Well, the 60 was just supposed to be a quick flip but I've kinda grown attached to it. It's officially my DD and even though its a freaking tractor I really like the hum of its woeful and pathetic 2F. Just thought I'd post up progress on its rebirth. I'll probably keep it around for a couple years or longer at this point.
The story: Garett told me about a guy with a $500 FJ60 for sale at last McGrew. After meeting him and seeing pictures of it I was intrigued. He rescued it from the junkyard with a bad engine and then purchased another engine from the junkyard and stabbed it in with his tractor. I traded him a radiator for gas money and $500 and I met him half way in between Bend and Medford. The 60 was half torn apart with a bunch of parts in the back and bunch of big pieces in the bed of his truck. He gave me the uhaul trailer to return in Medford. When I got home I had to pull it off the trailer with the Suburban because the 60 wouldn't even roll.
Over the summer I started assembling the easy stuff and realized I was missing driveshafts, exhaust, harmonic balancer and a ton of other parts. I emailed the guy I got it from and he still had about half of the parts I needed so my wife and I drove up to Bend and spent the day touring breweries and collecting Landcruiser parts. I love Bend not to mention the parts far exceeded $1000 if I had to buy them separately. The balancer alone is $400!
The hard part of the 60 was the dash was completely torn apart. Evidently it had a bad heater core and someone took it all apart to get at it. I looked at the 18 pieces of ducting and all the little brackets and half ass tried to put them together repeatedly. One evening I must've been feeling smart or had just the right amount of beer in me because I just went for it and everything fell into place after about 2 hours.
The interior turned out remarkably clean although the pictures are better than it actually is.
There was nothing in the engine bay bolted down including the engine and transmission which were just sitting on the perches. It was missing a bunch of things like an alternator, fan and wiper motor not to mention the distributor was non-op. I eventually got it to run but the gas was literally 10 years old and once the engine cooled off again it glued 4 of the valves to the guides which mangled four pushrods. Luckily Kief came to my rescue for the umpteenth time on this rig and dropped off all kinds of parts I needed including a bag of push rods. Thanks Kief! I was debating on rebuilding the top end or swapping to a V8, neither of which I wanted to do. I soaked the rockers and valves in all kinds of solvents and lubricants and pounded on them with a hammer to free them up. Finally I was down to one sticky valve and Kief had dropped off a plethora of pushrods so I figured I had one freebie to try and get the engine going again without pulling it apart. I drained 15 gallons of nasty old gas and put some new stuff in the tank. It fired right up! I adjusted the valves and have been messing with smog and carb stuff ever since.
I got some 15% remaining but evenly worn 33" BFG AT's from my brother in law and had a spare set of 4runner wheels from Ty. Loaded them all up yesterday and got them mounted and I'm into my wheels and tires for a total of $44! I did have to use spacers on the front end since the offset is far from factory Cruiser specs.
I think they really update the look of it.
Been fixing and replacing stuff constantly. The heater core still has a leak so I have no heater at the moment. I'm working on getting all the gauges functional since maybe 2 outta 8 work. I installed a speedometer cable two days ago and I need to install a water temp sending unit soon. I put in new front brake pads... did you guys know this has 4 piston calipers? I randomly found a shackle lift in the back of my orange 55 new in the box with all new bushings and bolts. Should lift it about an inch, I'll be doing that next week. Also on the lookout for some OME heavy lift springs. That's next along with winch and armor and birf job.
The story: Garett told me about a guy with a $500 FJ60 for sale at last McGrew. After meeting him and seeing pictures of it I was intrigued. He rescued it from the junkyard with a bad engine and then purchased another engine from the junkyard and stabbed it in with his tractor. I traded him a radiator for gas money and $500 and I met him half way in between Bend and Medford. The 60 was half torn apart with a bunch of parts in the back and bunch of big pieces in the bed of his truck. He gave me the uhaul trailer to return in Medford. When I got home I had to pull it off the trailer with the Suburban because the 60 wouldn't even roll.
Over the summer I started assembling the easy stuff and realized I was missing driveshafts, exhaust, harmonic balancer and a ton of other parts. I emailed the guy I got it from and he still had about half of the parts I needed so my wife and I drove up to Bend and spent the day touring breweries and collecting Landcruiser parts. I love Bend not to mention the parts far exceeded $1000 if I had to buy them separately. The balancer alone is $400!
The hard part of the 60 was the dash was completely torn apart. Evidently it had a bad heater core and someone took it all apart to get at it. I looked at the 18 pieces of ducting and all the little brackets and half ass tried to put them together repeatedly. One evening I must've been feeling smart or had just the right amount of beer in me because I just went for it and everything fell into place after about 2 hours.
The interior turned out remarkably clean although the pictures are better than it actually is.
There was nothing in the engine bay bolted down including the engine and transmission which were just sitting on the perches. It was missing a bunch of things like an alternator, fan and wiper motor not to mention the distributor was non-op. I eventually got it to run but the gas was literally 10 years old and once the engine cooled off again it glued 4 of the valves to the guides which mangled four pushrods. Luckily Kief came to my rescue for the umpteenth time on this rig and dropped off all kinds of parts I needed including a bag of push rods. Thanks Kief! I was debating on rebuilding the top end or swapping to a V8, neither of which I wanted to do. I soaked the rockers and valves in all kinds of solvents and lubricants and pounded on them with a hammer to free them up. Finally I was down to one sticky valve and Kief had dropped off a plethora of pushrods so I figured I had one freebie to try and get the engine going again without pulling it apart. I drained 15 gallons of nasty old gas and put some new stuff in the tank. It fired right up! I adjusted the valves and have been messing with smog and carb stuff ever since.
I got some 15% remaining but evenly worn 33" BFG AT's from my brother in law and had a spare set of 4runner wheels from Ty. Loaded them all up yesterday and got them mounted and I'm into my wheels and tires for a total of $44! I did have to use spacers on the front end since the offset is far from factory Cruiser specs.
I think they really update the look of it.
Been fixing and replacing stuff constantly. The heater core still has a leak so I have no heater at the moment. I'm working on getting all the gauges functional since maybe 2 outta 8 work. I installed a speedometer cable two days ago and I need to install a water temp sending unit soon. I put in new front brake pads... did you guys know this has 4 piston calipers? I randomly found a shackle lift in the back of my orange 55 new in the box with all new bushings and bolts. Should lift it about an inch, I'll be doing that next week. Also on the lookout for some OME heavy lift springs. That's next along with winch and armor and birf job.
I love getting NEW Toyota parts but not having to get raped at the dealership for the EXACT SAME PART!
