FJ62 Hospice Care (1 Viewer)

[EscapeWagon62]

I have spent the last FOUR DAYS working on the intake manifold gasket.

Four. Days.
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That was, by far, the most complicated and expensive part of this desmog. I ended up spending $75 on consumables to get that thing cleaned off. I don’t know what was going on but I did notice that the new OEM gasket is a different material and not metal-backed. If possible, I’d like to never do that again. What finally worked was applying aerokroil, letting it sit, using a white 3M Roloc bristle disc on my drill until it stopped being effective, then repeating. Permatex gasket remover also worked but kroil worked better.

In the middle of working on the gasket I found something else that can come off in a desmog but is not in the guide - the air rail heat shield. It’s the big squared-u-shaped bit in the above photo. It’s held on by three bolts; two of them go nowhere and can be left off but the bolt closest to the front of the engine needs to be replaced to attach the evap line bracket.

The gasket finally came off and I got everything put back together today. It took a bit of cranking (the fuel rail had been depressurized when I removed the cold start injector) but fired up and ran great right away. I took the opportunity while everything was apart to de-carbonize as much as I could reach. I’m going to need to send the injectors away for cleaning this winter, this is the cold start injector *after* several applications of carb cleaner:
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While I was working on the engine my wife decided she didn’t like that the bedliner paint job on the front bumper/bull bar was flaking off. She’s decided to strip and repaint it, which I‘m not going to argue with since anything that gets her more interested in ‘cruisers is good, right?
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Right about the time I got the engine back together today the new battery tray showed up. MUCH nicer!
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Once the engine was running I checked for vacuum leaks with starter fluid; I am happy to report there don’t appear to be any. I was especially curious about the vacuum hard lines since I have them configured differently than the desmog guide; I also had blown canned air through while the manifold was off to check my routing. Once the vacuum leak check was done I put caps on all the unused lines to keep them clean.

Took it for a test drive and there is A LOT more power now. I’m honestly going to attribute most of that to the new, non-leaky, vacuum lines. I noticed the 4WD light didn’t work before; it does now. Having a billion vacuum leaks probably wasn’t helping the actuators engage.

Came back from the drive and checked the wheels for temperature. Passenger rear was hot. Pulled the brake drum off and the parking brake bellcrank is dead. Lubed it as best I could and forced it back; guess that’s on my list now. I managed to break off a bolt in one of the threaded drum holes so I tried drilling it out - no dice. I eventually gave up and just used the tap I bought for the VSV mount to tap the stuck bolt:
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Went for another drive and all the wheels stayed cool but there was a nagging vibration. I checked around and the transfer case was hot. I think it’s low on lube; hopefully low and not completely out (especially since we went about 20 miles each way). I’m still waiting on gear lube so I might try dumping some random quarts of motor oil into the tcase tomorrow to see if that helps.

I agree with you on the exhaust intake manifold gasket. Not a job I want to do again.
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[Devils Paw 80]

Enjoy reading your updates Advent. PO is the culprit with the bedliner. He really went wild with that stuff.

 

[Advent]

PO is the culprit with the bedliner. He really went wild with that stuff.

Well at least it’s the cheap stuff that cuts easily! I think it’s holding water against some of the body, though.

 

[Advent]

It’s been a while! The FJ62 was my ski chalet this past winter; the lifts were turning but the lodge was closed. Worked great.

I have noticed that there were issues with the voltage being low pretty often; I’ve had to do some fiddling a couple times to get the alternator to charge. I finally dove in to the electrical this week.

That was the connection from the alternator wire to the battery. Not good. I spliced in a better wire; if I were keeping this rig long term I would replace the entire alternator wire (and battery cables while I was at it…). It still looks a lot better now:

I also decided to remove a previous owner’s hackjob remote start install; some of it was done with speaker wire. It is a lot easier than I expected to pull the dash apart:

Unfortunately I also found that all the ignition switch wires were cut at one time:

That’s not good, and explains the window glass laser VIN etching.

Here’s the full pile of remote start wires I pulled from behind the dash:

Between the remote start gremlins and bad alternator wire, it is amazing how much higher the voltmeter shows now!

 

[Devils Paw 80]

It’s been a while! The FJ62 was my ski chalet this past winter; the lifts were turning but the lodge was closed. Worked great.

I have noticed that there were issues with the voltage being low pretty often; I’ve had to do some fiddling a couple times to get the alternator to charge. I finally dove in to the electrical this week.

View attachment 2733455

That was the connection from the alternator wire to the battery. Not good. I spliced in a better wire; if I were keeping this rig long term I would replace the entire alternator wire (and battery cables while I was at it…). It still looks a lot better now:

View attachment 2733454

I also decided to remove a previous owner’s hackjob remote start install; some of it was done with speaker wire. It is a lot easier than I expected to pull the dash apart:

View attachment 2733456

Unfortunately I also found that all the ignition switch wires were cut at one time:



That’s not good, and explains the window glass laser VIN etching.

What do you mean by the VIN etching? I'm curious who did the "hack job". Had no idea so much wiring was needed for a remote start.