Builds Dusty the mini truck that wishes it was a Land Cruiser (1 Viewer)

[yotadude520]

Just read the entire build thread...what a journey. You have some SERIOUS skills and knowledge. This whole build is absolutely insane and can't wait to see it hit it's first trail. Are you thinking you're gonna paint the "bed" tan too or leave the stainless look?

Gonna be following this one for sure.

 

[gpfj40]

Just read the entire build thread...what a journey. You have some SERIOUS skills and knowledge. This whole build is absolutely insane and can't wait to see it hit it's first trail. Are you thinking you're gonna paint the "bed" tan too or leave the stainless look?

Gonna be following this one for sure.

Thanks, I sure enjoy the process and everything I learn along the way. Not planning on painting the aluminum, just leaving it natural.

Today I pulled the steering box, stripped it down, tapped it, and reinstalled it. This is the first time doing this for me and it was super simple with the help of a u tube video by @vonwilsonator. It was a good time to do this cause the PS fluid was already drained for the trans swap.

I bolted in the painted rear cross member and drive shafts.

Bolted up the reworked exhaust, and welded on the final two hangers. I’m way happier with this version.

Routed the transmission cooler lines, including covering the first foot with DEI heat sleave cause it’s close to the exhaust tube.

 

[gpfj40]

Today I finished the rest of the under hood stuff: ps, coolant lines, intake, vent lines and vacuum lines etc. Its ready for grille, hood, fluids, floor panels and seat!!

The only interesting addition today was the catch can. The engine builder recommended not returning any of the crank case vapours to the intake so I installed an Amazon catch can to vent the crank case.

 

[Bripars40]

Today I finished the rest of the under hood stuff: ps, coolant lines, intake, vent lines and vacuum lines etc. Its ready for grille, hood, fluids, floor panels and seat!!

The only interesting addition today was the catch can. The engine builder recommended not returning any of the crank case vapours to the intake so I installed an Amazon catch can to vent the crank case.

View attachment 1913338

Can you post a link to your catch can? I made a makeshift one for my 40, but I'm wanting to rework it for my 2uz swap.

 

[gpfj40]

Can you post a link to your catch can? I made a makeshift one for my 40, but I'm wanting to rework it for my 2uz swap.

Couldn’t find the amazon invoice, I guess I got it from summit in an order back before Christmas...... here you go:
Summit Racing® Breather Tanks SUM-300104

 

[gpfj40]

I finished up the fluids, getting the air out of the cooling system was a PITA, should have drilled a 1/4” hole in the thermostat. The oil pressure gauge gave me more grief again, after a bunch of testing I decided to buy a new one to replace the face and that was the problem.

Here’s the shifter install. It looks crooked because it is. I mounted it higher and tilted to the center a bit. I feel way less crowded now.

Here’s the hi lift mount I came up with.

Finally success!!! Braved the -20C temps today to shake it down. The only issue was the vss sensor speedo adapter wasn’t quite set in the split case. Motor sounds and runs great. The th400 is working good. The torque converter is right where I was hoping, it’s tight enough to move it along nicely at 1500 rpm but the actual brake stall is 2200rpm. The LS2 really starts to pull at 3000 rpm.

 

[Pacer]

KickAss!

 

[GLTHFJ60]

Looks wicked man!! Shifter placement looks perfect.

 

[yotadude520]

That thing is a BEAST! Great work man!

 

[gpfj40]

I bent up a box to cover up the fuel tank out of 14 gauge aluminum and put my bead roller and spool gun to use, nothing special but should keep the lines protected from junk bouncing around back there.

There is a bit of death wobble at 65 kph, after checking the toe (in 1/8”) and checking all of the steering joints for play I decided to swap the radial 35” pbr from my cruiser to see if it being caused by the 39.5” bias iroks on diy beadlocks. Sure enough it was smooth to 110 kph on the pbr’s so I decided to mount the iroks on the 15x10 allied beadlocks I acquired with an abandoned project purchase. I also added 4 more oz of beads taking them to 12 oz each. This reduced the wobble at 65 kph when the tires are cold and it goes away once the tires warm up.

Here is dusty on the 35”s

Here’s the beadlocks install

Note the diy beadlocks on the left and the wider allied beadlock on the right.

I also uncovered a major oversight. The person I bought the front axle from said it was a 4.10, I never checked, including the whole process to install the ARB air locker. Only after feeling the binding when driving do I clue into the problem. A quick tire drive shaft spin test and I realize I have 3.73 in the front and 4.11 in the back. S**t. The previously mentioned purchase of an abandoned project also included 2x Sierra gear 5.29s with bearings and pinion seal/nut (no shims). I did some calcs and 5.29s should be about 2700 rpm at 100kph so here I go on gear changes.... hopefully I’ll have some pics by Sunday night.

 

[gpfj40]

The re gear to 5.29s went ok. The rear was a learning experience, I was suprised to find the 80 series e locker is set up with side bearing shims, not adjuster nuts. For the pinion I just transferred the master shim and the depth was great. This thread was super helpful to figure out the side shims:
Re-gearing E-locker rear differential
The side shims in my third are .1157 and .1169, I was able to swap them to tighten up the backlash to .009, a little loose but as good as can be without different shims. I’ve heard a couple thousand extra in harsh use is ok cause more oil is between the teeth to cushion the shock load. I’m telling my self that makes .009 ok!!

The front should have been easier, I was supprised to find a pinion with the pre load spacer machined in to the pinion and pre load shims rather than a crush sleeve. Good thing I collect junk and had a bunch of shims and a crush sleeve left over from previous re gears. I ended up using shims between the bearing and gear rather than under the race like this was OEM, partly because I had smaller shims and partly because changing the shims won’t affect the preload. It took 2 tries to get a depth I was ok with, I also had to clearance the housing just a little on each side for the thicker ring gear. Backlash ended up at .007 after torquing the caps down. Pinion pre load was 10 in lb before the seal.

Since the axle shafts need to come out up front to pull the third I took the opportunity to install the RCV 300m shafts I bought a few months ago. I was plesently suprised to find them already pre loaded with RCV synthetic moly grease. WINNING. I also put the included cromo hub gears in the hubs.

The not so fun part of the re assembly was stripping off a trail gear super hub stud. Oops. I had one spare so that was an easy fix. Then I stripped off a trail gear spindle stud. FML. 2 hours later and one messed up hub seal (lucky I’m a parts hoarder) I drilled out that stripped stud and tapped to m12 course thread. It ain’t pretty but it will hold just fine. I gotta say I’m not super pumped about TG studs today.

I put the front tires on swapped left to right then took it for a test drive and diff break in. The tire swap was on the advice of a bud with 36” bias iroks who says he can only run them in certain positions or he gets wobble. It worked, death wobble is gone!!

Here’s a pic of the completed hillbilly fender flares, made out of rubber converyor belting. At 100 kph the engine is at 3000rpm with the 5:29s axle gears; the trans, t case and black box at 1:1. I’m pretty happy with how everything has turned out. It weighs 4200 lbs without me in it. Next up is a dyno tuning session at DM Tuning.

 

[gpfj40]

Dyno at DM Tuning in Lethbridge AB went great. Jason went through both the speed density MAP maps and the MAF maps getting everything to with in a percent of target. The knock sensors were triggering timing retard really prematurely above 3200rpm by picking up chassis noise. This was expected because I’m using a gen 3 ecu on a gen 4 block so the earlier knock sensors are on the out side of the block rather than in the valley so it’s way easier for them to pick up knock. This is not that common of switch and the difference in settings is small. Turns out I was getting half the power I cound above 3500 because of this. Once this was corrected and the base maps complete we proceeded with the wide open throttle pulls. Added timing and fuel up to 26 degrees but the max power happened at 24.5 degrees. I guess this is actually a safe number so I could get away with 87 gas if needed in a pinch (tuning on 91). Max power was 260hp and 274tq. If you recall the cam is 216/220 114 LSA so not too big, so I’m pretty happy with the max power and more importantly the power curve. It really gives up nothing down low so drivability in the bush will be great. One can estimate anywhere between 30-40% driveline loss, and given the old school converter, TH400, and 2 t cases I’m pretty happy with the numbers. The converter is tight enough to move the truck along nicely at 15-1700 rpm but doesn’t fully couple/stall to above 2800. The cooling system worked flawlessly on the Dyno with zero extra fans, 216 was the hottest we saw. Coolant flow is poor at idle so it warms up to 207-208 idling, as soon as you rev to 1600 rpm the temp drops to 190. We actually raised the second fan cut in from 190 to 205, it will run until the temp drops 10.

Over all I’m super happy with how the engine/converter/transmission are functioning. It is quiet and drivable under 2500 and above that it roars and twists the frame when your foots in it. It’s a lot more engine than truck now. A far cry from th 57 rwhp the 22r made, and with roughly an equal engine weight it really gets up an goes now!!!

Next up will be a pusher fan on the trans cooler cause the converter is pushing the trans temps to 200 regularly when my foot is in it. The current placement doesn’t suck air across the trans cooler good enough. I will also be considering an electric in line water pump to help the engine cooling system at idle.
Sorry for all the typing, here’s the good part of the post, video of the final pull:

 

[gpfj40]

I went out in to the mountains in the B.C. Peace last weekend for a little spring snow wheeling. Dusty crawled on the rotting snow without any issues. The iroks were aired down to <3psi (the deflator gauge stops at 3) which made floating on top easy. I did discover a couple weak spots. The charging system can’t keep up with 2 fans at idle, and as previously mentioned the coolant doesn’t flow well at less than 1800 rpm. Simple answer is to crawl at 1800 rpm right? Well that’s about 4-5 kph so it’s not quite slow enough and that builds heat in the power steering system. So the plan is to finish the hydro assist and install a cooler in the ps system to solve that; and install an in-line electric coolant pump that should handle the low rpm coolant shortfall.


Stewart Components E558A-BK: In-Line Electric Water Pump 1-3/4" slip-on fittings | JEGS

 

[Sethro60]

I've been working through this thread for almost a week now, like a good book you keep coming back to when you have time. I've learned a lot, although I doubt I will reach this level of skill. Love the pie tin air intake, and keeping the mini truck look. Thanks for sharing, and please post a video of you nut jobs wheeling in the snow.

 

[gpfj40]

I've been working through this thread for almost a week now, like a good book you keep coming back to when you have time. I've learned a lot, although I doubt I will reach this level of skill. Love the pie tin air intake, and keeping the mini truck look. Thanks for sharing, and please post a video of you nut jobs wheeling in the snow.

I’m happy your enjoying it, I sure am. As for videos of snow wheeling, I don’t have any vids cause they would be painful to watch. Crawling along at 2 mph doesn’t make for very exciting videos. It’s how I imagine watching turtles race would be......

 

[gpfj40]

This past weekend I did some steering upgrades. First was to get rid of that oem tie rod that someone welded an angle iron to that came with the axle. I used 1.25, .250 DOM with trailgear weld bungs and new moog TREs from rock auto. Then I trimmed up the brackets that came with the PSC ram and installed it. I used the 1.5 x 8.75” ram. -6 jic hoses were done at the local hydraulic shop. I don’t trust the twist on fittings, guys say they are good for trail fixes but leaky hose is easily solved by removing and capping the box fittings.

The hydro assist and new TRE’s solved the death wobble completely, so that’s great news.

I haven’t installed the PS cooler yet, I’m going to see how much heat it builds now that it is moving all that fluid through the ram. Not ruling it out, just want to understand how much heat the present set up makes.

Test drive:



I’ve also jumped in on this 4800 ultra 4 car build.....

 

[kirvesmies]

@gpfj40, well thanks a whole lot dude, pretty much f$&kered away the afternoon today reading dusty's build
top shelf material for sure