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[BM34]

registration instructions said to post an intro thread, so here it is. I'm a retired military expat working in Riyadh for a few years, and just picked up a 78 FJ43. the goal here is to get it mechanically how i want it, ship it home with any extra body panels I may need, and have the body done there.

the tub is in pretty good shape, very little rust (thank you, dry dessert), and most of it is original. I'm currently looking for some sort of measurements on how to verify if I have the long Birfs so I can change out the drive flanges for lockers, measurements for roll bars so I can have one made at a local shop (so I can put seatbelts in it. Note the laptop bag strap the PO was using as a seatbelt to avoid tickets) and pictures of the mini truck box used in the power steering upgrade along with bolt pattern measurements for the box so I can try to source one here. The world's largest junkyard is about 40 minutes from me, but I need to make sure the pickups and fortuners over here used the same boxes. I've been skulking around and searching the forums for a while, and have only pieced together some of the roll bar info. Any help would be appreciated!

Once I am done here, I am retiring to a small beach town in Florida where the FJ will spend it's days towing my boat, my dog, and my gear to the launch or the beach.

 

[ojaij40]

registration instructions said to post an intro thread, so here it is. I'm a retired military expat working in Riyadh for a few years, and just picked up a 78 FJ43. the goal here is to get it mechanically how i want it, ship it home with any extra body panels I may need, and have the body done there.

the tub is in pretty good shape, very little rust (thank you, dry dessert), and most of it is original. I'm currently looking for some sort of measurements on how to verify if I have the long Birfs so I can change out the drive flanges for lockers, measurements for roll bars so I can have one made at a local shop (so I can put seatbelts in it. Note the laptop bag strap the PO was using as a seatbelt to avoid tickets) and pictures of the mini truck box used in the power steering upgrade along with bolt pattern measurements for the box so I can try to source one here. The world's largest junkyard is about 40 minutes from me, but I need to make sure the pickups and fortuners over here used the same boxes. I've been skulking around and searching the forums for a while, and have only pieced together some of the roll bar info. Any help would be appreciated!

Once I am done here, I am retiring to a small beach town in Florida where the FJ will spend it's days towing my boat, my dog, and my gear to the launch or the beach.

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Dude , that interior is off the hook !!

 

[BM34]

Dude , that interior is off the hook !!

It's something special, I can't deny. a buddy of mine got a great deal on a set of FJ Cruiser seats and new skins for a good price, I'm probably going to go the same route.

for the rear seats, I'm going to try and shift them just to get the roll bar in, hopefully I wont have get different ones.

as for the top, the junkyard has a bunch of 40s and at least 1 45 with hardtops. I'm going to find and work with a local body shop to get one either cut down or extended to mount on mine.

 

[pb4ugo]

For birf info, go to the top of this section(FJ40) and click on FAQ's, scroll down to frt ends and read the 1st 2 threads. Looks like a nice project and plan.

 

[BM34]

For birf info, go to the top of this section(FJ40) and click on FAQ's, scroll down to frt ends and read the 1st 2 threads. Looks like a nice project and plan.

Yeah, the second thread I think is the one that made me even more nervous. Neither one of them actually show how to identify your birfs unless you already have a hub lock on it. the closest it gets it by telling you the difference in the bodies is 10mm. So it's not a large difference.

for clarity, I went and took a few pics, attached here. I'm still waiting for some tools to arrive, so excuse the tape measure, if I took the drive flange off, the end of the birf would extend right around 40mm. now with the body measurements I saw of 45 and 55mm for short and long locks, and some of the pics I have seen of the different locks, I would guess that you cant fit the cap and whatnot in a space of 5mm. But that would be just a guess.

Can someone who is familiar with both long and short birfs please look at these and tell me their thoughts?

 

[bhsdriller]

How much does something like that cost over there

 

[BM34]

How much does something like that cost over there

There's a full frame off absolutely perfect one in town for about 22k USD, but I paid about 5k for mine. They're going up because the locals realized how much Americans will pay for them in Riyadh. I've been told that you can get them for a lot less out in the countryside, but you've also got to contend with coastal salt air and mountainous wet areas, so they're likely to have a lot more rust.

 

[OPMACHINE]

Very cool 43! I would keep the headliner at the very least. Sorry I don't have any info on the birfields.

 

[DSRTRDR]