duggy's build thread: 1998 Land Cruiser #SAS100 (1 Viewer)

[duggy]

Hey all,

I recently acquired a rear locked 1998 Land Cruiser that was picked up in Ft Worth. My room mate purchased the truck and eventually sold it to me. I came from the 80-series world with a built 80 which served me very well. I eventually desired more comfort such as heated seats, smooth IFS ride and V8 power.

I usually maintain and build the trucks myself as I find peace working in my garage. Currently, I am living in a town home which keeps me pretty cramped up, but I make due with what I have.

This Cruiser currently has 279k miles but runs like a dream. It had the 90k service done a few thousand miles ago (as stated by the PO). For having that many miles, it truly idles smooth and surprises me every time I'm driving in town.

I have a few plans for this truck but being IFS, I understand that it will never flex as well as my old 80 did. It will be more of an expedition truck and less emphasis on rock crawling as my 80 did.

I am heading out to Brazos Valley Offroad Ranch (BVORR) this week so the last 2 weeks have been in preparation of getting this truck ready to wheel. I kept a lot of my old parts such as my RTT, Hella 4000s, ARB fridge, ARB awning and roof rack which are now on the current truck. I purchased it bone stock and it currently has the following mods:

Suspension:
OME 864 rear springs
Fox 2.0 with remote reservoirs
Sway Away (SAW) front torsion bars
BumpIt offroad Diff Drop

Electronics:
Pioneer 1400DVD with backup camera
Alpine Type R 10" sub
Boss 600 watt amp
Custom dual battery bracket
Blue Sea Systems Auto Charging Relay and Fuse block
ARB 50Qt fridge
32" LED light bar

Exterior:
LabRak Roof Rack
Axxis Off road snorkel
Dissent Offroad bumper with Badlands 12,000 lb winch w/ Masterpull 3/8" synthetic line
Bump-It Offroad rear bumper
OPOR Sliders
18x9 +24 Method NV
Slee 1.25" wheel spacers
Slee skid plate system - front, middle and belly pan skids
LED Tail lights
Depo 1pc headlights with H7 HIDs

Maintenence:
New serpentine belt
Replaced both CV axles that were clicking
Spark plugs
Front, tcase and rear diff fluids replaced with Mobil1
Full transmission fluid swap with Mobil1
20KCST fluid in fan clutch
Dual 10" Electric fans for radiator and condenser

I will regularly update this thread as new parts or maintenance comes along.

This is the earliest picture I have of my truck. The build went pretty quickly since I had parts from my 80 waiting to be put on.
Roof rack on and 35s along with snorkel

A week later the RTT, and ARB front bumper were in

Testing out flex on the 35" KM2s

Custom built 2nd battery tray to power my fridge, acc sockets in the rear and camping lights. I never liked how the Slee took up so much space since i have plans to install my ARB twin compressor for OBA. The ARB compressor will go right behind the battery on it's own custom bracket. The PS resevior has to be relocated for this battery bracket to work. I am fabbing up a tie down as we speak.

I will post pics after the lift is done. Since I live in a town home complex, I could only get half done tonight. The rear is sitting high while the front is at a rake

 

[mcgaskins]

It is amazing how well these drive with high miles isn't it? Looks good!

 

[ENGINE er]

Welcome to the dark side Duc! Have fun at bvorr. drink one for me, I'll be at a wedding in wimberly.

 

[SmoothLC]

Nice!

How do you like the KM2s?

 

[FlammableFishie]

Sweet rig! Lookin forward to the rest of the build

 

[duggy]

Nice!

How do you like the KM2s?

I had 33" tires on the truck before and found a good deal on the KM2s. They're about 60% tread on them and are a bit loud, but I believe it was because the previous owner had alignment issues. I'll run these until they wear down but their main purpose is for me to see how the truck behaves on 35s. I will make my shock and whether I want to run spacers decision based on my experience this weekend at Brazos Valley.

 

[yotasavg]

Good lookin truck! So the only suspension mod with those 35's is the OME 863's and SAW bars? How much lift do you estimate is dialed in?

 

[duggy]

Thanks for the comments all. I estimate 3" of lift with this setup. I finally got the front lifted properly and aligned with the SAW torsion bars. I looked into a Speski cargo barrier but I simply could not drop the coin on it due to purchasing a house soon. I decided to make my own to keep my pup contained in the cargo area.

Here are some updated pics!

Testing out the angles on the cargo barrier

A frame is starting to form

Round cross bars tacked in

Installed!

My OPOR sliders finally came in, got those installed in 45 mins

Most recent pic of my truck. Front is finally lifted after riding drag racer style for a while.

 

[klinetime574]

Awesome work man. Can't wait to see in person!

 

[yotasavg]

That barrier came out great! Stance looks dialed too.

 

[duggy]

Some more progress since I haven't been keeping up with this thread like I should. I recently purchased a house so the LC has been on the backburner for a bit.

I had continuing issues with the current Sway-Away torsion bars settling even after re-indexing and cranking the torsion bars to the max. It turns out that both torsion bars were not holding their tension and allowing the vehicle to droop to stock height. They sent me a pair of new torsion bars and I am about 350 miles in and the ride is MUCH better now that I'm not hitting bump stops at every bump. Ride height is dialed a bit more

I also built a custom platform which would manage storage space for my recovery straps and camping items. I will need to get some new containers which fit better in there.

I am toying around with this light mount. Not sure how I like it. If it works, it will stay and it has worked so far.

I did some plastidip work on the wheels, rear emblems and grille. I think they turned out great

Next mods/plans
Slee rear bumper
Front wheel bearing rebuild
Brake rotor and pad change
Full fluid flush including the diffs, TC, transmission, engine and coolant
Valvecover gasket replacement

 

[2000UZJ]

Duggy,

You can actually mount a pair of Dually's on the rear bumper. That is where I put mine, they do not block anything and stay out of the way of brush. A light mounted right there is pulled sheet metal waiting to happen on my rig.

 

[duggy]

I agree. Are you referring to the Slee or stock rear bumper? I need it for a camp light more than a backup light, although both would be nice. This was a temporary solution until I get the rear bumper which could resolve my CB, hi-lift, spare tire and camping light mount needs.

 

[2000UZJ]

I agree. Are you referring to the Slee or stock rear bumper? I need it for a camp light more than a backup light, although both would be nice. This was a temporary solution until I get the rear bumper which could resolve my CB, hi-lift, spare tire and camping light mount needs.

OEM bumper. They make great camping lights even mounted low.

 

[ENGINE er]

If you are looking to buy that slee in the next 30 days let me know, we can save some doll hairs on shipping. (would loo good for the house warming party!)

 

[duggy]

So this was a productive weekend!

I started the baselining process with a full synthetic switchover to Mobil1 5W30 and M1 filter. I seafoamed the truck also but didn't see much (if any) white smoke so I am hoping that means great health.

I also spend most of a day creating a bracket for my ARB twin air compressor. I don't have AHC so there was plenty of space to fab up brackets to mount this monstrosity. I used the existing holes in the passenger bay area to pass some screws through the fenderwell into the engine bay.

I mounted two tabs to my battery tray that I made previously for a sturdy and precise fit. It makes removal of either easy peasy.

I wish I had taken more photos but here are the aftermath of it mounted and the switch placed.

Excuse the mess in my engine bay. It needs to be cleaned up terribly which I will around to....eventually I cleaned up the wires for the ARB shortly after this picture. I have a viair 2ga tank that I am going to mount in between the slider and frame horn which will need a plate fabbed up. I want to run the airline to the ARB but need to visit the fitting shop first to get a flush body mount for it.

My shipment of Mobil1 gear oil, M1 ATF, OEM plugs and PM items should be coming in soon. I'll be sure to document that process.

 

[duggy]

Preventative maintenence time!

I went through and replaced the following:

Mobile1 Synthetic ATF, 75w90 diff fluid for front, rear and tcase, and 5w30 engine oil with M1 filter
Toyota OEM bearings and seals
Toyota OEM front and rear brake pads with aftermarket rotors

Parts shipment from Beno! Includes f/r pads, inner and outer front wheel bearings, inline fuel filter, wheel hub grease gasket, oring for trans dipstick tube and tranny pan crush washer

Tranny pan pulled off. The 4 magnets had a lot of shavings but no metal shards which reassures my mind about the tranny

Left is clean, right are not

Cleaned up, gasket material mostly cleaned off. I replaced the gasket with red toyota FIPG from beno

Hub pre bearing replacement. No grease and regular non synthetic grease in there. It almost looks like they used vaseline

No irregular marks on the hub. Was the same on both sides

Old grease in the hub. This stuff was crap

Best solution I've found to be able to clean the hub with brake cleaner and degreaser

New rotor, pads, bearings, flange gasket on. Doesn't look pretty outside but inside is beautiful

All old. Talked to a Toyota tech and he stated these have an estimated 80-90k on them. Not good for standard non-iridum plugs! My slight engine misfire is now gone.

Next on the list is CB radio and antenna install along with redoing my sub install for concealment and space

 

[duggy]

Updates! I've been doing all of this maintenence in preparation for a wheeling trip which I just finished up this weekend.

The day before I was slated to meet up with the group to roll-out, my truck would not start. It would crank and crank and crank but no turnover. I was pretty bummed and started doing some searching along with starting a thread. It turned out to to be the crank position sensor that was chafed due to the 90k service.

I welded together a simple tab setup for my CB antenna and also welded on a light tab from Gamiviti for a camping light which works awesome for night cooking!

I picked up a 32" lightbar locally which fits perfectly in between the ARB bars. I may re-do the mount with some security bolts to make sure some sticky fingers don't get a hold of it.

I installed my tank for my OBA setup under the truck. The cheapo PVC line I used will not hold up to the heat in the engine bay and along the frame so I'll have to look for another

I disliked the orange in the tail lights so I opted to paint the tails before dropping $200 for a new set. I'll stick with this for a while.

Pics make it look frosted, but it actually looks really good.

Updated pics of the truck from the trip! The workaround I did for the CPS worked well and I had no issues all weekend.

Not much more planned on the plate until my BIOR rear bumper comes in. I'm having Mike create a few changes. I may have to level out the stance of the truck after it's installed.

 

[yotasavg]

Whoah nice job on the tail lights! I also hate the orange and I had not considered painting them... could you please post any better on the truck pics? Did you also paint over the existing red? Any scuffing before application(s)?

Edit: Now that I'm on a real computer I can see the tape lines better. Looks like you sprayed the whole thing minus the clear sections. I really like it, still.

 

[duggy]

Yup, I just taped off the clear section and the black plastic border that surrounds the whole tail light and went to town. I'd much rather pull apart the tail lights to take out the orange filter but knowing me, I'd overcook them and end up with some melted tail lights