1987 FJ60 Wheeler/Daily Refresh (1 Viewer)

[WeeksAuto]

Hello Everyone! Just picked this FJ60 up last week to use as a family wheeler and a daily from time to time. I've been missing my FZJ80s and fj80 for a while now and with a wheeling trip coming up Labor Day weekend I decided to try an fj60. This one was on marketplace a few hours from me and after working out a deal, I ended up with a decent condition 60 with a list of ok parts.
It has a chevy 350 and a th350 transmission adapted to a stock case, a SOA lift with OME leafs. It's got crossover high steering and a set of decent 35s. And the cherry on top for me is the Warn 8274 winch.
First of all, it runs like crap and has some bad valvetrain noise which I knew about when buying. the trans leaks bad and the front axle seals are leaking. So, this weekend I am going to swap the worn our 350 for a vortec 4.8 (truck LS), keep the th350 transmission and add a megasquirt ECU to control the EFI. I have all of the swap parts laying around from past projects, so it just makes sense to swap instead of fixing the carbureted 350.
After I get it running with the 4.8, I will wheel it for a bit and decide what's next to upgrade.

 

[WeeksAuto]

After doing so triage on the fj I found quite a few issues with the old setup, it had some loose rocker arms because the cam was worn flat on a few lobes. While removing it I noticed a few issues, the harmonic dampener hold down bolt was missing, the torque converter had different size headed bolts in it, half the teeth on the flex plate were ground down and some of the spark plug boots were burned. So out with the old and in with the "newer".

I pulled the 350 and pressure washed the engine bay to get ready for the 4.8. I didn't spend much time cleaning the 4.8 before install since it was going to get dirty very soon. I threw on the swap engine mounts, an SFI flex plate with the correct th350 torque converter bolt pattern and installed the crank spacer. Then dropped the 4.8 in and bolted it up without any drama since its just replacing a SBC engine.
Sorry for the lack of pics, I will try and take more as the project move forward.