20 years in the making. 72-fj55

[trainbufftony]

Driving a classic toyota, makes the other classic toyotas come out to play. The red Corona belongs to another rastaman named Ice Cream. I asked if I could photograph his toyota and he said "go ahead I just did yours."

Ice cream has a thing for vintage toyotas and in my opinion he drives probably the nicest car in town. (The red Corona)
James (my coworker) and I are going to Cars and coffee in the morning.
That's his 79 Benz. He has done all sorts of work to it including a custom compound turbocharger setup.
I stayed late and welded up my broken exhaust mounts, while James fixed his headlights.

I don't like car people.
So I'm not really looking forward to cars and coffee, but I do like to chill with James and his girlfriend off hours, so I'm going...

 

[trainbufftony]

Oops

 

[120mm]

I don't like car people.

I agree with you on that. A car show belongs in one of Dante's circles of Hell.

There is a difference between interesting people who drive interesting cars and "car people" imo.

 

[PabloCruise]

Over the weekend I dug in and came up with the fix for the oil lines.
I had to beat a wedge in between the header and the block in order to get the other oil line to thread onto its fitting.
Once tight, I aligned the nearest flat, parallel to the header down pipe an knocked the wedge out.
It fits really really tight but it works and doesn't leak. Unfortunately, Sunday once oli finished up, I couldn't think of anywhere to go, so I just drove to the end of the street.

Today I took the fj55 to work. Before I left work my friend Ken called and his 4x4 mini truck quit running at the library (I just worked on it).
So I swooped him up in the fj55 and we went to fix his truck. His coil wire had come loose due to me routing it improperly around the air Cleaner.
After that I met up with my girlfriend and her family to celebrate her grandpa turning 91 years old. Caught a lot of guys staring and I had a great time. It feels good to use it as I would any other truck.
Throw some tools and snacks on the seat and go to work...

How close are the oil lines to the header?

Pics?

 

[trainbufftony]

How close are the oil lines to the header?

Pics?

Header is cooling off right now but I'll get you a photo soon.
I don't think i could slip a dollar between them, if I had a single dollar...
I drove the piss out of it yesterday, took it to cars and coffee, went to a fund raiser lunch, then helped my friend jessee move, using the landcruiser... he had a bunch of steel pipe and chain and I put most of that crap right in the back of the landcruiser, stacked stuff to the ceiling and made two trips like that. Then, later in the day I drove to my girlfriends house, went around the back way and came up on Lucas from behind. Lucas is probably who dropped the fj55 heater in my pickup months back. He had an fj55 at one point. So I pull through the back and he hears a truck coming so he glances back, sees a bright green fj55 grill and does the most priceless double take I've ever seen in my life. Lucas, come to find out built out two fj55s and had all sorts of things to say about mine. Lucas at one point lived down the street from me and I'd go hang out down there after work with him and his brother drinking whiskey and riding 3 wheelers and other fun stuff... It was good to catch up with Lucas.

 

[trainbufftony]

Yeah it's really close but so far it works and doesn't leak.
If I ever take the header off of it, I'll mill down the housing and get that fitting moved over towards the block by 10 thousandths or so. I'm going for originality and function.
It's got to be as close as can be to original and it's got to work, which it does....

As a kid I was having clutch trouble one day after school. I pulled to the roadside shut the engine off and proceeded to use the header collector as a grab hold to pull myself under the truck. I lost all of the skin on that palm. Some is still attached to the collector as a reminder to let exhaust systems cool down before you go in for work, photos or anything else.
It's just not worth losing your skin over...

 

[RUSH55]

Something about that sounds familiar.
I think I recall a guy named Lucas who did a paint job on a big, jacked up 55.
Is his name Lucas Gray?

 

[trainbufftony]

Something about that sounds familiar.
I think I recall a guy named Lucas who did a paint job on a big, jacked up 55.
Is his name Lucas Gray?

That's him.
Didn't just paint it he welded up a bunch of rust and fabricated all sorts of body work... He was telling me all about it last night ...

 

[RUSH55]

He sent me these pics several years ago

 

[trainbufftony]

Big day today, I've got the iron pig loaded for adventure. I'm going solo 4 wheeling up and into the ishi wilderness to spend 2 nights in some shade by a creek. I brought food, water, books tools, extra fluids and a 5 gallon fuel can filled.
I need to hit one grocery store on the way, but I'm finally doing it. I'm going camping with the Iron pig.

 

[RUSH55]

Tons of pics!

 

[trainbufftony]

I made it in and out with no problems.
I had fun, and explored some interesting places. The roads were rough. I threw myself right into some serious 4x4 territory and the first trail I went down I backed out. It was more technical than I was comfortable with and luckily there was a turn around so I turned around and crawled out in first gear, low range 4x4.
After all the messed up roads I traveled this weekend I'd probably confidently drop that trail again but it didn't give me a good feeling first thing. Too sketch.

I took a road in, called hogsback. It is brutal. Not difficult but it's on lava cap, and extremely bumpy. From there I took ishi road down to what's called Fisher camp, which is a beautiful shady area by antelope creek where there's camp spots and creek access.

I stayed for an hour maybe 2 then decided it was too hot. I needed to go higher on the mountain, then deeper into a hole. I took the same road out that I took in and caught back up to hogsback, then went up and caught the ponderosa road which traverses 3 ridges then drops you down into black rock campground which is always cool, wet, and shady. Also it's a brutal drive for most vehicles, but I made it. This would be my camp spot for the night.

Behind the landcruiser are blackberry vines. Once I found my spot I began foraging. I was able to acquire enough berries to put together a cobbler in my Dutch oven and share it with the campers in the next spot over. They were friendly dudes and I hung out at their fire both nights. They fed me steak and offered me beers, and they were all current or former forestry employees. It was a great opportunity to shut up and listen to what they had to say. Cobbler came out OK but the bottom was a little black.

The first night I got a rain scare, it blew over. The second night however the thunder was much more intense and an intense rain storm moved in which had me scrambling to pack stuff up and tarp the cruiser. It quit raining as soon as I put the last of my gear away. It did a nice job of settling the dust, which was nice.

This morning I had my things packed up, truck running and was in gear at 7:00 am.
I dumped in 5 gallons of fuel I brought and began the crawl out. The return trip was uneventful and I made it home by about 10:30 am. With half a tank on the gauge.
Nothing broke, nobody got hurt.
Everything went according to plan and I had a great time.
There are a few things I'm going to add to my kit and a few things which will never ever go with me again.

 

[riderjgs]

I made it in and out with no problems.
I had fun, and explored some interesting places. The roads were rough. I threw myself right into some serious 4x4 territory and the first trail I went down I backed out. It was more technical than I was comfortable with and luckily there was a turn around so I turned around and crawled out in first gear, low range 4x4.
After all the messed up roads I traveled this weekend I'd probably confidently drop that trail again but it didn't give me a good feeling first thing. Too sketch.

View attachment 3402762
I took a road in, called hogsback. It is brutal. Not difficult but it's on lava cap, and extremely bumpy. From there I took ishi road down to what's called Fisher camp, which is a beautiful shady area by antelope creek where there's camp spots and creek access.
View attachment 3402763



I stayed for an hour maybe 2 then decided it was too hot. I needed to go higher on the mountain, then deeper into a hole. I took the same road out that I took in and caught back up to hogsback, then went up and caught the ponderosa road which traverses 3 ridges then drops you down into black rock campground which is always cool, wet, and shady. Also it's a brutal drive for most vehicles, but I made it. This would be my camp spot for the night.View attachment 3402766

Behind the landcruiser are blackberry vines. Once I found my spot I began foraging. I was able to acquire enough berries to put together a cobbler in my Dutch oven and share it with the campers in the next spot over. They were friendly dudes and I hung out at their fire both nights. They fed me steak and offered me beers, and they were all current or former forestry employees. It was a great opportunity to shut up and listen to what they had to say. Cobbler came out OK but the bottom was a little black.

The first night I got a rain scare, it blew over. The second night however the thunder was much more intense and an intense rain storm moved in which had me scrambling to pack stuff up and tarp the cruiser. It quit raining as soon as I put the last of my gear away. It did a nice job of settling the dust, which was nice.
View attachment 3402782
This morning I had my things packed up, truck running and was in gear at 7:00 am.
I dumped in 5 gallons of fuel I brought and began the crawl out. The return trip was uneventful and I made it home by about 10:30 am.
Nothing broke, nobody got hurt.
Everything went according to plan and I had a great time.

Nothing like the first real off-road camping trip to make a lot of hard work seem justified! We have lifelong friends originally from here who've lived in Chico for years. Lots of nice country around there once you're up above the rice and nut fields.

 

[RUSH55]

Where was this at? Sounds like Pig Party potential

 

[trainbufftony]

The name of the place is the Ishi wilderness. Ishi was the name given to the last native American to wander out of this remote region. He had seen his family unit slaughtered and his traditional way of life decimated by settlers, yet he survived here for years before turing up in Oroville. Oroville is not near here at all...
Anyway the man who we all know as Ishi...


He never shared his name with his captors.

The man who the world knows as ishi, took his real name to the grave.

Nevertheless it's called the ishi wilderness and if there's a pig party. I'll be there.
It's only about 3.5 hours from my front door as the pig crawls.
There's swimming, fishing, hiking and all sorts of fun places to discover and explore from the camp at black rock. No camping fees, vault toilet, creek for water... I think it's a perfect spot.

 

[RUSH55]

So this is in Washington?

They made a movie about Ishi.

 

[trainbufftony]

So this is in Washington?

They made a movie about Ishi.

Northern California.
Look up red bluff California that's the last place I have access to a store on my way up. I take hwy 36 usually, to the Paynes Creek exit, then plum Creek road to ponderosa. That's the easy way in.

 

[bobm]

KNUKED SWIMUN or Slingshot

 

[trainbufftony]

KNUKED SWIMUN or Slingshot

Whichever you prefer.

 

[trainbufftony]

Yesterday when I got home from camping there was a message from my friend who owns a beautiful little 22re 2 wheel drive pickup, which I just put a head on. She smelled gas and It was leaking fuel from an injector seal. I try not to see problems where I could see opportunity, so I drove the landcruiser over to Putneys shop (known on the internet as 22re performance) and gave him $20 for a full injector reseal kit.
This morning I drove up to her little farm outside Gerber and changed the injector o rings, and stopped the leak.

I figured it would be a good photo opportunity because Mindy also owns an fj60. Several years back I put a head on it, it's dirty, but it runs really well, she and her husband both love it, and they are eventually going to set it up to go camping... I'm not sure what that means but I'm glad she's got it...