older-shape Land Cruisers. Where I am from, 80 Series Land Cruisers are dime a dozen and most of them are in pretty average condition and petrol. This led me to looking into the 60 Series Land Cruiser. At this time, diesel examples could be had for a reasonable price as they weren’t hit as hard by the Toyota tax or the Covid tax at this point. It was at this point that one of Chloe’s (my girlfriend) coworkers told us that her partner was selling his diesel 60 Series. It wasn’t meant to be unfortunately but the mishap in the sale fueled the fire to own a diesel 60 Series.
After much looking on Facebook Marketplace and Gumtree, I found this.
Keen and not-so-keen eyes will tell you this is Freeborn Red. I had never seen this colour on a Land Cruiser before, let alone a 60. After messaging the owner, I found out it was a 1981 base model with the 2H diesel and had a 5-speed conversion from the later-year 60 Series. After consulting with the owner, Chloe and I drove from where we lived in Bunbury to Katanning, about a two hour drive. It was love at first sight for me. The photos on the ad weren’t the best quality and the Freeborn Red seemed to glisten in the sunlight. Maybe it was the paint swirls though, I’m not sure.
After filling up the fuel tank and realising that it had a long-range fuel tank, we set off on the very slow trip home. The 2H was never a spritely engine and when it’s carrying around 2000kg worth of metal and rubber, it was never going to break any records. That combined with the strangely short gearing (as of writing, I still suspect it has had different diff gearing put in it), it made its way home a few km/h slower than the speed limits.
I never got around to doing much to the Cruiser, it needed new tyres desperately so some Dick Cepek Extreme Country 33x10.5R15 mud-terrains were purchased as they were the only 33in tyre that suited the 15in stock chrome wheels that were available at the time. I still want some BFG KO2’s for the true period correct look but that can wait and the DC’s are doing just fine.
This is where things go a bit pear-shaped. I had driven up in the Cruiser to see one of my best mates, also into his cars, and was about to leave his house to go back home. As I turn out of his suburb, the car cuts out for no logical reason. Odd. I pull over and restart the car, only now it is making a strange ticking sound. I’m no genius but when a car starts making strange ticking sounds it’s not a good thing. After calling up my mate for advice and his dad who happens to be a mechanic from way back, it’s diagnosed that the bottom end is completely shot. Not wanting to risk any more damage, I called a tow truck and had it towed 150km back home.
That brings us to now. After having it parked up at home for the last few months, I’ve decided to pull my finger out and try and get it running again. The original plan was to swap in a 12H-T factory turbo engine however Toyota diesels run a premium in the used engine market, fetching up to $10k for a good example. This just wasn’t viable as I’m currently 19 and not making huge amounts of money. All seemed lost until I thought about those friends who had introduced me to the 4WD scene all those years ago. One of them was planning to put a Ford Barra into his Nissan GU Patrol which he owned at the time however fell out of love for the car so the swap never ended up happening. This combined with the recent introduction to Richard Swindel-Hurst to my YouTube subscription box cemented the plan to try and swap a Barra into the Cruiser. Turns out there aren't very many, if any, Barra-swapped 60s around, so no pressure!
I’ve always been into cars from a very young age. While I never had the facilities to work on cars myself (and I still don’t), I was always fascinated about the ins and outs of how they worked. Once I had been introduced to the 4WD scene by some friends in high school, I purchased a 2007 Holden Rodeo dual-cab ute at 17, after an unfortunate accident in my beloved Honda Jazz thanks to a HiLux driver (typical!). It was used as a service vehicle by the local Isuzu dealership and thus had over 380,000km on its 4JJ1 engine. Still one of the best diesel engines I have experienced, even with the very hard life it had.
I did many camping trips in this car, and despite it being my daily driver, I had no little to no issues with this vehicle during my ownership. Not much was done to it aside from removing the huge steel toolboxes from the tray, adding 31 inch all-terrain tyres and a mint stereo system, for a 17 year old anyway. Would like to mention that the car in its entirety was paid for by myself which only really makes sense when I mention that I went to a private school where most kids had their cars paid for by their parents.
Fast forward two years, the Rodeo was long sold (I still regret this today) and I was driving a somewhat modified 2007 Honda Accord Euro, which ended up getting defected for being too low and excessive camber. Not sure what they were on about…
Getting the car defected was inevitable but it did put me in a bit of a state. My girlfriend and I had always been talking about me buying another offroad vehicle so we could go on more camping trips together without having to borrow the father-in-law’s petrol Rodeo or hitching a ride with someone else. I was still very much into the 4WD scene despite owning a low car - apparently owning one type of car is meant to restrict you to only liking that type of car in today’s social media influence - and I had a particularly keen eye for the older-shape Land Cruisers. Where I am from, 80 Series Land Cruisers are dime a dozen and most of them are in pretty average condition and petrol. This led me to looking into the 60 Series Land Cruiser. At this time, diesel examples could be had for a reasonable price as they weren’t hit as hard by the Toyota tax or the Covid tax at this point. It was at this point that one of Chloe’s (my girlfriend) coworkers told us that her partner was selling his diesel 60 Series. It wasn’t meant to be unfortunately but the mishap in the sale fueled the fire to own a diesel 60 Series.
After much looking on Facebook Marketplace and Gumtree, I found this.
Keen and not-so-keen eyes will tell you this is Freeborn Red. I had never seen this colour on a Land Cruiser before, let alone a 60. After messaging the owner, I found out it was a 1981 base model with the 2H diesel and had a 5-speed conversion from the later-year 60 Series. After consulting with the owner, Chloe and I drove from where we lived in Bunbury to Katanning, about a two hour drive. It was love at first sight for me. The photos on the ad weren’t the best quality and the Freeborn Red seemed to glisten in the sunlight. Maybe it was the paint swirls though, I’m not sure.
After filling up the fuel tank and realising that it had a long-range fuel tank, we set off on the very slow trip home. The 2H was never a spritely engine and when it’s carrying around 2000kg worth of metal and rubber, it was never going to break any records. That combined with the strangely short gearing (as of writing, I still suspect it has had different diff gearing put in it), it made its way home a few km/h slower than the speed limits.
I never got around to doing much to the Cruiser, it needed new tyres desperately so some Dick Cepek Extreme Country 33x10.5R15 mud-terrains were purchased as they were the only 33in tyre that suited the 15in stock chrome wheels that were available at the time. I still want some BFG KO2’s for the true period correct look but that can wait and the DC’s are doing just fine.
This is where things go a bit pear-shaped. I had driven up in the Cruiser to see one of my best mates, also into his cars, and was about to leave his house to go back home. As I turn out of his suburb, the car cuts out for no logical reason. Odd. I pull over and restart the car, only now it is making a strange ticking sound. I’m no genius but when a car starts making strange ticking sounds it’s not a good thing. After calling up my mate for advice and his dad who happens to be a mechanic from way back, it’s diagnosed that the bottom end is completely shot. Not wanting to risk any more damage, I called a tow truck and had it towed 150km back home.
That brings us to now. After having it parked up at home for the last few months, I’ve decided to pull my finger out and try and get it running again. The original plan was to swap in a 12H-T factory turbo engine however Toyota diesels run a premium in the used engine market, fetching up to $10k for a good example. This just wasn’t viable as I’m currently 19 and not making huge amounts of money. All seemed lost until I thought about those friends who had introduced me to the 4WD scene all those years ago. One of them was planning to put a Ford Barra into his Nissan GU Patrol which he owned at the time however fell out of love for the car so the swap never ended up happening. This combined with the recent introduction to Richard Swindel-Hurst to my YouTube subscription box cemented the plan to try and swap a Barra into the Cruiser. Turns out there aren't very many, if any, Barra-swapped 60s around, so no pressure!
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