I got my first 60 series about 16 years ago (a 1988 FJ62) and have since owned a few since then. The 60 series has always been my favorite LC, I appreciate all the others but the 60 is what did it for me. That said the US market FJ62's have always left something to be desired, the 3FE is just a dog so I'd always dreamed of owning a JDM turbo diesel version. Fast forward to about 10 years ago when I met my friend Zach who had a 1988 HJ61 with the 12HT and the turbo stripes. I knew at some point I'd own one after hearing it start up in elevation on a super cold morning on a camp trip in Idaho haha. That choppy 12HT was it.
A couple months ago I asked my friend Eric who lives in Canada if he knew of any HJ61's for sale. He immediately sent me one that was on FB marketplace, it had been on there for nearly 4 years. It was to the point that you couldn't find it if you searched but he had it saved so we reached out to see if it was still for sale. It was a strange situation where this kid was trying to help sell it for his neighbor who was 80 years old and had moved to a different part of the island. It took weeks of excruciatingly slow back and forth (Eric is a saint for doing this for me) of trying to negotiate on price. It became painfully obvious why after 4 years it hadn't sold haha. We finally agreed on a price and I bought tickets to fly up to Vancouver with my wife. I wish it went as smoothly as we'd hoped but Wells Fargo absolutely screwed the pooch on the wire transfer and it got rejected....After some scrambling we flew up with cash to go buy the cruiser.
Upon arrival Eric picked us up from the airport and we took the ferry to Vancouver Island. And once again things didn't go as smoothly as we'd hoped. We get to the location and the kid tells us to wait while he "replaced a belt and the batteries." After nearly two hours of waiting we see it coming down the road and to my disappointment the truck just isn't what we thought it was going to be. Turns out the photos he sent us were from 2-3 years ago and the truck had been sitting so it was super dirty, covered in literal moss and wasps nests. After getting over the shock of seeing it we noticed it wasn't running right. Both turbo lights were on along with the alternator and battery lights indicating a charging error. We popped the hood and noticed the alternator wasn't tight and was banging around along with charging at nearly 34v! That's when we started calling all of our friends with HJ61's to get their opinions (including @BrickRunner ). After another two hours of hemming and hawing over it I was ready to walk away when Eric convinced me that after a good cleaning and an afternoon at his house this was going to be a good truck. I took his advice and we negotiated on price given it's condition and drove away! We missed our ferry back to the mainland so had to grab a hotel and catch the early ferry in the morning.
We spent the next day exploring Squamish and Vancouver (also check out Eric's partners sweet diesel 100 series).
On Sunday Zach drove up from Washington to help work on my truck and get it ready for it's big trip home. We pressure washed it, deep cleaned the interior, changed the oil, got battery tie downs, tightened the alternator and gave the truck a once over to make sure it was good to go. Luckily Eric had ordered a new grill for a 61 he didn't end up getting so we threw that on as well! And boy was Eric right, this truck cleaned up SO nice and I was absolutely over the moon with the decision to buy it. The interior was so nice along with the paint and underside of the truck (minus a couple of small rust spots which is to be expected). I feel like I got a great truck for a great price.
I started to drive back from Vancouver that next morning. I stopped at a few friends houses on my way through WA before getting a hotel and crashing for the night. The next day I had a huge driving day ahead of me and a stop in Bend to see my friend Alex at Fit Garage. While there we put on a new steering stabilizer cause mine was shot and got the fuel filter changed because we couldn't get one in Canada. After hanging there for a couple of hours I headed south to Mammoth Lakes which resulted in a 15 hour drive that day but the truck handled it like a champ!
After a good nights sleep and a day of relaxing at our mammoth house I made the final push home and it made it back with no issues, the story continues in the next post.
A couple months ago I asked my friend Eric who lives in Canada if he knew of any HJ61's for sale. He immediately sent me one that was on FB marketplace, it had been on there for nearly 4 years. It was to the point that you couldn't find it if you searched but he had it saved so we reached out to see if it was still for sale. It was a strange situation where this kid was trying to help sell it for his neighbor who was 80 years old and had moved to a different part of the island. It took weeks of excruciatingly slow back and forth (Eric is a saint for doing this for me) of trying to negotiate on price. It became painfully obvious why after 4 years it hadn't sold haha. We finally agreed on a price and I bought tickets to fly up to Vancouver with my wife. I wish it went as smoothly as we'd hoped but Wells Fargo absolutely screwed the pooch on the wire transfer and it got rejected....After some scrambling we flew up with cash to go buy the cruiser.
Upon arrival Eric picked us up from the airport and we took the ferry to Vancouver Island. And once again things didn't go as smoothly as we'd hoped. We get to the location and the kid tells us to wait while he "replaced a belt and the batteries." After nearly two hours of waiting we see it coming down the road and to my disappointment the truck just isn't what we thought it was going to be. Turns out the photos he sent us were from 2-3 years ago and the truck had been sitting so it was super dirty, covered in literal moss and wasps nests. After getting over the shock of seeing it we noticed it wasn't running right. Both turbo lights were on along with the alternator and battery lights indicating a charging error. We popped the hood and noticed the alternator wasn't tight and was banging around along with charging at nearly 34v! That's when we started calling all of our friends with HJ61's to get their opinions (including @BrickRunner ). After another two hours of hemming and hawing over it I was ready to walk away when Eric convinced me that after a good cleaning and an afternoon at his house this was going to be a good truck. I took his advice and we negotiated on price given it's condition and drove away! We missed our ferry back to the mainland so had to grab a hotel and catch the early ferry in the morning.
We spent the next day exploring Squamish and Vancouver (also check out Eric's partners sweet diesel 100 series).
On Sunday Zach drove up from Washington to help work on my truck and get it ready for it's big trip home. We pressure washed it, deep cleaned the interior, changed the oil, got battery tie downs, tightened the alternator and gave the truck a once over to make sure it was good to go. Luckily Eric had ordered a new grill for a 61 he didn't end up getting so we threw that on as well! And boy was Eric right, this truck cleaned up SO nice and I was absolutely over the moon with the decision to buy it. The interior was so nice along with the paint and underside of the truck (minus a couple of small rust spots which is to be expected). I feel like I got a great truck for a great price.
I started to drive back from Vancouver that next morning. I stopped at a few friends houses on my way through WA before getting a hotel and crashing for the night. The next day I had a huge driving day ahead of me and a stop in Bend to see my friend Alex at Fit Garage. While there we put on a new steering stabilizer cause mine was shot and got the fuel filter changed because we couldn't get one in Canada. After hanging there for a couple of hours I headed south to Mammoth Lakes which resulted in a 15 hour drive that day but the truck handled it like a champ!
After a good nights sleep and a day of relaxing at our mammoth house I made the final push home and it made it back with no issues, the story continues in the next post.
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