Build '73 FJ40 rebuild - family wheeler

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This last weekend was pretty hard on me and I needed to do something that didn’t take much thought to get my mind off of things. I decided to change my Weber from an internal vent to an external vent. This will improve its ability to run at angles. The first thing you need to do is pull the top of the carb off, turn it over and remove the floats. This is what it will look like:

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You can see a plugged port casted into the body. I just tapped it out to fit a threaded barbed fitting I had lying around:

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The next step is to drill holes to open that port:

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And seal off the internal vent. I have heard of people using JB Weld but I used something called FastSteel that I had lying around.

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After that, I put everything back together. The vent will go to a catch can that I can empty back into the tank after a wheeling trip. It’s not an ideal setup but this is free!

I also think I advanced my timing too much. It’s running great but the driver side of the hood is noticeably hotter than the passenger side…
 
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I haven't yet... I should have done it while it was taken apart but I wasn't really thinking clearly that day.

Progress on this is going to slow down a bit. My daughter was diagnosed with T1 Diabetes and until we get our schedule and budget back up to speed, the 40 is on the back burner. Hopefully it won't be effected very much but only time will tell!
 
Brittney and I drove over to Bend this weekend to see my Dad's new place, then we headed down to Gilchrist for some relaxation. To be honest, I didn't think about the 40 at all but I did get to do some fire road running in the 100. It sure is nice and smooth over washboard! Anyway, I came back to an email saying my fuel cell has finally been shipped. As soon as I get that I can start working on the rear seating and cage.

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So I was planning on painting the 40 red with gloss black bumper/cage/etc. However, with my daughter's diabetes, I'm thinking of painting it to match the Type 1 Diabetes Awareness Ribbon. Lite blue with grey tubework and slight red accents. What do you guys think?

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My new fuel cell came in yesterday so I can start mocking up the rear area. I was able to sneak out into the garage last night and adjusted the timing and the valves. I wanted to check compression too but I couldn't find my tester. As of now she is running awesome so I think I got the carb dialed in. The real test will be on the trail. I'm going to go around and check the tightness of things again and try to get her on the trail one more time before my buddies bachelor party at the end of the month. After that I can start fabricating instead of wrenching!
 
CreeperSleeper said:
So I was planning on painting the 40 red with gloss black bumper/cage/etc. However, with my daughter's diabetes, I'm thinking of painting it to match the Type 1 Diabetes Awareness Ribbon. Lite blue with grey tubework and slight red accents. What do you guys think?

Click to expand...

I like it!!
 
I could always use some help! It won't get paint until the 1/4's are replaced but hopefully that will happen this fall / winter. But I think I found the colors!

Body color:
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All tube work, gauge/switch panals & beadlock rings:
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Misc. touches:
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I think that looks pretty close. What do you think? The bezel will be semi-gloss white and the frame and wheels will be semi-gloss black...
 
I like those colors, the blue you chose looks a little greyer than the one in the ribbon... but would actually look better on an FJ anyway.
 
Last weekend I was able to go wheeling with a couple of friends to see how the carb mods worked out. It is definitely a lot better while wheeling but it is hard to start. Maybe I have the fuel mix too high still… I really don’t want to spend the money on this engine but a Trollhole carb is sounding better and better! Anyways, there are a few things that I still need to address before my 3 day wheeling trip at the end of the month:

Install the CB
Track down loud clunk under the rig. I think it may be the track-bar.
Fiddle with my idle mixture to run leaner
Mount Hi-Lift
Mount Go-Pro
Tighten every bolt I can find (LOL)
Figure out why my PS was bubbling over

Okay, enough of that. Here are the pics!

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Playing on the man-made rock garden on Firebreak 5:
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Trying the main face of Airplane Hill:
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Figuring out my PS is bubbling out the resevoir:
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And backing back down:
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Cool shot my wife got on the gravel... Nothing like an old 40 with no doors!
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Hard hot-starting... Lower the float level, check your fuel line routing for heat causing vapor issues, make sure your choke isn't acting up?

EDIT: How about this... after I wrap up one of my classes this week, I'll come down and we can play with the float.

We also need to go kill some coyotes one of these days.
 
It is very frustrating, that's for sure! I'm going to play with it a bit more tonight and see what happens. I just wish I knew what I was doing or had someone to show me. I'm a kinetic learner, so trying to read about it and understand is difficult. Oh well, this is all part of the fun, right?
 
My wife had her first sitting of a new tattoo so I got a few things done last night on the 40! However, I totally forgot to take pics... I know, I fail.

First thing I did was pull the top of the carb off (again) and check my float level. According to what I could find, the float was set way higher than factory specs. I lowered the float to 2mm below spec and made sure I still had 10 - 11 mms of travel. I put it all back together and if fired right up. Hopefully I made it better and not worse! LOL

Next I checked the PS fluid. It was barely on the dipstick... I believe that confirmed that I overheated the fluid on my last trip. I will be putting a PS cooler and synthetic fluid in eventually but for now I topped it off and called it good.

After that I crawled under to find where a clunk was coming from. I'm 90% sure that it is from slop in my ghetto track bar. Eventually that will be replaced so I'm not going to worry about it. The sad thing is every time I get under this thing I find something else ghetto-fied and I start threatening getting out of wheeling for a couple of years to rebuild this thing from the ground up. Then I remember I'm broke... I figured now would be a good time to do something fun before I sell the damn thing.

Next up, CB install. The PO was nice enough to include a CB and coax, so it got mounted and wired up. I still need to get an antenna spring and antenna for it but I was able to test it and everything worked!

Another item that came with the 40 was a spare tire / Hi-Lift mount. Since I don't have a spare, I was planning on cutting it up and making it a removable Hi-Lift mount for the upcoming trip. I don't want to do anything permanent yet because I'm not sure how the cargo area is going to work out. I ended up just borrowing a spare tire from Brian (TonsOFun) so it looked better. It also made more room in the back of his 80 so it was a win-win.

I also removed the dash pad and remounted the dash light so it worked better. That also gave me the room I needed to "fix" the windshield hardware. The captured nut on the driver side was broke and the knob was stripped. I'm not planning on dropping the windshield all that often, so I just used a bolt.

I think that was about it. Big thanks to Brian (TonsOFun), Josh and Sam for coming out and helping. I just have a few more things to do and (hopefully) I'll be ready to wheel!
 
Went over to wrench on the 40 this last weekend, ended up cooking some elk and helping do a Honda head gasket instead. How does that happen? :flipoff2:
 
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