1987 FJ60 Revival

[amjadi123]

Hey all,

I'm new to the forum but not new to Toyota trucks. I've always been a gear head and currently have a 3rd Gen TRD Supercharged 4Runner and Honda S2000.

I've always loved the look of the FJ60 but didn't want to buy something thats been modded or repaired incorrectly so I began the search for something I could restore myself. After reaching out to countless folks on here and on FB marketplace (and seeing them go pending/sold in a day or two), I finally found one that looked decent for the price, a 1987 FJ60. Its white with a brown interior in decent shape. It has all of the common areas of rust as most of these do, but the roof and front windshield/cowl are surprisingly in good shape. I bit the bullet and paid for it and shipped it to my house.

Upon further inspection the frame will need the Trail Tailor C-Channel kit, and a new/reinforced rear cross member. I purchased new quarters and dog legs from CruiserCorps and am going to try and save the doors (they're not that bad). My plan for the truck is a semi-full restoration, which is my eyes is a full repaint and replacement of rusted panels. I am going to keep the interior and truck itself mostly stock but will get off road tires and probably more eventually.

Here are some pics of the truck. Its a clean title, no accident FJ60, so thankfully all the panel gaps and panels themselves are original. I also like that its never been repainted before. One of the previous owners removed the SMOG stuff and replaced the power steering pump with a saginaw kit. I may eventually try and reinstall the SMOG stuff but that will be a project for later.

Also, yes thats my backyard, I live in Chicago and have little to no room so don't judge, lol.

 

[amjadi123]

Here are some "surprises" I found when I took delivery of the truck. Thankfully this is the worst of it for the floor. I'm going to fabricate some metal panels for these holes and weld them in/seam seal and paint them. I'm not hoping for anything perfect, just something that will be structurally sound, look good, and is fun to drive.

 

[amjadi123]

Here are some additional pictures of the roof, everything up there looks great from that perspective thankfully. The quarters are okay, and were touched up in the past, but I ordered new ones w/doglegs from CruiserCorps. I also have good rockers coming next week to replace mine with. Seeing this thing in my backyard was ridiculous.

 

[amjadi123]

Finally, I brought the truck to our shop to begin the "resto". We began grinding away at some of the rust to see how bad it is and thankfully its not through the metal on some portions of the quarters. I may end up trying to fab small sections are replace only what cant be saved to save as much original metal as possible, but will decide as we continue to dig into it. Thankfully the upper and lower portions of tailgate are in fantastic shape aside from a little surface rust.

I also covered the headliner to keep it from spontaneously combusting since apparently thats an issue with these. I'm in the process of removing all moldings, trim, and windows as well. I am a little OCD and hate overspray, and I really want the repaint to look as original as possible.

Thats all for now until the next update. Thanks for reading this far if you have!

 

[onemanarmy]

Oh you have a shop at your disposal! I thought this was all gonna take place in your backyard! Darn it!

 

[amjadi123]

Oh you have a shop at your disposal! I thought this was all gonna take place in your backyard! Darn it!

Haha that would have been dreadful and the lady friend would have probably kicked me out of the house if I tried that, lol. My father has a shop that performs repair work for insurance companies so its there now. I grew up going to that shop, lots of fun/not so fun memories there, haha.

 

[zeeklafreek]

Proof it's legit:

 

[kirvesmies]

Oh you have a shop at your disposal! I thought this was all gonna take place in your backyard! Darn it!

yup, i was looking to see a backyard build also

 

[amjadi123]

Haha, yeah a backyard build would have been interesting to say the least. I wish I had the time, ability and space for it.

Heres a quick update since last:

I received replacement steel for the rear quarters and doglegs from WolfSteel. I bought them secondhand from someone who didn't end up using them. Theres some small imperfections here and there, but I'm hoping our body guy can take care of that.

They're in the process of saving the doors now and cut out the rusted portions and replaced it with new metal. They're also going to seam seal the doors where the new panels are to mirror the OEM finish. I'm not expecting anything perfect here, but I am happy with the results so far.

 

[amjadi123]

They were also able to tack weld in some new panels temporarily for the floor. I'm hoping they can try and shape the new floor panels to resemble the original panels but not holding my breath. They also fixed the rust near the left rear body mount but it still needs a little shaping to be perfect, but overall I'm happy with the progress made.

Next on the list are the front fenders, the swish-cheese rear crossmember, rocker panels and delaminated rear C channels. Hoping to have another update in the next week or so.

 

[KC masterpiece]

If your rear crossmember looks like that make sure to check the frame at the rear leaf spring hangers. Mine was starting to rot out from the inside there.

Looking good!

 

[onemanarmy]

Thank you for saving it!

 

[amjadi123]

Agree on the rear crossmember. Once I get it painted I’m going to move to the frame repair part of the rebuild.

And I’m happy to save this one. I had trouble finding a white one for my price range so I decided to build my own!

Here’s an update from today. The new quarters have been welded in. I wanted to retain as much of the original metal as possible so the body guys only replaced the portions that were rusted. The left over metal from WolfSteel is going to be used for the other parts of the truck.

All the doors have been saved as well as the fenders. I’m hoping we can begin paint next week!

 

[amjadi123]

Hey all, its been a while since I've given an update but the truck is still at the shop. Its been primed and is ready for paint which I'm hoping happens sometime next week. I ended up going with a replacement rear bumper support which hasn't been installed yet. Also, the doors, fenders, hood tail/lift gate have been removed for paint. All in all I think the body work came out great, here are some pics (not the greatest as I was in a rush). Fingers crossed I'll be driving this thing around in a couple of weeks!

 

[MWM1]

Nice stitching work!

 

[SteveH]

Looking good! Glad it's indoors and out of the rain.

When all finished painting, go wild with some rustproofing, and then don't drive it in the rain, snow, salt, crap of Chicago!

 

[tmxmotorsports]

Your very lucky to have the shop and knowledge. Keep it up

 

[amjadi123]

Thanks for all the replies! Definitely lucky on having access to a shop, and I am planning on keeping it out of the Chicago snow/salt/rain. I'm also going to work on rust proofing the undercarriage as well post-paint.

Question for you guys, does anyone know how to remove the chrome trim around the windows on the doors? There isn't any rust on the upper portions of the doors so I was originally planning on not painting them, however after doing all this work I'm debating on removing them/painting. I've read that they're really fragile and can bend, so I want to be as careful as I can. Thank you!

 

[amjadi123]

Medium size update for today... I was able to get the rest of the chrome trim removed from the doors but I did end up breaking some of the clips, so I'll have to source those.

The shop has been really busy with customer cars recently so they haven't been able to spend as much time on the FJ as I had hoped. Thankfully though I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel with the restore. Here are a couple pics of the progress the past week or two.

Happy to report that the truck has finally been primed and painted! Fingers crossed, I'm planning on beginning assembly next week and hoping to have this thing road worthy again by the end of January.

As a side update, I ended up purchasing a tan '84 FJ60 from TN that I am also planning on lightly restoring. Thinking I caught the FJ bug... its not as rusty as the white one so I'm up in the air on which one I want to keep vs. sell. I'll upload some pics of the tan one once we start working on it.

 

[Beams37]

Looks great!