Builds Amateur's 200-Series Build Follies (1 Viewer)

[GWNavigator]

Hi all, I am starting this thread to document the trials and tribulations, the defeats, and the glory of my 2019 200-series build-up. I will start with my suspension install, then move on to other vehicle-damaging and life-threatening mod attempts. My main motivation for doing this is firstly selfish - hoping that you all can bail me out with good advice when I get in over my head. But also I'm doing this as a public service, to help any of you sitting on the fence regarding doing your own mods, to either conclude - "s***, no way I'm doing that!" or (hopefully) "Dang, that doesn't look too bad - I can do this!". If nothing else, I hope this will be mildly entertaining, or at least a good cure for insomnia - thanks for reading!

To start with, here she is, looking pretty from the dealership, unaware of this being but the beginning of her transformation from Cinderella to Sarah Conor...

 

[stevenjj71]

Looking forward to an amateur building. I find most of the mods incredibly intimidating, hopefully your experiences will convince me otherwise

Great looking cruiser!

 

[tincan45]

I like where this is going. I’m subscribing.

 

[GWNavigator]

First significant mod will be suspension. After doing four previous suspension installs on other Toyotas and a mild ZR2 leveling lift, and cursing every time, promising myself I'd never do it again, I decided to embark on installing the suspension onto the 200.

Some background. This rig was bought with some heavy duties to fulfill. Mainly, carrying a family of four plus two 60lb dogs over freeways, dirt roads and two-track trails into the American western backcountry, with gear and a 3,500lb Conqueror 440 trailer in tow. To add insult to injury on occasion I may swap the trailer for a hitch-mounted motorcycle carrier. And not to be too easy on Sarah Conor, I'm planning on adding front and rear bumpers plus a winch.

One thing she won't be doing is anything fast. Getting to the destination without breaking either her or the occupants is the primary goal. With all that said, I opted for Ironman 4x4 Foam Cell Pro shocks with the 600lb continuous load springs, and just-in-case bought some ride-rite air bags for if/when things get overloaded. To keep the front alignment proper, I also bought a pair of Total Chaos UCAs.

First order of business was to build the front coilovers, which involved compressing the springs - the 600lb continuous load Landcruiser-sized springs. These are quite a bit bigger than anything I've dealt with in the past. Fortunately though, previous life-threatening suspension builds (including the spring-compressor-free install on a Tacoma - using body weight of the truck) led me to purchase a 2nd hand American-made Branick Bad-Ass shop-grade spring compressor off of Craigslist. Doing this cost me roughly $400, but has saved me a full $200 in having the vendor build them for me - great deal! Not to mention the satisfaction of having built them yourself.

The springs were tough - even for the compressor. All I can say is even the Branick looked as if to say "What the hell are you loading onto me buddy?!? I didn't sign up for train car springs!" Here's a pic before we started.

Then once done...

Lesson learned: I would not even consider attempting this with anything less than the Branick. But honesty, better yet - unless you plan on doing this type of thing often enough, have the vendor do it for you! If you can afford a 200-series, you can afford the $200!

 

[CharlieS]

Nice spring compressor!

 

[GWNavigator]

Thanks @CharlieS! I see them every now and then on craigslist - usually some shop owner retiring and selling all their tools.

 

[GWNavigator]

Ok, so I decided to start with the rear suspension install thinking this would be the easier part. And, truth be told, it was ok (minus the fact that I am currently stuck half way). The first challenge was replacing the springs. Again, the 600lb continuous weight springs are tough - no wiggle room using my muscle power, whatsoever. Plus they are relatively heavy. The key to surviving this was unbolting everything from the rear axle to allow it to drop as much as possible.

So I started by loosening the KDSS valves 2.5 turns (because everybody on the interwebs says to do this, and therefore must be the right thing to do). Then I lifted the rear by placing a floor jack under the axle - until wheels were about 8" off the ground. After placing a jack stand under the frame immediately in front of the rear linkage bracket, I lowered using the floor jack so she was resting on the jack stands. Then, couple of inches back up on the floor jack to make sure the axle was supported. So far so good.

Next I started to unbolt the main things that would prevent the axle from dropping, starting with the lower shock bolts, then followed by the driver's side sway bar linkage nut, then the passenger side sway bar linkage top nut (one with thick rubber washers under it). After wiggling the drivers side linkage, it came apart with no issues. Then I unbolted the upper part of the diff breather hose, and all of the brake line bracket and other attachment bolts - there's a handful of them along the entire axle. Lastly I undid the huge 24mm pan hard rod bolt that attaches to the axle and pried off the knuckle - fortunately not my knuckle, the pan hard's knuckle. With all this done, I began to lower the axle. Note, that skipping the pan hard step will not get you low enough, so no point in trying to take any shortcuts. Also, a Milwaukee M18 cordless impact wrench will make easy work out of all of this.

With all this unbolting and unnutting (new word), and with the help of my wife's foot pushing down on each hub, I was able to relatively easily remove and (more importantly) fit the new springs (with airbags in them) onto the axle, and twist them into the right position. You will be able to feel as you twist them where they naturally want to sit, but take note the position when removing the originals to give you a ballpark. So here are some pics with figure headings below each one:

Figure 1. Rear spring beefiness comparison. Ironman 600 lb constant load springs (yellow - 100% bison meat), Dobinsons lower weight springs (blue - 100% beef ), and original springs (black - beyond beef).

Figure 2. Rear spring assembly with airbag inserted. Reusing the top cone-shaped rubber thingy, but cut off three levels from it using a reciprocal saw. Lit it up with rubber smoke like an Overlander's meet n' greet at the local Starbucks. Airbags are there in case I need to hitch a train car to the receiver.

Figure 3. Jack stand and floor jack setup. No other jacks or animals were injured in the production of this build (yet).

Figure 4. Springs installed. If you look carefully you can see the brake lines detached (not the yellow cable).

Figure 5. Afterwards, reattaching the pan hard rod was a PITA. Fortunately I discovered the only posting on the entire interweb (dating back to 1992) that illustrates how to use a ratchet strap to pull the pan hard rod back into place. For everyone else, this is just intuitive, common knowledge so I will keep with tradition and refuse to show you how to do it here.

EDIT: After getting the panhard bar back in place, the axle is off by roughly an inch. So I am going to get an adjustable one from ironman. They claim theirs can be adjusted while on the vehicle which is a nice feature.

To be continued...

 

[GWNavigator]

Now you may be asking - what about rear shocks? Well, unfortunately the shocks didn't get installed yet, for a reason that many of you who've tried this may understand. The top bolts of the shock are ridiculously inaccessible. Here is a picture of them...

Notice the bolt tucked in there, under shadow, daring you to come and try to remove it. Unfortunately, it is accessible from the outside with a long 22mm box wrench or angled ratchet. Problem is getting a small wrench on the top part to keep it from spinning is damn near impossible. Unfortunately I do not own a pipe wrench or strap wrench to hold the metal protective shroud as an alternative. Of course, this could be the only tool I don't have. I tried a pair of strong locking pliers, but it literally bent the metal and would not work. So... now I'm waiting for homedepot.com to drop off a strap wrench....

In the meantime, though I'm confident one way or another I'll get the old shocks off, I am questioning how in the hell will I fasten the nut on the new shocks once I get them in there? Any ideas or experience that you can share would be highly appreciated!

Oh, here is a current pick of the mutant Land Cruiser with stock rear shocks and 100% Bison meat 600lb continuous load springs...and stock front end:

The extreme-rake-and-tiny-tires look is growing on me. And here you can see the axle offset - right side is about 1" too far to the left compared to the left side:

 

[CharlieS]

If you don't want to wait for a strap wrench, an old serpentine belt and some locking pliers can do the same thing. I have a bunch of sections saved from old belts of varying widths that I use this way.

 

[GWNavigator]

If you don't want to wait for a strap wrench, an old serpentine belt and some locking pliers can do the same thing. I have a bunch of sections saved from old belts of varying widths that I use this way.

This is a good suggestion - I thought of using an old belt, but using locking pliers was the part that I was missing. Going to give this a try today. Thanks @CharlieS

 

[GWNavigator]

Ok, pipe wrench delivered from my local hardware store fixed the issue with accessing the top bolt on the rear shocks. Shocks removed and new ones put on!

Figure 1. Ripped and now replace.

Figure 2. That’s what I’m talking about.

EDIT: Forgot to mention the challenge of nutting up the new top bolt. Took me to crawl underneath to hold the top ‘nipple’ while my wife cranked the nut standing opposite side of the frame (outside).

Next challenge was getting the sway bar back in after it flopped down. For this I used a bottle jack and the help of some paving stones. There must be a better way to do this...

Figure 3. Bottle jack to lift drivers side sway bar back into place.

Figure 4. Passenger side of sway bar linkage approaching mount point (I did replace the lower bushing before getting it in there - not in picture).

After that I installed the Ironman4X4 adjustable panhard rod which was extremely easy and got my lateral alignment fixed.

So now I have one final thing to wrap up the rear suspension. When lowering the axle I disconnected the rear diff breather hose upper bracket. For the life of me, now I can’t figure out where it attaches to! Do any of you happen to know, or can please send me a snapshot of where the upper bracket attaches?

 

[CharlieS]

 

[GWNavigator]

Thanks @CharlieS ! Very much appreciate this! I saw that bracket but wasn't sure since the part attached to the breather hose has a retainer nub which seems to do nothing. This will work though!

 

[GWNavigator]

Brief update: front shocks and Total Chaos UCAs installed a while back. Got roughly 23" hub to fender on the fronts, but the rear end was ~25" - too much rake for my liking. So, I hummed and hawed for a few days. After a while, decided to put in the lighter Dobinsons rear springs. Here are the measurements before changing out the rear springs:

And here is what it looks like now. Pic is on aslope, but yes there is still some rake, but given this is a tow vehicle, should sit quite level when hitched up:

Coming up next is the Anderson connector for the rear (for trailer charging and portable air compressor), and new wheels/tires.

 

[GWNavigator]

Added the wiring for the rear Anderson connector:

Attached it to trailer - started engine. Does what it's supposed to do. Beer O'clock.

 

[CharlieS]

Added the wiring for the rear Anderson connector:

View attachment 2336120
View attachment 2336121

Attached it to trailer - started engine. Does what it's supposed to do. Beer O'clock.

Did you run your wires through the interior or under the body? What route did you follow, if you went underneath? This is on my list of possible to-do additions for charging the camper (hopefully we'll get to start camping again one of these days).

 

[GWNavigator]

Did you run your wires through the interior or under the body? What route did you follow, if you went underneath? This is on my list of possible to-do additions for charging the camper (hopefully we'll get to start camping again one of these days).

I ran it under the body along the inside of the frame. There are some metal tubes that run from the engine bay all the way to the back, so I generally followed along those lines. Once I spotted the lines, and got around the front wheel well, it was quite easy. I'll take some pics and post them here when I get a chance later today.

 

[GWNavigator]

Did you run your wires through the interior or under the body? What route did you follow, if you went underneath? This is on my list of possible to-do additions for charging the camper (hopefully we'll get to start camping again one of these days).

@CharlieS here are photos going from front to rear, starting at the wheel well. The wires are wrapped in red conduit. In the first pic you can see the red conduit peeking out on the right. The rest of the pics are looking from back to front. It is actually on the outside edge of the frame until it reaches the KDSS valves, where it crosses over and goes up overtop the rear spring perch.

Next post I'll show where it comes out in the tail end (limit of 5 pics).

 

[GWNavigator]

Here are pics where it comes out from over the rear spring, around the spare tire and tucks in along the inside of the rear bumper:

 

[CharlieS]

Check out Wits end for some mounts.