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Not much happening on the Prado over the past couple of weeks, between hot weather and being out of town I haven't gotten the chance to work on it until the last couple of days. Started in on the mounts for the intercooler heat exchanger last night, I found some heavy nylon clips that are just the right size to hold the top and bottom tanks of the Smart Car radiator. It fits nicely between the AC condenser and radiator, but the core support will need to be trimmed back just a bit to clear the top tank.
The lower outlet just clears the frame:
Finished up installing the 3D printed intake adapter, used a bit of sealant to assist the o-ring as suggested by the guy that made it, then clamped it lightly to cure overnight.
This evening I finally added some stiffening to my bead roller, it worked ok before but I had to clamp some heavy angle across the throat when beading intake tubing. The additional material has made it a lot heavier but worked a treat.
There was just enough clearance over the bench to clear the bead roller handle and swing the entire intake tube off the other end.
Both coolant pipes are installed on the engine, the bleed port on the upper radiator pipe just barely clears the intake tube but should work.
The radiator outlet points the wrong way, so I'll probably cut it off and and reorient it.
Not quite Prado related but we had record breaking heat across much of Montana last weekend, so my brother and I decided to head for the mountains to gain some elevation and hopefully escape the heat wave. Since my Prado is still very much under the knife we took his HDJ81. The road to our chosen campsite turned out to be a lot rougher than expected, but the 81 pulled through with flying colors. One hill required all three diff locks but otherwise it walked up every obstacle.
We camped next to a little alpine lake at nearly 9000', the bugs were pretty nasty but it was a lot cooler than the 95º-105ºF back in town. We climbed a mountain, explored a few abandoned mines, and hung out around the campfire.
Hot and muggy today, I didn't feel like welding the heat exchanger support or coolant pipes so I focused mostly on wiring. Spent most of the afternoon digging through diagrams and tearing the dash apart trying to find a couple of wires that used to go to the original ECU. In doing so I discovered the jumper that was added for daytime running lights, presumably so the Prado would pass muster in Canada.
I deleted the jumper, was never a fan of the DRL's since it was just the headlights on low beam whenever the ignition was on. Unfortunately whoever installed it butchered the job, I'll probably have to cut and splice the wires to get it fixed.
The engine harness is almost entirely integrated into the vehicle at this point, I need to hook up one ignition wire and one ground and it should be good to go. Just some tidying up of the harness behind the glovebox left.
Small progress over the past couple of evenings. I got an aluminum 1/8"NPT plug, ground the anodizing off it and welded it to the top half of the air filter housing.
With a hole drilled through the middle it made the perfect threaded bung for the Donaldson Informer.
Next up was modifying the upper coolant pipe. It originally had a sharp 90º bend at the end and it needed to be straight. The bend started back behind the beginning of the mounting bracket, so I cut it off as close as possible and gas welded a few inches of 1.25" tubing on. The weld isn't the prettiest but there was no way I could have fit the TIG torch in behind the bracket.
The thermostat housing interferes with the lower coolant manifold, so it needed to be shortened. I cut about 1/2" out of it but it still needs a little trimming before I weld it back together.
A set of EGR delete plates arrived in the mail, when I went to install them I realized I had misplaced the o-ring and gasket. A thorough cleaning of the box truck seems to be in order. I had to check fitment regardless, of course.
I was able to finish up the harness connector for the OBD port and throttle pedal. The extra wires hanging out are a couple of grounds, the CAN-Bus loom, and the coolant temp sensor wires.
