Irish's Another BJ73 Build Thread (1 Viewer)

[Felde]

Nice work.
Did you gain any experiences on using B100 already?
Cheers Ralf

 

[Irish11]

Nice work.
Did you gain any experiences on using B100 already?
Cheers Ralf

Thanks! Still a work in progress. Nice work on the interior refresh. Not going to lie I followed that because I was doing the same work right behind you.

I am still on my first tank, I haven't been driving it much while working on the interior. I did get the carpet back in yesterday and hopefully the seats today, so I will get in some road testing soon and follow up on the B100. I've been watching the filters and so far no issues with excess water in the fuel so thats good.

 

[Felde]

Great I'm happy if my report on the interior refresh is of any help.
I'm curious on what the B100 turns out. Right now it is no option here in Germany anyway. Not only because taxes are same like on ordinary diesel, but mainly because vegetable oil is really rare and expensive right now.
The Ukraine provided 80% of Europe's sunflower products. There is not a a cup of vegetable oil available at any supermarket around, and multiple restaurants had to remove french fries from the menu because of lack of frying oil. No joke.

 

[Irish11]

Crazy. I had heard it was a major export of theirs, but I didn't know it was that high.

 

[mt72]

Clean good work mate!

 

[Irish11]

Long shot, anyone have one of the plastic clips that holds the HVAC cables in?

I busted one but you need to buy the whole fixture to replace the single clip, they do not sell them separately. Anyone have a spare around from replacing theirs?

 

[2fpower]

If they are on an 80 series, I have a few parts trucks.....???

 

[Irish11]

If they are on an 80 series, I have a few parts trucks.....???

That would be awesome. I think the older 4runners have a similar heater control setup, so maybe an 80 would as well.

 

[Irish11]

Yeasu FT-2980 in a BJ73. I used the lower two transmission boot bolts and bent up a bracket. Hoping to find a Tuffy Console to put in there and mount it to that eventually, but this will work for now.

 

[Irish11]

No real crazy project updates. I've spent the last few months leveling, building a retaining wall, filling said wall with concrete and putting up a carport so the Cruiser has a place to live (and a dryer place to be worked on). This is before the sides were put on. WAY better than just working onside in the PNW Winter/Spring weather. A garage would be ideal, but the next house will have a shop I swear.

Weather was great last week so I took it for a drive. Well, I had to slow charge the batteries since one was dead first. Now I have a handy Noco Gen5 dual charger so I can keep both batteries happy in storage. When I stopped at the port to take the photo I was there for all of 2min before someone stopped to talk to me about the BJ and was curious about it. I have forgot this feeling not driving it in a few months, haha.

 

[Irish11]

Its been a while since I posted an update. Took the Cruiser down to Torfab for a once over, trying to diagnose how bad the blow by is. Turns out looks like my head gasket is likely toast. Now I have to make some tough decisions:

• Do I take off the head and see what its like in there (potentially cracked head or is it just a bad gasket?)
• If its cracked do I try and find a new head?
• Should I just start saving for a 13/15BT swap and not worry about the old 3bii?
• Or do I just drive it as is and enjoy it while the old 3bii lasts?

I've got rust in the wheel wells that is starting to bubble up, need a new windshield frame, and looks like there might be rust on the top of the firewall below the windshield frame. Basically its a great camping rig, and I am not sure I want to dump thousands into it. Maybe its time to sit and think on this one for a bit.

 

[2fpower]

Time to open up a bottle of something and think hard....

Sorry to hear about the issues.... my two cents is start saving for a better powertrain.

Now that we know an LS swap will fit and work under that hood, that is an option too.

 

[JuanJ]

Hello,

Hopefully it is just a blown gasket.

3B engines can take a lot of punishment and keep going.

I would consider a 1HZ or a 15B-FT.







Juan

 

[BarnFab]

Bummer about your 3B-11 they are usually pretty hardie so I would pull the head and see what's going on .

 

[Irish11]

I am thinking of pulling the head and just checking, then I'll really know. Looks like the 3bii head gasket (Toyota 11115-58080) is still available. That seems like opening a can of worms, but also would be a baseline for what I need to do next.

Just in case I find a cracked head anyone have a 3bii head around that is in decent shape? 15b engine is tempting, but that might be a more long term option.

 

[FJBen]

Its been a while since I posted an update. Took the Cruiser down to Torfab for a once over, trying to diagnose how bad the blow by is. Turns out looks like my head gasket is likely toast. Now I have to make some tough decisions:

• Do I take off the head and see what its like in there (potentially cracked head or is it just a bad gasket?)
• If its cracked do I try and find a new head?
• Should I just start saving for a 13/15BT swap and not worry about the old 3bii?
• Or do I just drive it as is and enjoy it while the old 3bii lasts?

I've got rust in the wheel wells that is starting to bubble up, need a new windshield frame, and looks like there might be rust on the top of the firewall below the windshield frame. Basically its a great camping rig, and I am not sure I want to dump thousands into it. Maybe its time to sit and think on this one for a bit.

View attachment 3040472

A headgasket isn't that tough of a fix at all, however it can bring you down the while you are in there hole. It's either headgasket or rings. Either way pulling the head will give you a great view into it all. Wouldn't be a bad time to pull the pan and check the bottom end too.

If it's just a headgasket, then thats a fairly cheap fix and continue to enjoy.

If it's more than that, you could still put a headgasket on, again it's "cheap" and run it saving for the next engine.


I whole heartedly vote for a 15bt. It's basically bolt in and a much better engine.

 

[Irish11]

Well before I received the bad news about my engine I decided to treat myself. I've had them on two Tacomas and a FJ62 so far, so I figured why not add one to the 73 as well. After a year of searching for a used bumper I gave up and ordered an ARB bumper. It came in this week and I decided despite the bad news I should just go for it and install it.

Turns out My fenders might be a bit off. The driver's side (LHD) has a dent in it from a hit on something. Well I think they might have bent a support as well because I have an 1" gap on the passenger side and no gap on the driver's. Any ideas on checking squareness or how to bend the driver's fender back safely? (Bad idea list so far involves using the precision tool that is the hilift). So any advice is welcome.

Passenger side:

Driver's side:

 

[Gun Runner 5]

While I can’t offer any tips on correcting the alignment issue, this less than perfect photo does show the correct gap.

 

[Irish11]

Looks like the body is sitting a half inch lower on the drivers side. That would cause some of the spacing issues I think. Any ideas what might cause that? Body mounts might be the culprit.

 

[Irish11]

After inspecting the front body mounts yesterday they do not actually look that bad.

So now I am thinking maybe the dented fender just needs some adjusting upwards. I assume its a bit like a 40 fender where you can loosen it and move it a tiny amount to adjust. Anyone have any tips there?