Cam's FJ60 Gets a Heart Transplant (2 Viewers)

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate
links, including eBay, Amazon, Skimlinks, and others.

FJ60Cam

Supporting Vendor
SILVER Star
Joined
Nov 1, 2004
Threads
178
Messages
11,245
Location
Memphis, TN
Website
www.mosleymotors.com
I've been dreaming about a V8 swap in my 60 for years, but it hadn't been possible. Until now.

I was toying with the idea of building up my wife's LX450 when she retires it and turning it into a cross country wheeling machine. However when I started adding up everything I wanted in it, it was going to cost a fortune.

Then the lightbulb went off... why not just do the V8 swap in my truck? I can part out my 2F drivetrain and not be out of pocket too much $$$. It will already drive across the country and run the Rubicon. It just needs a little help on the highway and a little help on the super slow crawling, but it's pretty much already set up how I want it.

With the 2F and the H55, it will run 80 mph all day long. It will even climb long grades. It won't accelerate on long grades, but it will hold its speed. The problem is, at that speed, it is sprinting. I want something that's just jogging along at 80.

Also, I'm geared perfect for 90% of the road/trails that I do. But there were times on the Rubicon that I needed a little bit lower gearing. There was one time where I stalled, which caused me to slip off my line and won me a pretty sweet dent.

With the V8 and the auto, I should be able to kill two birds with one stone. It will just loaf along at highway speeds and the auto should help when crawling.

Here's my mother of all 2F's as she sits right now. It's a JimC rebuild (60,000 miles) with headers and TBI. I've probably got close to a quarter of a million dollars into this thing.

image.jpg
 
Last edited:
I can't believe no one has snatched that 2F up......

Ben Garcia has laid claim to it. I've sold the TBI and a few accessories. Now I just need to pull the whole thing so I can extract the gold (H55).
 
I started looking at motors on eBay and Craigslist. I noticed one of the eBay sellers was in Arkansas. His stuff looked cleaner than some of the bigger outfits from the north or midwest. Plus, I could drive and pick it up.

I gave him a call and told him what I was looking for - a complete 5.3 & 4L60E (2wd) combo with under 100K miles.

He told me he expected to have an '03 with 96K coming in soon and told me when to call him back.

When I called him back, he mentioned also getting an '07 with only 56K miles. I did a Georgle search to see if the lower mileage unit justified spending more money. Georgle confirmed that it did. I also noticed that the rated HP went up 15-20 HP in '04 or '05, so no complaints here.

I went over to Paragould yesterday and picked up this super clean motor combo. It an '07, 56K out of I forgot what. He's
Going to send me a copy of the salvage title when he gets it.

He pointed out that this has the desired 799 (Corvette?) heads. It's also a flex fuel motor, but for my purposes that doesn't matter. I'm not sure I've ever come across anything but regular ethanol and non-ethanol gas.

image.jpg


image.jpg


Loaded up!

image.jpg


Hail yeah! (Internet search confirms these are desirable, no idea if they came on all the 5.3's at the time.)

image.jpg
 
Last edited:
The V8 will really make it fun to drive. Make sure you find someone if you can't do it yourself...to fab up a nice fan shroud like this...(I"ll link it here in a second).

https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/89-fj62-w-5-3l-vortec-4l60e.801429/

The GM fan clutch and fan will do a great job for you.... I run a OEM style 4 core replacement radiator and run a shroud similar to what the link above shows. I have a 5.7 and I did modify my radiator is two ways (changed the top water neck on the radiator to match the diameter of the GM hose pickup/suv)(moved the lower radiator water neck to the far passenger side to give better clearance for the shroud and fan). Not sure whats comparable between the 5.7 and later V8's but the cooling is one of the challenges. A nice fan shroud and the GM mechanical fan is the way to go.

5.3 will be nice, I plan on running one of those or a 6.0 next time...with auto.
 
Last edited:
The V8 will really make it fun to drive. Make sure you find someone if you can't do it yourself...to fab up a nice fan shroud like this...(I"ll link it here in a second).

https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/89-fj62-w-5-3l-vortec-4l60e.801429/

The GM fan clutch and fan will do a great job for you.... I run a OEM style 4 core replacement radiator and run a shroud similar to what the link above shows. I have a 5.7 and I did modify my radiator is two ways (changed the top water neck on the radiator to match the diameter of the GM hose pickup/suv)(moved the lower radiator water neck to the far passenger side to give better clearance for the shroud and fan). Not sure whats comparable between the 5.7 and later V8's but the cooling is one of the challenges. A nice fan shroud and the GM mechanical fan is the way to go.

5.3 will be nice, I plan on running one of those or a 6.0 next time...with auto.

I saw that one, it's pretty sweet. Did you make yours?

I wonder if JL Roberts Mechanical stocks those :hmm:

I'm going to use an FJ62 radiator. I got a pro tip that it'll work fine with a mechanical fan and shroud.
 
A cool thing with these motors (that I didn't know) is that all the bolts are metric. The wrench sizes are different from Toyota -there's a lot of 13mm & 15mm, but I don't have to update my toolkit.
 
I saw that one, it's pretty sweet. Did you make yours?

I wonder if JL Roberts Mechanical stocks those :hmm:

I'm going to use an FJ62 radiator. I got a pro tip that it'll work fine with a mechanical fan and shroud.


My radiator is a 60 radiator...just aftermarket...and the mods I noted

No I did not make my shroud...my friend made it, and it does resemble the one in the link, it works well. Yeah the GM fan clutch and matching fan is the way to go..plus a fabbed up shroud. I've tried a couple of things and have read a bunch on it... nothing works better on the V8 swaps. The GM multiblade fan moves some air and the fan clutch works fine...win/win.

GM likes 10MM, 13MM and 15MM...as the most common sizes
 
I got me a cool "Racing" :hillbilly: cherry picker off Craigslist last week. I needed a way to unload my new beast.

I have absolutely zero experience lifting or pulling engines, so removing it from the pickup bed was very comical.

I stole some bolts from the accessories and bolted up my new load leveler (probably undersized) and got 'er dun and parked it in its new home.

This will be a super slow build, and I bought this way before I needed it so it probably won't move for a while.

image.jpg


image.jpg


image.jpg


image.jpg
 
My radiator is a 60 radiator...just aftermarket...and the mods I noted

No I did not make my shroud...my friend made it, and it does resemble the one in the link, it works well. Yeah the GM fan clutch and matching fan is the way to go..plus a fabbed up shroud. I've tried a couple of things and have read a bunch on it... nothing works better on the V8 swaps. The GM multiblade fan moves some air and the fan clutch works fine...win/win.

GM likes 10MM, 13MM and 15MM...as the most common sizes

Cool. I'm doing the 62 radiator so I can use the trans cooler plus an aux cooler. Mine was leaking and I've already had it fixed before so I wasn't going to use that one. I found a nice clean 62 rad in the classifieds.

The guy I got the motor from threw in a mechanical fan so I should be good to go.
 
Last edited:
If this is going to be a slow build, just make sure it is completed in time for next Spring's NorCal trip. :)

Hell, I'll drive up to Memphis for a weekend to help you pull out or put in since you are first timer. :lol:

The plan is starting to coalesce around Northern Nevada, which would be quite epic.
 
Bring it! Ali said he is in Memphis for the summer...

I need to get the old pulled soon. But it will probably be closer to the fall before the new goes back.

I'm still collecting parts, and part of the negotiations with the budget committee has me doing some house projects first.
 
Ali is definitely not a first timer when it comes to pulling out. :lol:

Let me know, I could use a roadtrip this summer/fall.
 
I wish you did too! It would have AC, right?!

I **hope** to pull the old drivetrain out this weekend so I can sell the H55 to generate the $$$ for adapters and stuff. We'll see.

After that, it will be slow going. I'll send the harness and computer off and accumulate parts, but I'm thinking it might be fall before I try to drop the new one in.
 
After that, it will be slow going. I'll send the harness and computer off and accumulate parts, but I'm thinking it might be fall before I try to drop the new one in.

Gay.
 


Looks good...the magic is to get the V8 centered to the radiator core and or get the fan shroud where it can be centered to the core and the fan opening relative to the GM fan. That sure does look like it might work... you can get the V8 centered on the radiator core...(assuming the 5.3 has the fan clutch approx center-line of the engine)... then its a game of getting the shroud to work in that space. Looks good on that truck...email the guy to see what he says about install.

you'll have to figure out the magic place to space the engine back from the radiator core and how much clearance you want at the firewall. With my marks adapter I'm kind of locked in as long as I want to use stock drive line. I would prefer a little more distance between the radiator core and engine on my truck next time around..of course the marks adapter will not be part of the next time equation.
 
Last edited:

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top Bottom