Builds Aimless build: 60 Series (1 Viewer)

[TrekkerOverlanding]

what bellhousing do you have and what's your motor mount situation? solid mounted 203/205 on one end and aluminum SBC bellhousing on the other, the 203/205 is going to win that battle. Keep a close eye on your bellhousing and 203 bolts. I shattered my bellhousing in last year

I have the hydraulic sm465 bell housing, from what I’ve heard they are pretty strong. Either way, the motor mounts are the same, sleeved polybushing. So the whole powertrain is hard mounted. It’s far from ideal but seemed like a good idea at the time...
I’ll be keeping a close eye on the doubler bolts and 465 bolts anyways as they all seem to like to slowly back out. Everything else has thread lock.
Shattering my bell housing would probably make me sad.

 

[cruisermatt]

I have the hydraulic sm465 bell housing, from what I’ve heard they are pretty strong. Either way, the motor mounts are the same, sleeved polybushing. So the whole powertrain is hard mounted. It’s far from ideal but seemed like a good idea at the time...
I’ll be keeping a close eye on the doubler bolts and 465 bolts anyways as they all seem to like to slowly back out. Everything else has thread lock.
Shattering my bell housing would probably make me sad.

Imagine a triangle formed by the motor mounts and a transmission mount or two in the center, that is what is ideal to allow for some frame flex. What you have might work alright if you aren't hard on it

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

Right, that makes sense, well I’ll be keeping a close eye on it. Thanks @cruisermatt

Took the cruiser out this last weekend and wheeled it for 2 days plus about 280mi driving round trip. Performed great! The trans is making excessive noise but shifts better than my last sm465. The doubler was awesome, complete control and lots of speed options depending on the obstacle. Totally a game changer!
I’ll post some pictures when I get them.

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

 

[Hojack]

Looks like you were out east of Black Butte. We need to get together. Camp trip to my property seems in order.

 

[Hojack]

The cool new thing is swapping radiators every 6 months. Doncha know?!

View attachment 2632824

Just curious, are you using distilled water with your coolant? Also, is your radiator grounded to the frame?

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

@Hojack absolutely! We were at Cline Butte OHV, about 15min NW of Redmond. It’s my favorite place to camp and wheel, love central Oregon.
I’m always down for Land Cruiser get togethers!
As to the radiator, I used 50/50 mix this last time and the rad is grounded (although I might make doubly sure with a ground strap). My brother and I changed the afr and idle timing, which has helped my temps a lot. My previous 2 radiators broke from excess twisting of the rad support, near as I can tell. I have that sorted now too I think...

 

[cruisermatt]

any road noise with the doubler? My 203 howls on deceleration above ~60 mph

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

any road noise with the doubler? My 203 howls on deceleration above ~60 mph

Really? That’s actually really good to know, makes me wonder if it’s my 203 that’s howling and not my trans... yeah mine makes a howl on deaccel and a very slight gear whine at above 50-55mph or so. I don’t have any bad vibrations though.
After this last trip my plan is to change out the oil in the trans cause it sat for so long, and check the tcases. Mostly looking for the shiny stuff, if it’s all clear I won’t worry about it.

 

[cruisermatt]

Really? That’s actually really good to know, makes me wonder if it’s my 203 that’s howling and not my trans... yeah mine makes a howl on deaccel and a very slight gear whine at above 50-55mph or so. I don’t have any bad vibrations though.
After this last trip my plan is to change out the oil in the trans cause it sat for so long, and check the tcases. Mostly looking for the shiny stuff, if it’s all clear I won’t worry about it.

I’ve had two transmissions and two transfer cases and the noise has always been the same.

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

I have a new LS style radiator installed, premixed coolant, system is bled (I’ll be rebleeding it today). Everything appears to be working correct and I still can’t keep my low speed driving temps down, I got up to 240* in town (stuck behind a city bus), so I whipped into a parking lot and shut her down.
I ran this same setup just a couple weeks ago wheeling and the temps stayed in the 210-215* range. Flip the secondary fan on and usually it slowly cools down.

So I adjust afr at idle from 14.2 to 14.5. I also moved idle timing from 12* to 18*.
I also plan on venting my hood, any other thoughts?

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

Forgot to mention, the adjustments I made seemed to cool my idle temps by about 5-10*

 

[cruisermatt]

How often do you drive it? I bet you just have air in it still. Have you verified the sensor is good?

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

How often do you drive it? I bet you just have air in it still. Have you verified the sensor is good?

I drive it a couple times a week. I think I still had air, I rebled it and with the other adjustments, I made it did great. I only ran one fan on and tried all day to overheat it in about 80* weather and hottest it got was 211* about perfect I think! Stopping and starting, high gear and low speed driving in town. It averaged out at 205* which I have no issues with.
I’ll be keeping a close eye on it this summer on the hotter days for sure though.
Hood vents are definitely on the menu.

 

[cruisermatt]

What thermostat do you have?

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

What thermostat do you have?

186* I think factory is 180*
Edit: it’s vice versa. 180* is what I have, 186* is stock.

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

At some point I may swap for one of those 160* tstats, a lot of LS guys seem to like those in built cars with less air flow. My bumper and stuff probably blocks quite a lot of flow. But so far having swapped to a 16psi rad cap has helped a lot.

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

I believe next on the menu will be a new steering box (red head?) tapped for ram assist.
I also need to clean up the engine bay wiring, probably delete a battery, and I want to snorkel the intake for cooler MAT. It’ll be well over 100* MAT on a hot day.

 

[TrekkerOverlanding]

Been a minute.
I should update…
Cleaned up engine bay wiring, still struggling to keep the engine cool under heavy load (ie snow wheeling).
Wired up my seat heaters finally so that’s been nice! Otherwise I’ve been fairly unproductive on the Cruiser, I did buy another distraction though so that certainly hasn’t helped (1983 P/U longbed).
I got some sound deadening for Christmas so that’ll be fun to install!